Profusion Art Glass - Handmade Lampwork Art

It's a nasty cold

2012-01-19T20:30:00.000+01:00

Isn't it amazing how a tiny little thing like a virus can knock down a complete person for days on end?
I've been on the couch for 3 days. Now I'm back at work, but not feeling too spiffy.

Anyway - nothing fun og beadrelated has happened, so ...
see you next week.

Love and vitamins, Lene

Where, oh where ...

2012-01-09T00:17:00.000+01:00

Where did I put that box with my torch?
And that other one with my tools?

In here?

In here?

Out here maybe?

Everything has been moved at least a couple of times, so nothing is where it was last time I saw it.

There is still a way to go for the basement of my dreams, but it is definately coming along nicely. I did find my boxes in the end. Now I just need my lamp, since no lamps are installed in the entire basement so far.

I have set up my torch and tools temporarily. I really need to get some torchtime in, and soon. My first show this year is in only six weeks (oh wow, six weeks?), and with the renovation as you see, I haven't made any glass for over a month.

After the show I can focus on renovating my workshop. I have a couple of new ideas for making it a wonderful place, but first the walls and ceiling must be covered and painted, and everything must be cleaned of the dust that is still everywhere.

I hope to have actual beads to show off for my next post :)
Lene

Merry Christmas!

2011-12-23T20:45:00.000+01:00

My dayjob is closing down for the entire week between now and new years eve, so I will be spending some much needed time at home resting and relaxing and taking care of house stuff.

I hope you will have a lovely and relaxing time.

I shall take a little break from this blog too, so I'll see you next year. 2012. How about that :)

Best regards,

Lene

Still working on the basement ...

2011-12-19T00:36:00.000+01:00

This is not my exact basement room, but it looks just like it. I have a window, a furnace and a radiator. But look at all that space! :)

Since then I have cleaned the floor and we have spent a full day moving stuff around, for two reasons. One is so the electrician can move through all rooms to set up sockets, and outtakes for lamps. The other is to clear the livingroom so we can celebrate christmas without getting stabbed on rods of coe 104 in ever corner. We are getting there :)
Now, I guess it is time to start thinking about getting presents for the family, yes?

So I'm off for yet another busy week with no torching in it. Oh well, I'll trade torching for christmas this week :)

Merry Christmas every one,
Lene

Tiny basement update

2011-12-11T23:53:00.001+01:00

My workshop is now all packed up and laying around in boxes in the living room. Glass stash, tools, kiln - everything. The room is empty and being tiled, and as with each of the other rooms, it looks so large and even has an echo :)

I really have to make a plan for how I'd like to place everything. As I said, I want a permanently ready-to-go torch area with my oxy-con, glass and kiln within easy reach.

I'd also like a jewellers bench (I don't need a real one, just an area for working in metal), a permanent photo tent, like one of those cubes or something similar. I'd like an bit of officespace for papers and packaging stuff and also for storrage (my dear boyfriend would be so happy to not have beads and parts all over the livingroom).

A bit of shelves for a little glass library, a nice cabinet for my slowly growing bead and glass collection, a nice chair for sipping tea and reading/having a guest over - Yup, I've got plenty of dreams, so even with an echo sized room, I bet some of this will not be able to fit. A plan is definately in order here.

I do know it will be fantastic in the end though :) Yay! and it will not be long before I can move my stuff back in. This I know because christmas is closing in on us, and we are having my family over!

I wish for you a less solidly booked week than mine :)
Lene

Basement restoration update

2011-12-04T23:15:00.001+01:00

The basement is coming along nicely. There are 4 rooms to get through though, and my workshop is getting to go last. It's a case of 'fix a bit of one area, move stuff over, fix a bit of next area' and so on, so actually only the floors are coming along nicely so far, but still - it's looking great! Used to be concrete, now we get tiles, lovely :)

After all the floors are done we have walls to plaster and wallpaper, a complete rewirering and setting up of adittional light and sockets (there is only one socket in the entire basement right now), the ceilings need a good once over and we are getting new windows too, since the old ones are really old and painted shut for good.

As you can tell, this is quite a bit of work and not something that will be done any time soon. I shall set up my workshop as there is space available, but first all of it must be cleaned thoroughly to remove all of the concrete dust that has enveloped every single thing in there.

We have spent the day moving and sorting 'stuff', even got a good load off to the recycling station. Now one more room is empty and ready for tiling, and other rooms are stacked. I don't know if you can see the dust, but here is a picture of my current workshop area. You can barely see where I'm supposed to go!

Well, I guess I'll just have to buckle up and get work. I have a show in february! to create for. It's just around the corner ...

I hope you have a nice week,
Lene

A bit of downtime ...

2011-11-28T22:03:00.001+01:00

Guess what?
Yesterday I completely forgot to set up my blogpost. Never even thought about it. I am a bit miffed, that after all these weeks it is still not a well rooted routine, but I guess if it had been a daily thing it might have been.

So, what do I have to tell you this week ... Well, my darling boyfriend has set out to renovate the entire basement. It is a huge project we have been looking forward to with equal parts of joy and dread since we moved in 5 years ago. I know it will be wonderfull in the end, but - my workshop is in the basement and for now I will have to close it down.

The entire basement, including my glass, tools, kiln and what have you - it is allready covered in a fine layer of concrete dust that seeps in under the doors, and even up the staircase a bit. Everything will have to be cleaned up before I can torch again.
And you know all the boxes and bags and furniture that seem to breed in a basement? All that needs to be cleaned too. We have nowhere to put everything, and there will be a lot of moving stuff around as one room gets tiled and the next is in line.

I look much forward to get the rest of the boxes sorted and thrown away. I did get through at least half of it when we had the flooding this summer, but there is still way too much stuff we don't need down there. Which is also the reason we never have had any good use of the space, except for storrage.

That is going to change now. We have great plans for all 4 rooms, and one will be my workshop! I haven't made a definate floorplan, but I have many thoughts about how I'd like it to end up. Especially I want gas and oxygen permanently attached to my torch. I have been rolling back and forth the hoses for the past almost 5 years I have been torching, and it's getting old. I'd like to be able to just go there and light up, and turn it off when I am done. It's a simple wish, I know, but one that would please me to no end.

I'm off to dream about it :)
What is your dream?
Lene

A prototype

2011-11-21T00:01:00.000+01:00

Yes! This week I finally got myself in bed early enough one night, to get up again at 03 a.m. to torch. It did rather ruin the next 3 days for me in terms of lost energy, but ... I got to make these

It's a pair of Goddess earrings, and they were more difficult to make than I had thought they would be. I had time for just one more before the alarmclock told me it was time to wake the family. She's a bit larger and should probably be a pendant instead of an earring.

I'm very pleased to have arms, legs and a head on these, but - they are not quite what I had expected. I'm not quite sure what I did infact expect, I have no clear image in my head of what I wanted them to be like, but this isn't exactly it.

I'll have to try and find out what my nebulous idea really is so I can make that next time I get to torch. I think perhaps rounder, more of a caricature. If I could make a mix of a pod-shape and a woman, or perhaps a marble that has indentations hinting of a human form ...
I already have made pendants which start out as a drop and end as a goddess. No arms, legs or head though, but it shouldn't be impossible to start with a marble instead.

Yup, that's my plan.
Lene

Tax Time

2011-11-13T23:52:00.001+01:00

This week, or at least a fair bit of it was spent bookkeeping, so I could register my VAT, so here is a lovely picture of , my favourite pendants, since a picture of my receipts is probably not so much fun. I do love it when the numbers line up perfectly in the end though :)

Have a great week :)
Lene

Oh my Goddess!

2011-11-07T00:08:00.002+01:00

This past week were all about the Goddesses.

Not only did I post 4 Goddess pendants to my shop at Amio.dk, like this one:

The Lady of the Shapely Posterior :)

I also got to send off this beauty halfway across the country, to Marslev on Fyn.

Please click the picture to fully apreciate her gorgeous slender curves

This is one of my new ladies, the largest bunch I have made until now, and her new owner is very pleased. I am so happy that I could make that happen. It is my mission after all, to spread the joy of lovely curves, captured in glass.

This week I will post a couple of these beauties to my shop, and I hope to get in a bit of torchtime too. I have a Goddess project I am quite eager to create. But - it's a secret for now, and I'm not telling ;)

Have a beautiful week,

Lene

Visit my Amio

2011-10-31T00:01:00.000+01:00

The shop is open! Click the pic to visit.

I have uploaded pretty new pieces and adjusted some prices. Fixed some postage for international shoppers. Go have a look, I'm kind of proud of my new pendants :)

I'll keep shooting pics this week and upload as I get them done. I might end up with quite a selection.

Have a great week!
Lene

KM&V Countdown - Week 0, Showtime!

2011-10-24T00:01:00.000+02:00

Phew! What a couple of days it has been.
It was very nice to be out in public with my glass. I got soo many compliments from soo many people, and I even made myself happy with a new booth look and all new pieces.

Here is a picture of my booth. I were very happy to get a corner with two sides open. My clever sister came up with the table arrangement of one table against the wall and the other out from the wall. It was brilliant actually, with plenty of space between them for people to go in and not feel squeezed, and room for me to sit in too.

My nifty new booth look

And check out the photos on the wall. I never had those before, but always knew I wanted some, and they were great!

I also managed to make enough figures and pendants to fill the tables, and even have a good portion left over to fill in with as sales were made. Here is a closer view of my tables.

My nice and simple setup

I'm loving my new trays. They look good and also makes it very easy to pack up every night and set up in minutes every morning. Excellent!

Now the show is over, and since the number of guests were quite a bit lower than expected I have a lot of pieces in stock, ready to be photographed and uploaded to my online shop at Amio.dk. That will happen during the coming days as I find time to shoot during daylight.

For now I just want to say THANK YOU to all that came by, to all that let me know they liked what I have made, and especially to my boyfriend and my sister for all their help before ad during these 3 days of the show.

Thank you :)
Lene

KM&V Countdown - Week 1

2011-10-17T09:21:00.001+02:00

Week 1 it says, but really there is only 4 days left!
This weeks production regrettably were not impressive, but look at these jewels! I am very pleased with them. Excellent colour and lots of shine.

