Bead any time, any place, anywhere?

Beading is normally a very mobile craft, but I attempted some on a rare trip on a lengthy train journey yesterday. I often give up with beading in the car as everything is too jerky, but thought the train would be ideal. Not quite! Although the pull down table needed a bit of leaning across, and it was a bit more fiddly than usual picking up size 15 seed beads, it was threading needles that really had me thwarted -I had to resort to waiting until we stopped at a station on a couple of occasions. I will pack bigger beads or collapsible eye needles for my next train project I think!

Bead Embroidered Cabochon Bracelet

At the moment I am completely obsessed with bead embroidery and cabochons.
I got the Laura McCabe's Embellished Beadweaving book for my birthday in November, and it's been  a great inspiration. You can find it here:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Laura-McCabes-Embellished-Beadweaving-Master/dp/1600595146/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1295618789&sr=8-1

I've seen her handiwork at an exhibition at Stitch n Craft, and it is absolutely exquisite - you forget the real size of the actual pieces as you get used to seeing close up photography in print. I booked a place on her Travellers' Tales workshop there but due to date changes had to cancel, so her books will give me a chance to practise her techniques more before I try to book again.

Although I am more likely to substitute beads in designs for similar ones that I either prefer or are already in my stash, I did have fun sourcing size 15 Czech Charlottes. I can't believe how much smaller these are than size 15 seed beads!

So far I've bead embroidered cabochon elements and embellished them with size 15 seed beads and size 13 charlottes (a good crystal substitute).

I've then cut them out and backed them, and am now on the peyote stitched rings for the rest of the strap and the toggle. The plain ring below I had to redo as I did too many rows of delicas.

One more ring, toggle bar and then assembling and embellishing and I'm done.

Finally winning with unfinished projects....

Belated Happy New Year!

Although I haven't posted recently I have managed to get a fair amount of beading done over the Christmas holidays so do actually have something to report! I am hoping to be posting much more frequently

I have completed the Dutch Spiral necklace I've been working on for months (photo up shortly) and have also finally finished the Spiral Rope to go with Helen's gorgeous lampwork focal from my first ever post. I am however in two minds over how to attach the lampwork bead, so that is sitting in my kitchen 'beading area' so that I can contemplate it whenever I pass by.

In the meantime I am working towards finishing an embellished bead embroidered bracelet designed by Laura McCabe and designing a blue shell cabachon cuff to match my last pendant.