Long time, no speak...

Hello my friends... It's been a long time since I've added anything to the blog... things should soon start changing though. I haven't been beading for quite a long time. Whatever I do bead, it's for a very brief period of time. I am just so easily wiped out. My latest test results show that I'm in remission which is excellent news! I am finishing my last dosages of chemotherapy Thursday 5th of June! You can guarantee I'll be celebrating that! Walking down stairs and then walking back upstairs to me is like having been in a marathon. I'm told I should start feeling better once I'm finished with chemotherapy. Let's hope so! I am noticing my hair is growing back... I have no idea how long it'll take for me to have a head full of hair so that I will not have to wear my biker's cap.

I'm currently working on a project that is by Carol Dean Sharpe... she is an incredible bead artist. I have always admired her work and imagine my extreme delight as well as excitement when I found her in Step By Step Beads magazine... not just one issue, but in three issues thus far. I think she's going to have another project again for the July/August magazine. I absolutely detest Southwestern zigzag designs... I have never liked such designs. My husband loves that design as does our youngest daughter, Nicole who will be 21 on the 25th. Carol has a Southwestern zigzag or abstract peyote pattern in the March/April 2008 Vol. 6, NO 2 issue on page 39. I swore I would not make a bracelet like that. Well was I ever wrong! Nicole out of the blue decided to get her wrist, (yes the top of her left wrist) tattooed. Why on earth she decided to do that, I'll never know. She has to have it covered whenever she works. Her sister warned her not to get it on her wrist but what can you tell them at that age? They're gonna do what they're gonna do with or without our blessings. Well... the tattoo isn't small like she said it was going to be... it's a little over 2 inches in width... so I have to make her a bracelet so she won't have to wear her "Heads" sweats wrist band all the time.
I copied the pattern and put it behind a peyote graph but it ended up confusing me even more so... the cuffs that Carol makes is absolutely perfect in width for me, but for my daughter, I have to make the cuff wider so her tattoo cannot be seen on the job and when she's interpreting which is a major distraction. I have never used a graph before and am trying to figure out how to make the cuff wider and keep the design neat. I thought about doing a mirror image but it will look awful eventually. I haven't purchased the Bead Tool program. I know purchasing that program will be a huge help. I wouldn't even be able to use the pattern on the program without the designer's permission, in this case, Carol Dean Sharpe. I need to make it at least 47mm or maximum of 2 inches in width. The length is something anyone can do... What I think I'll do is email the designer of the pattern and ask her if she has a program to extend the design of the pattern to the width I need. Or I'll ask her if I could please have her permission to play with the same design after I purchase Bead Tool and go with the width I need. I just hope Bead Tool won't be all that difficult. I cannot believe how swiss-cheesed brain I am over this one little thing. I keep thinking if I make the 2" width with extended zigzags, it's going to look wicked, busy and just tacky... The whole design is just one I don't like at all. I'm very much into spirals, circles and anything with soft edges... nothing rough, cut, sharp, harsh lines, harsh edges... I'm going to be using different colours. After I make her this bracelet, I'll make different designs.
There is another pattern that I actually like that Carol designed... it's in Step By Step Beads Vol. 6, NO. 3 on pages 20 - 21. It's a nice, lovely design and much softer. I've never done a 3-drop peyote stitch before... so it'll be nice to do this after I complete the bracelet cuff for Nicole. The spirals, dots and whatnot is being saved for another time. I don't want to get ahead of myself too much and then end up having UFO's all over the place. I've got several UFO's around the house... I'm so desperate to complete just one thing but must pay an additional 'lovely' $45 to a teacher who taught the stitch... I cannot for the life of me figure out what I did wrong and I just cannot justify having to pay $45 just to ask her to look at it to tell me what I did wrong... There's a place further out north east that automatically help anyone for free so I'll bring it there when I'm feeling up to it and see if someone can figure what I did wrong and get me back to where I need to be so I can finish it. It's the one piece I'm so anxious to finish because of the colours. I absolutely the bracelet but not the way it is right now. It's in front of me and every single time I look at it, it frustrates me because I cannot figure it out. Soon I'll have it taken cared of and I'll be wearing it proudly!
For those of you who are not familiar with Carol Dean Sharpe's work, please do visit her at her blog and also at her Etsy site. You'll see right away why I like her work very much. I especially like her personality... always positive and happy.
If I have Carol's permission, I will share my photos of the work in progress using her design. The only change that will appear is that it will be much wider than the cuff shown in her pattern. I personally like her size as I'm not big on wide bracelets... (I may accept some depending what it is)... Now if I do not have Carol's permission to share my work in progress, I am not going to do that. I will only show the final-finished piece. First I've got to figure out how to enlargen the piece & still make it look nice.
I am sincerely looking so very much forward to coming back with photos and whatnot! I miss blogging.