Post-Christmas Lazy Days

Bead of the Day: "Ebay 1.6m Assortment"

Christmas is behind us, and the New Year is coming. I love these days: they are always so lazy - if you've got nothing planned, like me. Of course, there are bits and pieces to do, but generally it's relaxing after the pre-Christmas rush.

We had Rod's sister staying with us over Christmas, we went out for dinner on Christmas eve, as we always do, and for lunch on Boxing day, and it was her treat for us. There will be visitors in the next couple of days, the children's friends. I haven't been doing much in terms of bead making, and today is a lovely day, not too cold, so I will probably attempt to start on my tutorial for Bead magazine. It will be on making the Matrioshka bead, the winner of the British Bead Awards 2011. Although the actual article will be going into one of the summer issues of the magazine, they need the material for the 18th January, so I'd better get on with it. The actual making of the bead isn't complicated, but there will be many steps, especially on the shaping. So I'm looking forward to this challenge.

Also, and now it's not too early to reveal this little secret, one of my beads was included into the "Flow" magazine gallery of the winter issue, which is usually the issue dedicated to women in glass. I've had to keep it a secret until the issue was out, and now it's available, as I understand, but I haven't received my complimentary copy yet :(. I was also putting in some info about my book, but I haven't heard from them, so possibly they haven't liked it and didn't include the little promo write-up. Never mind.

Well, I hope you all are having a lovely festive season, and I'll be keeping you up to date with what's going on here. And I've started putting my "bargain" bead assortments on ebay, hence the photo of the Beads of the day. I don't think they are going to be too expensive, so if you are looking for some beads to practice your jewellery-making techniques on, they are there!:)

The Bead Awards

I can just sit here at my computer and read other people's blogs - very happy! But I've got to tell you a little about the British Bead Awards which took place in London on 15th October.

The Big Bead Show was very well attended, with lots of marvelous things to buy and many people to say hello to.

The creations of the Bead competition finalists were displayed in the Sports Bar. There were some gorgeous pieces. I can sympathise with the judges: I liked everything, and it must have been soooo difficult to decide who the winners were.

My "Matrioshka" set won 1st place in the Handmade Glass Beads and Components category. Unfortunately, we missed the actual ceremony: on the way to the racecourse we took the wrong turning and ended up somewhere else. I'd like to say Congratulations and Well done! to everybody who took part in this competition, especially to those who I know personally and who are some of my favourite people in the glass bead making community.

Chloe Menage, editor of Bead, agreed to have this pic taken with me. Thank you, Chloe, for the super event (and the award!), I have really enjoyed it! 

Review in Bead Magazine and "Black Swan"

Hooray, the book has been reviewed in the Bead magazine Feb/March issue. This was a very pleasant surprise indeed. So far several people mentioned that the book is good for those who are new to lampworking. My aim, of course, was also to introduce wider audience to jewellery making - there is a chapter on the various bits and pieces, like findings and techniques, needed to make the jewellery shown in the book. That, I thought, is a good feature, especially compared to other books on lampwork, which usually have an enormous amount of photos of beautiful jewellery, but never explain how to make it. Nevertheless, the review is very good, so a big Thank You to Bead magazine!

I hadn't thought about checking with Bead if they had any spare copies of the book to give away, simply because I didn't know that a review was coming, so I might write to them and ask, and maybe I'd be able to write an article for them or a tutorial similar to the ones in the book. Also I've checked their competitions. I remember that previously they planned to have an issue dedicated to glass, so I will have to check this out too: I have noticed that there is a Readers' Challenge entitled "Glass, Glorious Glass" with the deadline for entries as 9th Feb. It would be very upsetting if I've missed this one!

I went to see "Black Swan" yesterday. I don't think I would have gone had I known what it was going to be like. I expected a psychological drama, but there was a lot of gory bits, lesbian sex (no wonder, male critics love it!) and other very scary things. There were good things too: the camerawork was great, the atmosphere of the main heroine living in a small closed shell-like world was portrayed very well. But Natalie Portman, although clearly having had some serious training and having spent a lot of time and effort, isn't a professional ballet dancer, and I'm sorry to say at times I kept remembering lovely ladies-competitors in "Strictly Come Dancing". The other problem was, just like Thomas, the ballet director, noted, Portman can't act sensual, and there was no sparkle between her and Vincent Cassel. There was one funny bit: without spoiling the plot, I'll just say: hiding the body. Ha-ha-ha!!! The ending could have been a lot more dramatic. The film left me drained, so, I suppose, that should mean that it was good. I'm sure a lot of people will like it, but it wasn't for me.