I also shot some pictures for the show. This is one.

I may have to re-shoot some of them. Some of the ivory pieces are burned out. Some are okay though, so I'll have to see about that. Time is running out and I have to order today/tonight to be sure to get them in time.
So I'll be off, doing more preparations.

Have a nice week!
(it is vacation week here in Denmark)

KM&V Countdown - Week 2

2011-10-10T12:01:00.000+02:00

Only 2 weeks to go! It is getting very exciting around here :)

This is this weeks production. Goddess pendant beads, one large goddess (+ 3 more in the kiln, Yay), and a bunch of drop pendant beads.

This week I also ordered and recieved most of everything I think I'll need, and I even had a bit of incoming funds, which is very nice.

There is no more time to worry, so I will simply be looking forward to the Kunst, Mad & Vin show for the remaining 2 weeks, while I torch like never before. Life is grand :)

Love, Lene

PS: I still have free/reduced price tickets for the show. Free admittance on friday from 14-16 and reduced prices for the rest of the weekend. Let me know if you would like one/some at profusionartglass[@]gmail.com. There is lots of art to be seen :)

KM&V Countdown - Week 3

2011-10-03T00:01:00.000+02:00

Argh, Only 18 days to go! And still I have no giftbags. After the last failure I am wary of shopping online, but I feel the deadline breathing down the back of my neck, so today I'll fire off an order and hope for the best.

This week I got a few good things done. I ordered more glass, a load of bails, some leathernecklaces for the pendants (need more), some earrings for the flowers (need more) and 2 display trays in black (need more). I also found some other display objects that I hope will be good with my ladies. The lofty idea I had of building some sort of shelf arrangement is not going to happen, so I am looking for alternatives.

I also celebrated my birthday on friday by taking the day off of work. I got in a nice couple of hours of torchtime, Yay! then proceeded to housecleaning (a bit less of a yay, but nice in the end) and picking up the kids early.

(sorry about the picture. It's getting dark earlier now, so I had to use flash)

Bye for now,

Lene

KM&V Countdown - week 4

2011-09-26T00:06:00.000+02:00

This week was very productive, and the weekend had a to-do list like you wouldn't believe. I am so ready to sleep, and I'll leave you with theese pictures of what I got made.

The pods by the way, are on a base of opal yellow. I got some after reading a lot of raves on Lampwork Etc., but I really like ivory a lot better since it fumes over so nicely. I'll have to go back and search to see what the excellence of opal yellow is, because so far I don't see it.

I also made and cored this bead. It is a birthday present for my mother, and the colour of the 'eyes' came out especially well and shines when seen from the side. I am very pleased with it :)

That is all for now, see you next week,
Lene

KM&V Countdown - Week 5

2011-09-19T00:04:00.000+02:00

I've had an excellent week!

Two mornings I got up at 03 in the morning to torch before going to work. It is a wonderful way to begin the day, though it does leave me quite exhausted the day after, so two days were all I could manage. I will practice going to bed early, and getting up even earlier, in the weeks to come. It seems like my best shot at getting things done.

This week I made lovely autumn leaf pendants and goddess pendants. I have a bunch more in the kiln from today, along with one large lady. Yay!

Goddess and Leaf Pendants.

And see those tabs under the banner? I put up those this week too, and am working on a gallery tab. It will be quite nifty in the end :)

Have a great week,
Lene

KM&V Countdown - Week 6

2011-09-12T00:01:00.000+02:00

Oh my, that title is scaring me.
Next week will be worse, as the final month creeps closer and closer. So I'm just going to hide this time, and show you a picture of a little guy that visits our garden instead.

He is about the size of two apples and very cute. We don't really know if he is a 'he', we just decided to call him that. He is not supposed to be out in the daytime, but he seems fine, healthy and curious, so I think he is alright.

Cute little creature, isn't he?

'Till next week,
Lene

KM&V Countdown - Week 7

2011-09-05T00:01:00.001+02:00

Hooray! I did manage to get that blurp written, and on time too :) This is something that really, really doesn't come easy to me, and I am happy to be done for now.
I also finished a few pendants and shot a picture for the catalogue. This is one of the pendants, with Clio looking all ethereal.

Hmm, what else? Not much I'm afraid. The whole write and worry routine took up a lot of time, and I have spent the weekend reading 500+ pages of fiction as a reward.
Now it is time for some serious torch action in the coming weeks, but for now - bedtime!

Bye for now,
Lene

KM&V Countdown - Week 8

2011-08-29T00:13:00.007+02:00

Just a tiny little update this week, since we went away with the girl's school class for the weekend and I am exhausted! I keep forgetting how much noise a room full of children and parents can generate, and what it does to my head. Phew!

Anyway - things I got done:
another torchsession (beads are in the kiln, pics below later)
final payment of booth fee paid
return payment for the gift bags recieved (okay, I didn't actually do that)
blurp for the show press center begun (about halfway through)
sketches for handmade bails with lots of swirls (because I've always loved swirls, and being around Karin Castens is inspirering :)

Things with a deadline fast approaching:
Blurp for the press center (send by thursday)
Picture for the catalogue (send by thursday)
An article for the catalogue (not likely, but send by thursday)

Also to consider:
order new giftbags + tissue paper
order bails for all the pendants + possibly sterling chains
set up timeline and deadline for large prints for the walls + perhaps business cards
start to seriously consider what type of display to buy/build

... and a million other little details.
(Argh!?)

Love,
Lene

-Aha, there it is :)

KM&V Countdown - Week 9

2011-08-22T00:01:00.012+02:00

This week, more pendant beads.
I tried out the Kalypso and it is delicious. I made the same type of beads with different Double Helix glasses, and they are all yummy with each their special colour.

This is Helios, like I used last week. See the little curl at the tip? I love it, but I'm not quite sure how I got it. Must try to replicate.

These are Kalypso,

this is Elektra,

and this is Psyche.

all on a base of Ivory. See how the Elektra and Psyche does not fume the base, and the Helios and Kalypso does? Quite a bit actually, and I think Kalypso fumes the most, so cover it up quickly if you don't want fuming around the beautifull purples. I rather like it, so I'll just keep doing what I have been doing.

This week I also asked my sister, the photographer, to help me. I need a portrait, product shots and some torch-action shots for the show catalogue and other preparations for the show. She makes me look good. Yay! She even makes me smile :)

I also had to return the gift bags, which is annoying, but I still have time to get new ones, so I am not overly worried. I have never returned anything before, so this is a whole new experience. Yay for that at least.

Now I have to write a bit for the catalogue and be done before september 1'st. Hm. Not something that comes easy to me, but I'll do what I can.

See you next week,
Lene

KM&V Countdown - Week 10

2011-08-15T00:38:00.015+02:00

I love getting mail :)

This week I recieved both the displays and giftbags I ordered last week and also a fresh bunch of glass, Yay!

I can't work without my favourite base colour Ivory, so I had to get some more. And while I were at it, I also got some new to me Double Helixs, the Kalypso and Helios.

I got to try out the Helios today, and I must say I love it. It fumes a lot, and when I made pendants, like the ones I have been making recently, but with the Helios instead of Psyche, I got lovely browns with a whisp of pale purple/light blue. They are very fall.
The beads are still hot in the kiln, so I can't show you until later, but I were very pleased with them when I put them in for annealing.

So this is just a short update, pics will be included later.

See you then,
Lene

----------------------------

Later is here!
And so are a couple of pictures. Aren't these just delicious? I am still very pleased, can you tell? :)
I love these shapes. Nicely melted half-way in, looking juicy and voluptuous. Very organic. Yup, this is what I have been after :)

And my new displays look like this. Stylish!

The foot is weighted so it doesn't fall over when you look at it which is nice. There is room for a pair of earrings up there in the middle, but I don't make earrings much so I will not need that. The pendants will present them selves better higher up, so I'll see if I can secure the chain somehow on the backside.
Hmm, I may need to buy more chains. I'll put that on my list.

Bye for now!
Lene

KM&V Countdown - Week 11

2011-08-08T00:01:00.013+02:00

Okay then, only 10 more weeks to go.
This week I have (yet again) spent recovering. This time it was the back-to-work and get-up-earlies that got me.
Yes I admit it. I love staying up late and sleeping in in the mornings. And since vacation time is the only time I get to do it for days in a row I may over do it a bit. Lets just say that a 3 week vacation can shift my rythm with about 5 hours, which makes it a bit hard to go back to early mornings.

So, what did I do to get closer to a fabulous and well prepared show in 10 weeks?
Well - I have been looking for a nice way to display my pendants. So far I have been laying them on a polished black slab of stone. It is a very nice stone, but it really doesn't do much for the pendants.

This week I got a special offer from BoxDisplays on a standing display I have not seen before. I can't find it in their pages now either, but I have ordered some and will show them off when they get here. I hope they are all I imagine and need them them to be ...

Also I have realised for some time now that I have no nice packaging for my larger Ladies, and that simply will not do at such an occation. So while I were at it I ordered a whole lot of giftbags with handles.
They are black and with a matt surface, which I imagine to match my jewellery boxes perfectly. I will stamp them with my logo and they will be all lovely and nice, and if I get a folder or postcard ready there will be plenty of room in the bag for that too.

In conclusion, I am very pleased to have these two problems mostly out of the way (there is still the stamping to do of course), but once more I must admit that I have quite a sinking feeling about the most important part - my actual glass products.

This week I plan to go shopping for a bit of glass. I have run very low on light ivory and it's the base of pretty much everything I do so it has to be taken care of, and quickly so I can continue my quest of creating a forrest of lovely Ladies.

P~

KM&V Countdown - Week 12

2011-08-01T00:01:00.012+02:00

What a great week! :)
Not only am I still vacationing, not only did I manage to make my (almost) first fabulous hollows ever ...

Check out the size of this set! I were very impressed with my calm patience. If this is what happens when I torch in the morning, I really have some prioritizing to consider.

