I’m inspired by today’s high of 91 here in Long Beach to come inside and write this blog post.

I’m just finishing steaming Shibori pole outside and it’s hot!  A reminder that there will be a lot of this ahead in the coming months.  Some of you are still getting snow storms- I’ve seen your instagram posts yearning for Spring and trust me, Warmer Weather WILL arrive.  Some of my friends and family in Iceland and Japan are celebrating the blooming of spring and warmer weather. It’s cherry blossom viewing season in Japan and I’ve really been enjoying the photos online.  But here- 91 today, ICK!  Inside is cool from the evening and keeping the house closed up until evening works wonders.

You may have seen a photo on IG of a new beading piece I started. I finished it yesterday.

I tend to get a little obsessive once I start a beading piece. I think it’s because I am really a novice beader and I’m learning new techniques every time I make something.  I think I’m afraid I will forget how or what I was doing if I don’t keep at it diligently until finished.

On this one, I learned how to do a cellini spiral.  Ages ago I did a few peyote tubes and was intrigued by the spiral ones.  I also wanted to incorporate the spiral into a shibori ribbon cording that would be the centerpiece of the necklace.  You can really get into the repetitive nature of doing the spiral which I alway find enjoyable. Sometimes, you just want to do something mindlessly rhythmic!  I made my own way decreasing and increasing the ends to suit the piece which went fine.  Not sure how others would do it but I just went with my own intuition.  I also wanted to play around with some beaded leafy pieces so I looked at some video tutorials of “beaded Russian leaves”.  Didn’t really find the look I wanted in the tutorials but did get a few ideas on how to approach what I wanted.  Will practice more of that another time.  I’ve also been playing around with more cut and dyed silk cocoons so I added one of them into the piece.  This colorway always invokes an oceanic feeling to me so I went with it and wondered what a mermaid might wear to an underwater garden party…

If you are interested in how this piece started out, I made a little video back when I first started it -more as a reference for later and also to show Karan who does some very fun and inventive beading- often with shibori.

Last post I said I would put up my upcoming workshops.  I will but in a separate post.  This one is long enough!