New Collection on ArtFire

Another piece of my jewelry has been included in a collection on ArtFire titled Green Is Just Around the Corner.  It is the green and brown lampwork bracelet.  Please take a look.

http://www.artfire.com/modules.php?name=collections&op=details&cid=14944

How to Get the Perfect Crimp - Daily Blogs - Beading Daily

How to Get the Perfect Crimp - Daily Blogs - Beading Daily

My Jade in Pastel Necklace

Okay, so I'm ready for spring to get here.  My favorite season, as I've already said.  So my new pieces are all about spring--lots of pastels.  This necklace was a fun one to make because I had all the pastel colors I like and there were so many ideas in my head for these beads.  I've had them for awhile, but just couldn't decide what they needed to become.  They are briolettes of pastel jade, which is not what you usually think of when you think of jade. To me they almost look like little jelly beans, all ready for the Easter basket.  I added some sparkly aurora borealis rondelle crystals and little faceted pink quartz beads to make it dressy.  Then in the middle I added two rose Swarovski crystals with a blue jade briolette in between.  It's hard to see the clasp, but it is a hook and eye clasp with some rhinestones.  I think this would be so pretty for a spring bride or for an Easter outfit.  It's not big and bulky at all and is so very feminine.  It is for sale, but like most of the things I make, I would be happy keeping it and wearing it myself.  This is a perfect example of that harmony I've been talking about.  To me, the combination of colors, sizes, and textures in this necklace are harmonious.  Tell me what you think.

Spring Jewelry

I spent some time today rephotographing some of my new spring pieces.  One is a pastel jade necklace and the other is a pastel cracked quartz bracelet.  Notice the theme of pastel here?  Yes, I love pastels just as I love spring.  The beads in both these pieces just breathe of springtime.  And going back to my harmony theme, to me spring is the time of year when everything seems to be in harmony.  I don't know why I feel that way.  Maybe it's because of the music of the season--the birds chirping and singing, the sounds I hear on a warm spring evening when it's warm enough to go out and sit on my deck.  Just the thought of music I know about spring brings warm feelings and those lovely harmonies float around in my head just like the harmony of those beautiful pastel beads.  So I hope my new photos give just a little justice to the beauty of those jewelry pieces.  It's hard to capture beauty in a photo, and even harder to capture the warm feelings that beauty brings.  So please forgive my meager photography attempts.  Take a look and tell me what you think. They are in my Etsy shop. http://www.texasnan.etsy.com.

More on the harmony in creating jewelry

Today when I was playing the organ in church, I noticed it was just the least bit flat.  Now if I were playing alone, that wouldn't be an issue.  No one would notice.  But I was playing with a piano, keyboard, bass, and acoustic guitar.  When that many instruments figure into the mix, everything needs to be in tune to have the very best, most pleasing harmony.  That little bit of flatness in the organ just put an edge on the morning's music.  Unfortunately, I can't go up and tune the pipes, which probably wasn't the problem anyway, since the whole organ was flat.  Maybe it was all the many nights of sub-freezing temperatures that affected it, maybe the air pressure from the bellows was below par (it's a pipe organ).  Whatever it was, it couldn't be fixed.  Now most people probably didn't even notice.  But I did.

This same kind of silghtly-out-of-tuneness can also make the most beautiful piece of jewelry seem just not quite right.  If the shade of a certain stone, the shape, the size, or even the kind of stone is not just quite right, everything seems the slightest bit out of harmony.  So the blending of colors, shades, textures, shapes all goes into creating the most breathtaking work of art and gives the perfect harmony that will hopefully elicit that response that the creator wants from the prospective customer.

This is who I am

Hello, everyone.
This is a new experience for me--blogging.  But just to tell a little about myself, here we go.  I am a retired educator, having been a high school English teacher for 24 years and  an administrator for 8 years.

One of my passions is music.  I have been a church organist since the age of 16, and I also taught piano lessons for about 20 years.  Something about music that intrigues me is the harmonies that carefully chosen groupings of notes can produce.  The right notes together bring about a pleasing harmony.  Another group of notes together may elicit certain feelings, emotions, or moods.  And some groups of notes are just downright ugly. 

I guess you could say my love for beautiful harmony figures into my designs for the jewelry I create.  The notes are the beads, the colors, the textures, and the findings that I use.  The harmony is created with the right grouping of those "notes".  And I think jewelry can be used to enhance moods and feelings, just like those beautiful, or not so beautiful, harmonies can do.

I'll elaborate more on this idea in my next blog.

See my jewelry designs at http://www.texasnan.etsy.com or http://facebook.com/nancyscrystalfantasies