These are made in ivory and covered with Zimmermans fabled Z-99 purple. I love the stuff, it keeps prolonging my purple period. My stash will last for a while, but it's really too bad they don't make it anymore :/

I'd like to add that these are made by building discs only, not on a hollow mandrel. There has been no blowing involved, as you can see by the unevenness of the beads, or should I say the wonderfull rustic and organic shapes ;)

I also tried adding a bit of very chunky frit, which I have never tried before. It was not easy to get it to stick, but I am very pleased with the colour. I might like to crush it into smaller sizes of frit, but for this is was good.
Isn't that a lovely purple/blue planet full of little islands? There's even a crater :)

I am a bit undecided about wheather all these should be silvercored, but I suppose I'll have to see if they will fit my tool and let that be the deciding factor.

SO - not only did I get to make these lovelies, I also got a kick in the butt from the wonderfull Karin Castens of Castens Gallery (blog / website). I love what that woman can do with a little bit of silver, gold and precious stones!

But back to the kicking part - it led to me visiting an art gallery down the street from Karins shop, presenting my glassfigures to the owner, and voilá - on saturday I delivered 3 figures and 3 goddess pendants to be included in the gallery. Yay! :D

The gallery is called Gallerie Eros. It is the only gallery purely of erotic art in Denmark, and in a couple of days she will have pictures of my ladies on the website.

The gallery has a mix of old and new, explicit and understated, and you can read all about it on the gallery website!
The owner, Bettina Sinnet Fornitz, was very optimistic and now I am too, so a double yay! and many Thank You's goes out to her :)

A lovely week. Just lovely :)
P~

KM&V Countdown - Week 13

2011-07-25T00:47:00.006+02:00

Still vacationing and loving it :)

This week I have been grating all the rough edges off a bunch of these metal cubes I use as base for my larger ladies.

When I get them they have sharp edges and pointy corners, and are somewhat unpleasant. Now they are all smooth and nice to touch. It is important to me that all parts are a pleasure, and as a bonus they will not scratch the surface you place them on (unless you make an effort), Yay!

I hope you are enjoying the summer where you are :)
P~

KM&V Countdown - Week 14

2011-07-18T00:40:00.007+02:00

I'm afraid I have no beadrelated news this week either, because this week we went away on holiday, Yay :)
We played in the water, we watched the baby swallows leave the nest during the week, we got close to the wildlife at Knuthenborg.

We visited with family and played bordgames. I've made a few sketches of beads I'd like to make, and began drawing a palette of coulours to stick to, but nothing I'd like to show off :)
It is nice to be back home though, and I am looking forward to the rest of the vacation too.

I hope you have a lovely summer!
P~

KM&V Countdown - Week 15

2011-07-11T00:01:00.007+02:00

Oh my, what a week. I don't think I have ever worked quite as hard all in one week. Unfortunately this has nothing to do with my show and everything to do with the rain that fell last saturday and the flooding that followed.

I have spent every evening of the week moving boxes of stuff, I even took a day off to try to get ahead. I did start out sorting the stuff, but by the end of the week I just moved the dry boxes to dry spots without looking much at it. The wet boxes had to be sorted of course, to see what was trash and what was treasure. I have to admit, it was mostly trash, though some things have been rescued. It is amazing how we have let it build up without even looking at it.

I am happy to say that the basement is dry now (mostly) and looking better than ever (mostly). I would really like to sort through the dry boxes and only keep the good stuff, and I will, I just need to regain my energy, and also give some attention to my show project. I feel terribly behind after this week.

So - since nothing beadrelated has happened this week, I'll tell you about an experiment I did the week before.

While surfing I came across this post on Watch me Create
I had never heard of fuming with EDP, but it sounds like something I'd like so I had to try it right away. I made a little bead in dark ivory, then fumed it in fine silver first. I wanted to make it crackle, but I guess I burned it all off.
Then I got my EDP and cooked it 'till it boiled. I could see the fuming hapening, but the bead didn't seem to take it. As I cleaned the bead the matted areas could be rubbed right off, so I'm guessing I put it in the wrong place in the flame or perhaps it was too cold. I shall definately try this again to see if I can get the matted surface to stay.

And I want to show you something interesting that happened. Here is the rod I used for fuming. See how at the end it has gone all clear? Fascinating!

Have a great week, try something new :)
P~

PS: I'm very happy to say that my oxygen concentrator is still alive after the flooding. I did manage to get it out of the water in time. Phew! & Hooray!
Unfortunately our laundry maschine was not as lucky :(

KM&V Countdown - Week 16

2011-07-04T00:01:00.007+02:00

This week I have lost several beads to cracking bead realease. Some mandrels were freshly dipped and dried, some were dipped weeks ago. I think it might be a humidity problem. Maybe.
I did get a couple finished, these are from my first torchsession:

And my second:

The green flowerpod is a mess, and that lady on the right? She has no boobs because of beadrelease releasing too soon. I decided to make some nipsenåle (cause they aer made without release), even if I don't intend to bring any for the show, and here are 6 happy turtles in a row.

On saturday we had 2 months worth of rain within a couple of hours. Some areas close by got 150mm. I don't think we got that much, but it still ended up in my basement and my workshop.
I managed to burn my arm when reaching behind the kiln to untangle the cord of my oxygen concentrator, the only part of my tools that is on the floor. I hope I got it out in time, that water was raising fast! But I have to say - peppermint tootpaste is your friend. It took the pain away quickly so I could shovel water all night completely painfree. Yay! :)

But oh my poor muscles. I have aches all over from shoveling for hours on end. I need a rest. Goodnight :)

P~

KM&V Countdown - week 17

2011-06-27T00:01:00.008+02:00

I started out the week with a torchsession on sunday. I haven't been torching much at all during this year, so this was a practice run, to see if I can even make a bead anymore. I decided from the start that I would only be playing and getting my feel for the glass back, which was a good thing.

These ringbeads are my first ever and hold their share of mistakes and inaccuracy. I don't think this is a good time to start practicing something completely new (allthough I am dying to try making hollows by blowing, as well as these ring beads), so I will only be doing them for fun, if at all, during these weeks. I intend to make beads I know well, with little variations to keep it fresh.

The drop pendant bead is going in the 'to sell' box after all, and I have added 'Buy more bails' to my to-do list.

Then I had another torchsession, oh yes, two within a week, how about that?

I had a plan as to what to make, instead of just deciding on the spot. I know I want to bring lots of my large ladies and lots of pendants to the show, so I set off with a torso.
These are only hard to do because of the time they take to finish. This one took more than an hour, with all the melting down of rods and even more keeping her warm. But apart from that it is a calm process that does not involve much precision, which is the perfect project to start up on after months of inactivity.

After I finished her I made a couple of pendants, using DH Clio and Psyche and Zimmerman purple rose and extreme white frit. I love that stuff :)
They are all very well reduced and extremely shiny and jewel-like, and it doesn't show at all in this picture ...

I have also begun making a plan for the 17 weeks. Nothing solid as of yet, but I have thought of what I want to bring, and am settling on a colour palette for the entire range of products. I'd like my space at the show to be a pleasant visual experience, which will take a bit of colour discipline on my part.

That is all for this week :)
P~

17 week countdown!

2011-06-20T22:29:00.018+02:00

At the market last weekend I had and awfull lot of beads stolen. 14 purple silvercored braceletbeads, 30 uncored braceletbeads and two larger beads too.

I'm not going to complain about it though. It left me with all sorts of weird feelings, some unpleasant, but mostly I feel strangely relieved and very eager to start producing new beads. This is a good thing :)

My next 'market' is the huge (and might I add censored ;) 'Kunst, Mad & Vin' (Art, Food & Wine) show at Falconer Centeret in Copenhagen. It is on october 21-23'rd and I am very excited about being accepted. A ton of people will come, it is a fact, and I intend to be ready this time.
I have 17 weeks (including this one) to produce and stock up.

However - I know myself well enough by now to know that if I'm not carefull I will let weeks and weeks pass because 'there's plenty of time'.
So in order to keep myself accountable I hereby declare:

~ o 0 o ~
I intend that on monday of each of the 17 weeks I will accumulate and post a list of what I have done during the past week to reach my goals for this art fair.
~ o 0 o ~
So be it!
p~

3 days at the Valdemar Castle Market

2011-06-16T19:14:00.026+02:00

Phew! 2 weekends in a row away from home, that's enough for me for a while.

This weekend I spent 3 days at the Valdemar Castle Market with my friend Lenette. The weather was fantastic and thousands of people came to enjoy the day and the goods of the 220 sellers. You could even get a helicopter ride :)

Here are pictures of our booth and of my table alone. Looking at it now I can see a few things I'd like to have done differently, but there you go.

One of the great things about being a seller is that you get to go and look at other peoples goods for a few days. Many times I will be convinced I want to buy something I may well not have bought, had I been a guest for one day only. This time was no exception, and here are what I brought home.

These delicious handmade soaps are from www.countryhome.dk and are nice and chunky. I were happily surprised at how thick she cut them, at the price they had. It has been a long time since I had handmade soap last. It's a little bit of luxury for me.

I also brought home this rather large ornamental ball of willow branches. As soon as we got to the market to set up our booth on the first day, I had spotted this fabulous piece of handiwork. It doesn't show well in pictures, but the pattern is intricate and lovely, made of many, many joined spirals.

The lady from www.birkelevnaturkunst.dk stood in the sun for all 3 days, working on more of her garden ornaments.

I also really liked these 'baskets' of solid wood, but I didn't buy one because I didn't know what I'd use it for. They are too large for beads ;)
(yes, I do know what I'll do with the ornament ball!)

Finally, in the very last minutes of the final day, I made a trade :)
Above the stable where we were, there was a huge gallery space full of paintings. Most of them were not for me, but this one made me stop and oogle. I'm usually not a flowery person, but this little painting has a lovely mood about it, so I asked if perhaps she would be interested in a trade. And Yay! she agreed :)

You can see more of her flowery paintings at www.janemjensen.dk

One thing that I did not get to take home were these amazing glass dinner plates by Lene Hjorhöy. I haven't really thought about glass dinner plates before, but these are so exquisite!

They are so beautiful and you can tell they took forever to make. She has the same pattern in these 3 bowls of different sizes, and I want one of each! I am so going to remember these when my birthday comes around later this year :)

I love markets, but I'm glad I have 17 weeks before my next one. I'm also glad that it is an Art Fair, rather than a place to look for bargains, Yay!

P~

PS: I just googled 'art glass dinner plates', and I have to say, these are definately the cream. Just imagine having an actual dinner on them. Ooh!

Bunny Beads :)

2011-04-07T21:02:00.005+02:00

I'm so excited!
Tomorrow is my big girl's birthday, she'll be 8, and we have decided to get her a bunny. She has been begging for a pet for years, but since I am very allergic to guineapigs it has always been a big no! to anything furry.

Personally, since I grew up, my pets have always been insects, but you can't really pet them much, and they don't inspire you to whisper your secrets to them either, so ... an outdoor bunny - I am sure that can't be much of an allergy problem.

The thing is though, we have no bunny to give her, just the cage/house for it. So this morning I got up early and started making a bunny bead that I can give her, so she'll know who is going to live in the cage.

I have never made a bunny bead before, but it turned out quite well, so I just kept going and 8 cute little bunnies are now on my table. I only need one for my girl, so the rest will be going up in my Amio.dk shop during the coming week.

I have been googling bunny links lately, and have found that there are several breeders in our area, and a group who competes in bunny hop too, so it shouldn't be a problem to get her a little furball very soon. I am in fact looking much forward to it, since now that the decision is made, I too can dream of cuddling up a little furry creature.

P~

Marketday has come and gone ...

2011-03-22T15:24:00.011+01:00

Okay, so I have signed this Contract of No Complaining for 49 days, and though I may not have been fulfilling it perfectly, let me tell you about this sundays market.

The rooms we were in were lovely. The building was a small theater, and my booth was in the actual room where audience would normally sit. The stage was at one end and there were painted decorations all around from floor to ceiling.

I got there a bit later than I had wanted, but managed to set up my display in time for opening, except for pricemarks which I scribled right then and there.
I usually don't have space for people to go around my table, but the arranger convinced me that it was a good idea, and also it went better with the booths on either side of mine. So here is my first go-around set-up.

My neighboor booth were a couple of nice ladies, sisters, who works in needlepoint. Their business is called Sorbet Design. Some of their goods were freshly handmade, and others were vintage.
They use vintage pieces of needlepoint to incorporate with beautiful fabrics in pillows, handbags and shoulderbags of several sizes, all with a shiny vintage brooch on the front (not the pillows, that would be un-comfy).
I should have taken pictures, but you can go visit their website.

We also discovered a shared interest. Remember those nipsenåle a few posts back? One of the sisters is a collector, and she promptly bought 2 of my pins. Yay! I were happy :) I in turn bought one of her lovely pincussions. Look, isn't that a fabulous combination?

In the evening one sister asked if I were interested in a trade, and I am now the happy owner of a beautifully handmade shoulderbag. It goes perfectly with my favourite coat. Yay!
It is really well made, it's sturdy, yet feminine, it will last me a lifetime I am sure. I am very pleased :)

Then I packed up and drove home.

P~

Market fast approaching

2011-03-19T17:37:00.006+01:00

Ahem, I just realized I have neglected to spread the info here on my blog. And it's tomorrow no less!

Yes, tomorrow I'll get up early and take off for the city of Helsinore. From 11am to 5 pm you have the chance to see my glass in person, along with many other goods, some handmade and some not.
It's at Helsingør Musik Teater, at Søstrædet 4. Here is the info from the arranger:

Have a fabulous weekend :)
P~

Sign up for my Newsletter

2011-03-03T09:51:00.019+01:00

As I said in my previous post I shall send out my very first newsletter in just a few days. I am aiming for sunday, to promote my appearance at a market really soon. I have made it an event already, over at my Facebook fan page, and I'd love to have you 'like' it over there too.
There will be other nice stuff in the newsletter, as I know most of you might not live close enough to stop by.

I have put up a link to my newsletter sign-up form, over to the left. Don't forget to chose wether you want it in Danish or English. I might make further segments later on based on your interests, but for now I just want to get started.

Also - I just found a bead set of mine on the frontpage of Amio.dk, the decorated bones second pic in line 3. If you don't know Amio, it is a Danish site, much like Etsy, where I have my online shop. What a nice surprise :)

Have a lovely day :)
P~

Anniversary! 4 years of lampwork :)

2011-03-01T23:06:00.016+01:00

I don't know the exact date, but some time during february 2007 I went and got my lampwork starter set and a bunch of glassrods, and I set up my very own lampwork workshop in the basement.
Now, 4 years and a lot of beads later, I am still at it in the basement, and lampwork is still my most preferred craft. I am so pleased to be able to work in glass, in 3D and at a much larger size than when I started out.

To celebrate these years and the wonderfull craft, I have decided to start a newsletter. I have set it up at MailChimp and I am almost ready to send out my first newsletter ever :)
If you would like to join me in this new adventure, get updates and 10% off at my upcoming market, please follow this link and sign up so I can keep in touch with you.
(crossing my fingers, hoping this will work ...)

Greetings, and thank you for following me and my glass :)

New 'Things'

2011-02-08T22:59:00.019+01:00

The last couple of days I have been working on my bookkeeping which is due by thursday. It is not really a 'thing', so I can't show it of here, and so I took a few days off from the 'thing'.
I did get a couple of hours of torchtime in on sunday though, and here is some of what I made.

A goddess, nice and slender, and big! It's been a while since I made one last, and I were surprised to see that she is very close to the size of my largest ever goddess. Which is nice since I want to go bigger.

A purple leaf pendant bead, like the one I sold at Valdemar Slot Christmas Market.

And two tops for plantsticks. They would be lovely pendants, but they are huge!

Then I decided to end the day with another goddess. Unfortunately I forgot to keep her heated while fiddling with the neck and shoulder area, and she exploded :/ If you can use a broken goddess do let me know and I'll send her to you. Something mosaic perhaps? She is complete except that she has no nipples. It is the very last thing I do when making a goddess, and the only thing undone on her. And she is not annealed. (ETA: the broken Goddess is on her way to a good home)

P~

Nipsenåle

2011-02-03T19:25:00.007+01:00

Nipsenåle is an antique toy, that was given to little girls in Denmark during the first half of the 1900s. It is a purely Danish phenomenon of playing with pins with a glass head.

Some pins were short and with a simple single coloured drop of glass, those were for playing. Others were more interesting and were for collecting and admirering. Those were longer pins and had glass figures at the end. Many were of birds and other animals, and different series like 'People of the World' or 'Animals from Africa'.

The needles were stuck into little pillows, often made form expensive fabric, and were arranged and rearranged over and over by the little girls.

Today these fascinating little treasures are still collected, and since I have always loved miniatures of almost any kind, I have decided to try my hand at making nipsenåle. These are my test needles.

It really does take some practice to work at this size, but I am very happy with these. Especially the tiny cute elephant who is about 1 cm tall, and the robot who unfortunately has cracks from getting too cold while getting the details done.
I have gotten hold of a bunch of long pins and I look forward to decorating each one with a little piece of nostalgic treasure.

P~

Thing-a-day 2011

2011-02-01T20:00:00.003+01:00

Today is the first day of this years Thing-a-day.
Last year I joined up and had a lot of fun making different things for the 28 days of february (although some days it would end up being an emergency haiku). At the end I proclaimed that I would do it again this year, but ... It seems I am already good at giving myself projects to take care of, and I will have plenty to do without the added stress of having to blog every day. So I have decided to not join up, but to do my own thing and blog it frequently.

The first thing I'd like to present was made during the last days of december. I needed a gift for my mother for christmas, and after a bit of thinking I decided to make something myself, and that I would be making plant sticks. I have been making a new (to me) type of pendants lately, so I figured: 'Make a large one, turn it upside down and glue it to a stick', voilá, a nice and fancy plant stick.
I sacrificed a couple of my less worn mandrels, and this is what I came up with.

They look great, catching the sun among the greenery on her windowsill :)

P~

Goodness is raining upon me

2011-01-31T23:31:00.010+01:00

2011 is starting out very nicely and I have high hopes of a wonderful year :)
I have had a couple of nice sales, a couple of nice mentionings, and most wonderful of all - my goddesses are now in an actual Gallery! Yay!

Firstly, thank you to Dorit, not only for mentioning my Amio shop as a favourite in her frontpage interview, but also blogging about the goddesspendant and facebead she got from me back in august. Dorit lives in Greenland and has a shop of her own at Amio: DOOit Design She sews, felts, paints, she works in sealskin. I find these earrings especially interesting, made from earstones from the fish she is holding in the last picture.

Secondly - Major thanks to Karin Castens for taking in my godesses. She is a fabulous jeweler living here in Copenhagen, and has just opened her own gallery of jewellery.

It's such a lovely place and you can read all about it in her blog this month. Here is the lady herself, working on a new pendant.

I love what she can do with metal, and visiting her gallery makes me want to work in silver again. It's been about 15-20 years since I did any silverwork last, and I never took it much of anywhere then. It's no wonder I hardly remember how, but I'm getting ideas all over again, so who knows? :) I will definately keep it in mind for when I get my basement renovated.

In any case, she is not only incredibly talented, she is also very nice, and this is where she put my Godesses. I'm so happy! :)

Go see her jewellery at Amio, or if you are in Copenhagen, live in the gallery!

Yay for 2011!

P~

Christmas Market at Valdemar Castle

2010-12-06T22:51:00.008+01:00

As I said a few weeks ago, my friend Lenette had invited me to share her boothspace at Valdemar Castle this passed weekend. The last couple of days before saturday presented us with a lot of snow, and I were worried that perhaps I shouldn't go since there were no time to get the summertires changed to fit the season :/

It all went smoothly though, and I had a great weekend. It was cold, it was snowy, it was beautiful. Lots of people came over the two days, and I had a great time with Lenette and the other sellers.

Here is Lenette demoing a bit of lampwork

here is my table

here the entire booth

and here is a fresh new pendant I sold. I only just made it and I am quite proud of it.
I'll have to see if I can make another :)

Happy Holidays!

P~

Kivanniversary!

2010-11-05T13:52:00.010+01:00

Today is my second anniversary as a lender at Kiva, and I'd like to celebrate by sharing the Kiva site with you.

I am very happy to have been introduced to Kiva (Thank you Hanne!) those 2 years ago. On their site they state: 'Kiva's mission is to connect people, through lending, for the sake of alleviating poverty'. Sounds good, doesn't it? They have made it so easy for us to microlend across the globe, and as your entrepreneurs repay their loans you kind of get 'free money' to relend.

It's a fabulous concept I think, and I love that you get to choose who to lend to yourself. I always have much fun looking through the loan requests.

If you'd like to join in or just check it out, go to their site and sign up, or let me send you an invite :)
I'll need you email address to invite you, so don't hesitate to let me know in the comments or at bindweed*@*gmail.com (no * of course).

Happy Lending!
Lene :)

Christmas Market at Valdemar Castle!

2010-10-26T15:50:00.003+02:00

Yes! on December 4'th and 5'th I will attend/sell at the Christmas Market at Valdmar Castle.
My lampwork-friend Lenette has kindly offered to share her booth with me, and she has been allowed to set up her torch to be able to do live demos. It will be great!

I've never been there before and I am looking very much forward to the experience, not to mention seeing what the other sellers are bringing. I can see from the event website that there were 72 booths last year, and this year they have doubled the market to last 2 weekends of wich we will attend the second.

Anyway - I really need to have some fresh new work when I go there (just for my own pleasure), so I made these:

They will be pendants on sterling bails, and I am very pleased with the patterns, both the frit'ed ones and the deliberately dotted ones. The purplish frit'ed one ended up with a bit of a pearshape, and I love it! Just a touch more organic than the marvered drops, Brilliant! And the pattern on it looks like a fierce thunderstorm at sunset, so Yup, that is my favourite :)
More of both types will definately follow :)

Merry Christmas! (a bit early perhaps?)
P~

Gail Crosman Moore Class, Day 1

2010-10-16T23:34:00.008+02:00

Ooh, I've had a great day :)
It is so nice to be in the company of dedicated beadmakers all day, torching away for hours.

We made 6 beads today, all in Gails lovely style. My first beads, we made 4 in a row on one mandrel, were quite wobbly and unevenly spaced, but after that it went very well, and I can't wait to see my beads again tomorrow.
Gail is a lovely woman, and everybody were very focused, working constantly at their beads all day long.

Here is Gail, working on one of her fabulous pod pendants

As for working in boro - the colours are just wonderful. Nice muted tones, just like I like them. Laying down lines of stringer is much easier than in soft glass, but shaping the base bead can take a while. The boro hardens much quicker and must be reheated a lot. Also, the bead while being shaped, is radiating a lot! of heat. It is not easy to get close to the bead when laying stringers or dots.

I am still undecided as to weather this is something I would like to invest in at this point, but since it will require a new pair of glasses, not just the glassrods, and probably new beadrelease too, I think I will have to wait for later. I'd love to try to make implosion marbles in boro, but I guess I could practice in soft glass first, then upgrade later if I like it.

Tomorrow will be interesting too. We have been asked to bring inspiration (pics, objects what have you), and our own works that we would like to develop on. I am not really sure what to bring, but that I must think about in the morning.

P~

Gail Crosman Moore Class!

2010-10-15T20:59:00.009+02:00

I have been looking forward to this weekend since I snatched the last seat in this class back in may.
I love Gails pod- and flowerlike beads, and getting to try boroglass will be exciting, since I have only ever worked in soft glass. I can't show you a pic cause I haven't asked for permission, but here is her website with gallery and blog and many lovely pictures.

Now I will pack a few tools and go to bed so I can get a good nights sleep before we tart tomorrow. 7 hours at the torch will be a bit hard, but the classes at Bifrost are great, and my friend Lenette will be there too, so I know it will be a fun couple of days :)

Yay!

P~

Frontpage!

2010-10-13T14:55:00.009+02:00

Yes!Once more I grace the frontpage of Danish handmade shop site Amio.dk
This time with a pair of nifty earrings in black and white, see the top row there?

Also, if you look below the B/W you will see a lovely focal in purple tones on white that I am very pleased with. It is not as big as the one I wear myself, but the colours and organic pattern came out very nicely.

And new at my blog is the scrolling box of my goods at Amio, over at the left. Fellow Amio shop owner Bo Kavlslund made the script for all us sellers at Amio to use. He also makes sterling Jewelry, and this one called 'Fire' is my favorite, me being a lampworker and all :)

So - Danes, check out Amio, lots of good stuff there.
Foreigners, you are welcome too of course, just click around and see what the danish words are hiding. Don't be put off by the prices, just split the amount by 5,5 for US$ and 7.6 for EUROs (todays rates).
Enjoy!

P~

Trollbead Release Party!

2010-08-27T22:51:00.018+02:00

Last night I attended the world premiere of Trollbeads' new concept, the nation speciffic beads.
500 tickets were available and the event was held at Arken, a danish museum of modern art.

The Trollbead people showed us a fun and lighthearted powerpoint presentation of the Trollbead history, ending with their thoughts on what might best represent the spirit of Denmark.
I'm afraid I'm not much of a reporter, if I were I would have pictures of the new beads here, but alas I didn't think of it. I can tell you however that the 4 new beads are:

1. a glas bead with a green core and alternating white and yellow flowers (lovely!), representing anemonea, the herald of spring in our forrests.
2. a sterling vikingship complete with a dragons head in front (a little on the light side)
3. an amberbead with 'Denmark' in runes around the middle
4. a tribute to the great designers of our country - a tiny Arne Jacobsen chair, the Egg, with a teeny tiny troll climbing it. It's a fun bead, with a very nice weight to it (I like that).

Before and after the presentation there were a couple of live demotables showing a bit of the process of making beads. One was a lampworking table

and much more interesting for me, two tables demoing wax modeling. This is something I have had an interest in for years and years, and I really want to try it one day, so even a little taster like this is fun for me.

Even more fun - I soon realized that I know the guy in the picture! His name is Allan Bayer and he used to be the younger brother of a boy my friends and I used to play with after school. Now he is a skilled jeweller with his own shop, making both lovely classic jewellery and fancyfull modeled pieces. Also - and that is the reason he was there last night, he is a Trollbead designer. I think there used to be a list of each designers beads at the Troll-site, but I can't find any now so maybe they took it down. He did make this fabulous tree though, and here is his website: www.guldsmedbayer.dk so go have a look for yourself.

The new beads were up for sale of course, along with a new necklace, and a lot of shopping followed. Here are a couple more pictures, from the end of the evening when things had calmed down.

I had great night :)
P~

PS: the shrimps in the buffet were great!

Anniversary!!

2010-08-26T15:49:00.002+02:00

One year ago today I conquered a fear.
I told myself it would be okay until I believed it, and I jumped in feet first with excitement in my heart.
One year ago today I registered as a proper business, and it was huge for me.

What have I learnt:
It wasn't so scary after all. In fact it has been a fun, exciting and interesting adventure
I rather like doing the bookkeeping (when I'm done and have solved the 'what goes where' puzzle)

What to work on:
I really need get over myself and work on pushing my goods, really!
I must set a fixed date for bookkeeping each month, so as not to let it accumulate (done! now to keep it up ...)
Less TV/websurfing = more time to torch = better glass art! Yay!

To celebrate this happy event I am having a 20% off SALE at my new shop. You can find it HERE at the new danish website for all things handmade: www.amio.dk

The sale will last 'till the end of the month, 5 whole days, and prices have already been reduced by 20%.
I will upload new goodies during these 5 days, so please visit more than once.

Happy New Year everybody!

Mythbuster!

2010-08-23T13:23:00.005+02:00

Yesterday, for the first time in 3½ months, I fired up my torch.
I have no good reason for not torching, so I must have just needed a summer break. Well, a break this long will make you loose your routines, and besides making uninspired beads, I also got a burn. I were rolling a bead in frit, reaching under the torch, when I got my highest knuckle turned up into the flame. Very stupid, but my attention were on the other end of the mandrel.

I finished off the bead (quickly!), and then thought I would try out the advice I had read about for burns, a remedy you are pretty sure to always have handy: toothpaste! I smeared on a blob, and what can I say, it really works! The pain subsided right away, and I could go about my business.

So I went about my day with a glob of toothpaste on my hand. A couple of times I had to wash my hands and each time I removed the paste I would feel the burn again. So I reapplied and even kept it on for the night (secured by a piece of bandaid).

Today I have a blister, but no pain, and I didn't have to spend the night with my hand in a cup of water. Excellent! :)

And the bead I made? So not worth a burn ;)

2010-06-07T22:20:00.017+02:00

Well isn't is about time I let you all know that I am still alive and well and having a good time with my glass? I think it is :)

In particular I'd like to tell you about the lampwork meet-up and market I attended during this weekend.
It was a two-day event on the grounds of Ravstedhus, clear across the country from where I live. I packed up my BFs festival tent and took off to spend the night come rain or come shine. Fortunately we had the best weather ever, you might even say it was a bit on the hot side, especially on sunday, the market day.

I have never visited Ravstedhus before, and I was surprised to see how huge the shoparea was. I don't know what it normally looks like but this weekend there were 3 visiting German sellers of lampwork tools and glass as well as the regular shop. It was a beadmakers heaven :)

Saturday was wall-to-wall demoes. I especially liked to hear about electroforming and marblemaking, which are both techniques I'd like to try one day. I found out that I might not entirely enjoy electroforming the way I'd thought, because of the lumpy edges, but that they can be reduced by turning down the voltage. I'd love to try it sometime :)
I'd absolutely love to make marbles, but not opaque ones as was demoed. I'd like to try the transparant ones with implosions and stuff inside. Yay!

Later in the day a meeting was held in the tent in the yard, and the long awaited Danish Bead Association was formed. I look much forward to having a central place for all our Danish beadmakers to connect and get together and I joined on the spot. It'll be great :)

Then we went out to eat at a nearby restaurant. Lots of chatter all around and good food, and then back to more demoes, this time by Jens Chr. Kondrup. He showed us how he works in tubes, and when the conversation came to torsos I showed him one of my ladies and he made me a man in a matter of minutes. It was fun to see his technique of starting at one end and never going back. I go back and forth and back and forth again. I'll have to try his way as he said it creates less stress in the glass.

Sunday was the day of the market open for the public.

I had been looking much forward to this and had signed up as a seller. I probably should have asked questions before I signed up, but now I know that for next time. I had imagined perhaps 15 sellers and maybe around 150-200 costumers, but aparently that was way off.

I guess everything has a growing periode, and since this was only the second year of this event, well ... I'll be happy to go again next year though, and then I'll know better. I should probably mention that Ravstedhus is in a tiny village out in the countryside, which means people have to really want to be there to attend. You don't stumble upon it accidentally. This is not ideal for a market, actually it is quite counterproductive, but for demoing the place is perfect, with lots of space and workstations and supplies and tools all over, so it's a bit of a dilemma.
I'll be happy to go again next year as the socializing was great. I got to meet a lot of new people and talked about beads all day long for two days. Excellent weekend :)

So yes - in all it was a great initiative. Thank you to the organisers and the participants too.

P~

(PS to the person who nicked one of my Goddess-pendants: Congratulations on your great taste. You picked the nicest one of the ones I had laid out at the time. My paypal is open for payment at any time convenient for you on p@profusionartglass.com (that was 250Dkr. in case you 'forgot' that too). Thank you, and have a nice day.)

Silver cores.

2010-03-14T23:51:00.002+01:00

A couple of new beads today, and yay! no cracked tube this time.
It all went as smoothly as it used to. I am happy :)

P~

Bottoms!

2010-03-11T22:48:00.006+01:00

New Listings

2010-03-04T23:06:00.005+01:00

Today I made beads. I'm not sure they are any good, but I did make some, and that is half the battle sometimes.
I also uploaded a couple more beads to englebasserne.dk. Now there are 7, and I am all out of pics to list. Getting pictures taken has always been a hurdle for me, but I am working on that.
Here is one of the listed beads

P~

Grand Opening!!!

2010-03-03T23:47:00.004+01:00

Well then - Tonight I have listed my first couple of beads ever, at the danish site www.englebasserne.dk. I now have two online shops, and one more will follow sometime during this summer.
I'm not sure it is a good idea with so many shops, but this one is good because you can pay with the Danish card Dankort, which is very clever. I've always wanted to be able to accept cards :)
So go here to see my profile and my beads, Yay!

P~

Grand Re-Opening!

2010-03-01T23:59:00.006+01:00

Yes! Tonight I have re-opened my etsy shop.
It has been a very long time since I listed anything, and I look forward to using it again.
I have only listed 2 items so far (silver cored beads of course), but I will list more in the days to come.
Fun, fun, fun! :)

P~

Thing-a-day: Feb. 28 (Workshop Clean-up)

2010-02-28T23:59:00.007+01:00

Todays thing - is not really a thing.
I would have liked to end with something fabulous, but instead I ended up cleaning up my workshop.
It was needed too, and now I am ready to jump flying into march and the rest of the year.
My pictures today is before and after the cleanup. It feels great, and seeing it in pictures makes me realize ... I need some inspirational art on that wall!
My gosh it's barren. That needs to be fixed.

Well - today is the last day of this years Thing-a-day. It has been a great experience to be a part of this project, and I have learnt several things.
It is indeed possible for me to blog a lot more frequently than I usually do.
It is also possible for me to make a 'thing' on an almost daily basis.
It is possible for me to get up early, to torch before going to work.
It is possible for me to produce more than I thought, if only I put my mind to it.
So - I should probably quit complaining about being tired and not having enough free time, and just decide to take action and work towards my visions :)

This has been great, and I look forward to joining next year as well, and also to take some time to look at all the entries I have missed over the days.

P~

Thing-a-day: Feb.27 (S-Clasps)

2010-02-27T23:59:00.006+01:00

Today I made a couple of S-clasps.
I shaped them simply with pliers, and hammered them afterwards, which gives the metal a nice finished look.
I like them :)

P~

Thing-a-day: Feb. 26 (Silver Core Failure)

2010-02-26T23:56:00.002+01:00

I am afraid todays thing didn't quite happen.
I wanted to core a couple of beads, but the sterling tube kept splitting, even after I sanded it smooth and pressed it very gently.
I startet over 4 times, and it is very odd, because the other bit of tube I got in the same order worked perfectly and easily, and I didn't do anything different this time. I think I will have to order some more fresh tube and hopefully it will go back to being easy again ...

So I give up for tonight on the coring, but before I go to bed I will make an S-clasp since I am so fond of the one I am wearing. I'd like to sell bracelets to go with my beads, but I wasn't satisfied with the toggle clasp I had before. Now I have a much better feeling about it, so I'd better get to work :)
Good night all, and have a nice weekend :)

P~

Thing-a-day: Feb. 25 (Beads & Sculptures)

2010-02-25T19:26:00.003+01:00

New beads!

All made yesterday. This is what I usually make in a productive week (or two).
I could so use more days off ...

P~

Thing-a-day: Feb. 24 (Bracelet Clasps and Pics)

2010-02-24T23:50:00.005+01:00

Excellent productive day. Yay!
Unfortunately my beads are stil in the kiln being annealed, so they will be tomorrows thing.

I do have a pic though, of my bracelet. I had first made it using a toggle clasp. I have never worn one of those, just seen them being used for bracelets all the time. After a month of testing I'm not sure I like it though, so today I changed it for a S hook I had made a long time ago and never used. Oh what a difference, I love it! It is a 100% better. It is so pretty, easy to use and generally lifts the over-all appearance of the bracelet. Super!

I did get to go shopping for materials today. I got the soldered jumprings on either end of the S which made it possible for me to assemble the piece. I also got some sterling wire for making fibulas, and got carried away and got some agate beads. They have a large hole that will fit on 1,5mm wire and are the first semi.precious stones I have seen with this size hole. Yeah, I don't get out much :) I look forward to working with them.

P~

Thing-a-day: Feb. 23 (No Thing Today)

2010-02-23T23:43:00.002+01:00

So - it appears I have begun to slack.
I have made no thing today, so I have nothing to show.
I did have at great day though, and I have taken tomorrow off from work, which means lots of torchtime!
I might even go shopping for some sterling wire. Can't make jewelry without it :)
Yay!

P~

Thing-a-day: Feb. 22 (Working on Banner)

2010-02-22T23:42:00.003+01:00

I have been working on a banner today, for a new online shop that will open this summer.
It is a place like Etsy, but in danish, and has just a front up for now with a bit of info and a lot of pictures.
Anyway, the banner - not finished and not worth presenting, so no pic today.

Hmm, that sounds like I am building a website community Etsy thing.
No, just a banner for my own little shop in the sea of handmade.

P~

Thing-a-day: Feb. 21 (Lego)

2010-02-21T23:21:00.003+01:00

Today I spent the day with my children at the 4 day Lego World show. We had a great time :)
I spent most of the time watching the kids, feeding them or trying to keep them together, but I also got to build a few things, and here is a pic of one of those.

P~

Thing-a-day: Feb. 20 (Bead Pics)

2010-02-20T23:42:00.008+01:00

I haven't been doing much today, feeling very tired, but I did get some pics edited which is nice.
I shot them yesterday, and now they are ready for use.

P~

Thing-a-day: Feb. 19 (New Beads)

2010-02-19T22:50:00.004+01:00

Todays thing is more beads. I got a bit into purple as you can see.
I did manage to get the redish hue I were after to appear, but not as easily as I had thought it would be.
I have cored a few of them already, but one broke because I weren't paying attention :/
I am pleased with the lot though :)

P~

Thing-a-day: Feb. 18 (Fancy Banana)

2010-02-18T20:27:00.005+01:00

For todays thing I decorated a banana :)

I scratched the peel of the banana with a knife and shortly after the lines had turned dark. The markings got darker as the day progressed, and I am looking forward to seeing it tomorrow.

P~

Thing-a-day: Feb. 17 (Emergency Haiku)

2010-02-17T23:53:00.002+01:00

No new thing today,
an emergency haiku
must step up again.

No beads have been made
as well as no jewelry,
now the time is up.

Another day looms,
will the morrow show a thing?
I surely hope so ...

P~

Thing-a-day: Feb. 16 (Silver Cored Beads)

2010-02-16T22:07:00.004+01:00

Today I have cored all of the beads I made last night.
It's a great feeling, getting things done.
I am very pleased that I decided to join Thing-a-day :)

P~

Thing-a-day: Feb. 15 (Bead Photo)

2010-02-15T23:29:00.004+01:00

Today I shot pictures of my beads so I can post them online for sale later.
Alas, it seems that they all have dust on them or are unfocused, so I'll have to redo them after all.
This one is allright though ...

P~

Thing-a-day: Feb. 14 (Glass Art Sculptures)

2010-02-14T23:34:00.004+01:00

Maybe not a forrest quite yet, but it's a beginning.
These aren't glued, just cut and ready to be.

P~

Thing-a-day: Feb. 13 (Silver Cored Beads)

2010-02-13T23:58:00.007+01:00

Freshly cored beads :)

P~
(Phew! I only just made it before the date changed :)

PS: visit my thing-a-day post, my thing-a-day blog, or the complete thing-a-day project blog

Thing-a-day: Feb. 12 (Beads & Sculptures)

2010-02-12T22:14:00.007+01:00

Success!
I did indeed manage to get myself up and into the studio at 3 in the morning, so I could get a bit of torchtime in before going to work.
It was quite an experience as I am not a morning person.
This is what I made, two lady figures and some frit tests.

I am pleased :)

P~

PS: visit my thing-a-day post, my thing-a-day blog, or the complete thing-a-day project blog

Thing-a-day: Feb. 11 (The Frits Arrived!)

2010-02-11T19:58:00.005+01:00

No thing today (again, ahem!), but ...
My frit is here!!!! Hooray!

I will go to bed now and get up in the morning before work to torch.
That is the plan anyway. I hope I can do it.
Then there will be beads tomorrow!
Yay!

P~

PS: visit my thing-a-day post, my thing-a-day blog, or the complete thing-a-day project blog

Thing-a-day: Feb. 10 (Business Card?)

2010-02-10T21:16:00.006+01:00

Todays thing is a file for a new businesscard. It's a beginning anyway, as I have doubts.

I have put only my web-address on it, and a line saying: Handmade Glassbeads, Unique Jewelry for Unique Individuals.
What kind of information do you like to see on the card of an artist?

P~

Thing-a-day: Feb.9 (Book-keeping Haiku)

2010-02-09T23:43:00.002+01:00

No thing today, sorry 'bout that.
I have used my day well though, by finally finishing my 2009 book-keeping.
The final deadline is tomorrow, but I am all done. Yay! :)

Oh wait! I can make a haiku.
Hang on ...

Amounts big and small
must line up in perfection.
It is done - now, sleep.

P~

Thing-a-day: Feb. 8 (Frozen Figures)

2010-02-08T23:23:00.007+01:00

Fun shapes of ice.
I see a flying bird, a horse and a man.

P~

Thing-a-day: Feb.7 (Fishtank Clean-up)

2010-02-07T22:38:00.007+01:00

No beads today. It is best to know when not to torch, or you'll learn the hard way, so this weekend I have relaxed.

Todays thing then?
Well - I cleaned up and re-arranged the fishtank?
Here it is, full of happy fish :)

P~

PS: visit my thing-a-day post, my thing-a-day blog, or the complete thing-a-day project blog

Thing-a-day: Feb.6 (Pendants)

2010-02-06T23:42:00.008+01:00

All week I were thinking it would be easier on a saturday, to find time to make a thing, for shooting a pic and for posting.
And yet here I am posting in the last minutes of the day. Ah well ...

Todays thing is a couple of pendants I made. I love this shape of beads :)

P~

(PS: sorry about the bad pictures. I had to shoot them indoors at night. A re'shoot might be in order here ...)

Thing-a-day: Feb. 5 (Beads & Sculpture)

2010-02-05T22:15:00.004+01:00

For today I have some new glasswork.

One goddess figure to display on a stand, one goddess to be worn as a pendant and 4 beads with 5mm holes for silver coring.

These were all made in one sitting, not the best, longest or most productive sitting, but how I ever got the idea that I could make a living from making beads is beyond me. Still - I'm surely going to try. Slow and steady wins the race, right?

P~

Thing-a-day: Feb. 4 (Chinese Button Knot)

2010-02-04T15:05:00.005+01:00

Here it is again that flowery bead. What did I do you ask?
Well, I made it ready for wearing, by stringing it on a leather cord. I'm not much into ordinary knots, it's not really jewelry-worthy I think, så I made this nifty chinese button knot instead.
It looks fancy and symetrical, and it's not that hard to do. This is the tut I have been using.

So for today - a knot.

P~

Thing-a-day: Feb. 3 (Mini Sculpture)

2010-02-03T23:04:00.010+01:00

My third piece of a thing is this, a small glass torso, now finally and permanently glued to it's foot.

I did not make the torso today, just the glueing part, something I have been postponing forever. It is the first one I have assembled completely, and I can see I have yet again procrastinated on something very worth doing.
I am really pleased with this one and I plan on making an absolute forrest of ladies. It would be fabulous :)

This assembly is just short of 12cm, the lady herself is 4,5cm high and 2,5cm wide.

P~

PS: visit my thing-a-day post, my thing-a-day blog, or the complete thing-a-day project blog

Thing-a-day: Feb. 2 (Silver Cored Bead)

2010-02-02T12:55:00.006+01:00

Todays thing is another bead I have cored with sterling silver.
Much smaller than yesterdays bead, but with lovely mild colours.

I still do not have access to post on the project blog, but I'm hoping to get there eventually.
Or I'll just run my own little (very similar) project :)

P~

PS: visit my thing-a-day post, my thing-a-day blog, or the complete thing-a-day project blog

Thing-a-day: Feb. 1 (Silver Cored Bead)

2010-02-01T23:55:00.006+01:00

Okay, so technically it's not feb 1 any more, but since I'm up I'm still counting (and backdating it a few minutes).
This is my first thing: a bead (Ta-daa!)

It's the longest I have yet cored, I used 38mms of tube for it, as opposed to usually using 12-15mms. A colleague asked me to make it, and I hope to get to make it into a nice necklace, or she might just want it on a leathercord.

Anyway - my first contribution :)

P~

PS: visit my thing-a-day post, my thing-a-day blog, or the complete thing-a-day project blog

Now I've done it!

2010-02-01T13:20:00.002+01:00

Sometimes we just have to challenge ourselves, and even though I have known about this project since I bumped into it last year, it still came as a bit of a surprise.
Not the project as such, but how fast january has ended and February begun. I am talking about the Thing-a-day project which begins today!! and makes you commit to making a new thing each day of February, and post it in the project blog.
I will post what I make in this blog too of course, and since this is the first day, I'll better get to it!

Sign up ends today, feb. 1'st, and I don't know which timezone, so if you want to be in on it, now would be a good time to check it out

P~

Pictures from the Larry Scott class at Bifrost

2010-01-27T15:37:00.017+01:00

Phew! That was a really hard weekend.
It startet out great with a short introduction of Larry and each of us students, while sitting down for a cup of tea

(must be a fine day ahead, right? :)

Then we went to the torches. Larry would demonstrate how to make the beads give us the materials and we'd get busy duplicating.
We had 8 beads on schedule during the two days, and began with an easy ivory and coppergreen design. Then on to larrys Peacock bead. Mine is not so fancy (the dots were too small to rake propperly), but here it is anyway, along with the Byzantine bead we were taught later on sunday.

The Filigre and Window beads went better. Here are mine, one etched to show the dark lines of silver on top of the ivory ridges, which is a trick he showed us.

By then evening had come, and those of us who wanted to, went out to eat locally. I had a wonderful time. I can't remember when I were last in a propper restaurant, and it was nice to be with people who also love beads :)
However - when we left to go home I didn't feel too well. I managed to get home and went straight to bed, proceeding to toss my cookies at regular intervals all night long. This was no fun and left me weak, dried up, tired and somewhat shaky. Not the best condition for precicion dot placement I'd say. The next morning I went to class, feeling fairly well most of the day, though the smell of lunch was no pleasure, even if I usually love lasagna :/

We were taught about dots, the Byzantine bead above, silver fuming, pulling stringers with a core colour, the No-name bead made with dark silver plum and Iris orange (which I gave up on shapeing)

and finally, the bead I had come for, the Night Sky bead

This bead has many more steps than any of the others, and of course I had to forget one (crusial) step, making my bead very dark and not so interesting. I did get the center dichrolayer down well (for a firsttimer anyway :), and some lovely massive swirls, so I am not entirely unpleased with it. And next time I'll definately remember :)
Here is a pic of how it should have been looking. I could not stand up the chance of getting one (or two as it may be) of Larrys beads, so here is the newest addition to my bead collection. A Byzantine bead and a Nightsky bead. Lovely :)

By now the afternoon was progressing and I were feeling quite poorly again, so I left during the last bead. I know how to make it though, if I should feel like it, although I would need a glass I don't currently have.

All in all it was a very educational couple of days. I have learnt a lot of little tricks and tips, and it was wonderful to get to meet Larry and the danish beadmakers. I should go on more courses :)
It was hard though. I usually only get to torch for about 4-6 hours in a week, so all this sitting and standing made my back a bit sore. But it's all gone now along with the sickness, and I am feeling fine.

Finally, here is Larry showing us the Byzantine and window bead.

P~

A class, a class, a beadmaking class!

2010-01-17T16:12:00.007+01:00

I'm so excited!
In just one week (6 days to be precise) I will attend my second beadmaking class ever. The first one was a beginners course, just to get me started, and it was over 3 years ago! This time I am splurging on myself by having enrolled in a 2 day class taught by Larry Scott.

The class will be held at Bifrost Studioglas, which is where I went for my beginners course too, and where I get most of my glass. It is a great place I think, and I look much forward to 2 whole days of torching.
Imagine that, hours and hours on end of melting glass and learning new tricks. It will be glorious! And further more, I have arranged for a day off from work the day after, so I will have time to go through everything again at home. Super!

I have recieved a mail with pictures of the beads he'll teach us, and they look fantastic (can't show you, because I haven't asked permission, sorry). I look much forward to learning the techniques and trying it all out for myself. Both his byzantine beads and windowbeads are there, and also a lovely black one with silverblue swirls, looking like a galaxy in outer space.

The course was a spur of the moment thing, as Larry Scott was going to be in Denmark for the opening of an exhibition at Bornholms Kunstmuseum. It's all about glass beads and opens today. I hope to get to go and see it myself later in the year. It runs from january 17'th to march 14'th 2010.

In other beady news, besides lots of purple beads, I made this guy.

Unfortunately he is stuck on the mandrel and is now living with one of my favourite plants :)

P~

Greetings to a New Year :)

2010-01-12T13:12:00.011+01:00

I love getting to stay home for a days on end, and this christmas I got 12 days in a row (the rest of the family got 16) Yay! We love sleeping in, and so our days will slowly start and end later and later. This makes starting up again very hard on all of us, especially in the winter with all it's darkness, but we just have to get to it I guess.

This is what I made from the nifty purple bead 2 posts back. I really like it and wear it everyday, even when it clashes with my blouses :)

I'm in a bit of a purple periode these days, it's all because if the frit. I have been making all kind of shapes using the same colours and I love all of them. I definately need more fabulous frits in other colours.
Here is one I have cored, fairly large, not a bracelet size (I've made those too :).

And here some tests on other basecolours.
Yep, I definately will get more frits :)

Happy New Year!
P~

Happy New Year!!

2009-12-31T20:45:00.010+01:00

Happy New Year everybody :) I wish you all the best in 2010.

If making resolutions does not work for you, but you'd still like to have a bit of focus during the year, I'd like to point you to this lady, Christine Kane, and her 'word of the year' instead. She is excellent.

And if you can see the moon where you are, go check out the tiny bit of an eclipse happening right now! Awesome end of the year :)

So - much success, health and happiness to you and yours!
P~

I made the Nifty!

2009-12-08T15:35:00.010+01:00

Yes, I made a lovely fine bead. This is it, and it includes frit which is something you have rarely seen from me. But - I think I may need to get me some more, I like it!
This is zimmerman, dark rose (I think), which seems much more colourfull when not encased. Strange, I'll have to explore that. I'll also have to make a new bead, one that includes a bit of olivegreen with all the purple. I bet it would be delicious :)

Do let me know of any frits I need to try. I like strong, but muted colours. Think 'autumn'.

P~

I'm on You Tube!

2009-12-04T14:34:00.006+01:00

And I didn't even put me there myself :)
It was the ladies of 'Millionøse metoden', Kirsten Stendevad & Christine Eilvig.
That's me in the red blouse in the front, at 3:33 and also my nose at 1:31 :)
Is this my 15 minutes?

P~

New Fibulas

2009-11-30T21:28:00.007+01:00

I made these for a customer and was very pleased with the result. So was she, yay! :)
These have an ekstra bead, compared to the ones I have made before. I always loved an uneven number more than an even number, but these look well ballanced, so I am happy.

Next year I will raise my price on these, but for the rest of this year I will take orders at the same low price(350Dkr/$70).

P~

We have a Winner!

2009-11-19T10:37:00.013+01:00

Monday night marked the end of my collection at Kræftens Bekæmpelse.
With the help of my lovely assistant we now have a winner.

Congratulations Lone!

Lone has her own lampwork website full of nifty beads and jewelry she has made, and also a new blog. Go visit her :)

P~

A Goddess Request

2009-11-12T15:23:00.007+01:00

Some days ago I had a request, to see if I could make a goddess bead that would fit the Danish charm/bracelet series(Troll & Pandora). An excellent challenge since I have just cored my first beads.
These are my first attempts, front and back:

As bracelet beads go, these are quite large, around 2cm long, but I have tried to keep the diameter fairly slim. Since these are for a bracelet they do not need to be perfectly ballanced, which is nice for these front-heavy ladies.
I am not sure these two can be cored, so I will work on getting the rim of the holes even, and also on getting them a little bit smaller.

Now to see if I can make goddesses with the hole going horizontally ...

P~

Kiva Anniversary!

2009-11-06T23:30:00.009+01:00

Yesterday was my 2 year anniversary as a lender at kiva.org.

I like Kiva. If you don't know it go check it out :)

P~

Støt Brysterne! (Support the Boobs!)

2009-11-04T15:53:00.021+01:00

Støt min indsamling hos Kræftens Bekæmpelse og vær med i lodtrækningen om en skøn halskæde i 24 karat guld doublé. Vedhænget (ca. 2,5 cm højt) er en af mine egne glasperler og hele herligheden kan ses på billederne herunder i posten. Hvis du ikke er til pink (eller nøgne damer) finder vi ud af et alternativ :)

Indsamlingen løber til d. 16 nov, og du får et lod i hatten for hver 25,- du bidrager med. Husk at kontakte mig med din mailadresse når du har givet et bidrag, sådan at jeg kan få fat i dig hvis du vinder. Læg en besked her i bloggen eller send mig en mail på profusionartglass @ gmail.com

Held og lykke!

'Support the Boobs' is the name of the campaign the Danish breastcancer research is running.
This necklace is the prize I am offering if you donate through my collection at their site.
It is all in Danish, but they take all kinds of cards, so I don't think it should be a problem for foreigners to donate too. Just remember to use the green button in the center of the page, and that 50Dkr equals app. 10US$. Each 25Dkr you donate will get your name into the drawing once.

The necklace is in 24 carat goldfill, sporting one of my glass ladies in pink. This can be exchanged into something else if you win and you really don't like pink (or naked ladies).
The campaign runs until nov. 16'th, and don't forget to let me know your email address, here or by mail to profusionartglass @ gmail.com, so I can contact you if you win.

Good luck!

P~

I did it!

2009-11-02T15:52:00.007+01:00

Finally, I did it. And it was so easy too.

Yesterday, I sorted all my beads with 5mm holes into those that fit the Sterling tube I've got and those that doesn't.
I changed the peg on my untill now unused Impress Beadliner and tried for the very first time my tiny tubecutter, my de-buring tool and my somewhat unprecise calliper.
I read the instructions and proceeded to line my first bead. It was easy! I don't know why I have to wait so long to try a new thing, I do that most of the times I try new things by myself when it really isn't all that difficult. I am working on that :)

Anyway - here are my 3 first cored beads. Now all I need is a Dremel/-like tool to polish up the inside of the tube, that hid a white surface I hadn't noticed before. And some more tube of course :)

P~

2009-10-29T14:41:00.006+01:00

Here I am, at the Bazar last thursday.
As you can see, just a little bit of space, but enough for me after the long creative draught this year.

It was pretty crowded, so I don't know how many people/buyers showed up. Nothing much happened in my shop, but it was fun to meet a couple of other vendors I have talked to before. Very nice in fact.
We were only open for 2 hours, and I didn't get to see everybodys crafts, but here are a few links of some I did see and liked:

Greeting Cards, illustrated by Anja Gram: http://langtmedkort.dk/

Felted Hats and Scarves: http://www.mariannelundov.dk/

Lamps, angels and Bowls in coldworked glass: http://www.zugaicha.dk/

Many interesting products from Greenland, incl. muskoxwool which is just plain fantastic: http://www.sika-mut.dk/

Enjoy!
P~

I have an Event tomorrow!

2009-10-21T23:20:00.007+02:00

I really had thoughts of going to bed early today, so I could be nicely refreshed for tomorrow, but no, I had to wait to the last day to pack my beads, jewelry and display-stuffs. Now it is midnight, but at least I am done. I think ...

Tomorrow I will be at the Bazar at La Oficina on Frederiksberg. It is a very nice place, and apparently we'll be 40 artists selling all kinds of crafts, so the 2 hours (7-9pm) we are there for, will run by quickly.
Be there, or be square! (foreigners and people living far away are excused ;)

Pics will follow at my earliest convenience (which may not be until saturday, because friday I will be watching the performance of Blixa Bargeld! Oh yes, we love that man, but hey, that is not the event I wanted to talk about).

Anyway, there will be 2 more Bazars before christmas, and here is the info in Danish:

Goodnight :)
P~

Newsflash! Beadorder saves a life!

2009-10-09T23:43:00.011+02:00

Thursday night a little life was saved by a beadorder.
My beadstudio is in the basement, and as I opened the backdoor to roll out the gashose an get it connected, there he was - a tiny little, apparently dead, hedgehog. The poor baby had tumbled down the stairs and being just about 12-15cm long he had no chance of getting back up. I was very sad to see him there. I like hedgehogs, they are so cute, and of course even cuter in the tiny little size he was.
Since I took him for dead, I simply told BF that we needed a permanent board to be placed down the stairs to avoid this kind of entrapment, and went about my beadmaking business, thinking I would dispose of him later. Some hours later I had run out of thin mandrels and went to have a better look at the little guy, who hadn't moved even a tiny bit. He was still laying curled up on one side, and I could see his eyes and ears were full of flyeggs.
I had brought a flashlight since it was dark, and after a bit, suddenly the light made him react. First he took a deep breath. 'Whoa!' I thought. 'Is he alive?!'. He moved a tiny paw, then turned his face towards the light, wriggeling his little nose. Omg-omg-omg! I ran upstairs.

'What should I do? What can I do?' I asked BF, who only thought for a minute before saying 'There's a website ... I saw a bit of TV about a hedgehogwoman ...'. So we googled, and guess what? She lives 20 min. south of us. Yay! The website said I could call any time, day and night, so I did, even if normaly I would never call people this late. 'Bring him over' she said 'quickly!' She even offered to pay a cab for me if I needed it. So I picked up the little guy (I hadn't touched him, being afraid to chok him in his fragile state), put him in a small box with a little towel around him, and off I drove in the middle of the night.

When I arrived she had prepared boiled honeywater for him, and soaked some catfood in case he could eat it, but first she proceeded to check him out and rid him of the flyeggs. I have to say I was shocked. Yes, I could see the eggs around his ears, but when she scraped out his little mouth I couldn't believe the amount. I don't know how he could breathe through all those. And even worse (or not, I'm not sure), she squished out a LOT of eggs from, get this - his eye! It was disgusting. I still feel queazy thinking about it. Poor, poor little baby. I have a whole new dislike for flies I can assure you.
She bathed him, warmed him up a bit, oiled his little nose and generally checked him out (he only weighs 130g!). He seemed a lot better after that, beginning to move a little, look around and even drink a little. I stayed for about an hour, watching and lending a hand when I could, and happy to se him liven up. She gave me lots of the groups newsletters, stickers and info, and told me I had to go and find his siblings, cause they will not survive the winter. Apparently a hedgehog looses 300g during hibernating, so this little fellow would disapear twice over. We haven't found any though ...

She really is very dedicated to these animals. She had at least 50 boxes with one or more hedgehogs spending the winter in her care, spread throughout her house, and more in the outside shed. This is the website of the Danish Hedgehog group: http://www.pindsvin.dk/ Hint: They take donations :)

Thank you to Grethe, who made the order,
to BF who had heard of the hedgehog group,
and to Kirsten for taking good care of the many, many little critters.

P~

PS: Yes I should have taken a picture, but I were too perplexed and in a hurry to get going, so I didn't think of it untill later. Go here for Hedgehog Cuteness

New Beads - fresh from the kiln!

2009-09-17T15:51:00.010+02:00

Ooh how I love having a kiln! :)
It is a very luxurious feeling to be able to work with the beads I made yesterday, today! as opposed to the 'in 2-3 months' that I am used to.
I also love being unafraid of going larger, although I now have thoughts of how much more glass is potentially wasted in an ugly/wonky bead. Yes, I have a block against wasting. I need to give myself permission to not be perfect, to not making a masterpiece every single time I torch. I'll be working on it ...

Here are my new beads. The smaller one is an example of the size I am used to making.

These 2 are my favourites

Here are my first 2 test sculptures, with a pendant of my usual size beside them.

They are big! for me anyway, but I aim to double this size before long. Sculpting is fun!

and all those are annealed! Yay!

P~