Bead Store Booty

Although I guess it isn't technically booty if you paid for it. For it to be booty you have to plunder it, like at sword-point. Or you have to win a battle or a war or something and then just take whatever's lying around after everybody flees or bleeds to death. I don't think filching it qualifies it as booty either, that would just be loot. Or if you went and broke the window at the bead store with a baseball bat during a civil uprising and looted it. That would be loot. I guess this was just...purchases. Such a dry, lifeless word for something so LIP-SMACKING TASTY!!!

OK, I only bought a little bit. There just wasn't that much that appealed to me. And unfortunately nothing from the $2 rack spoke to me. Bunch of chips, I don't like chips. Unless they're barbecue Kettle chips. Or plain Ruffles or classic Fritos.

So here are my ACQUISITIONS (oh, that's good--sort of Trumpy):

I don't know what these are. Aventurine? Carnelian? Red agate?

Crazy horse stone and I don't know what. Purple aventurine?

Little glass eggs. About the size of pistachios.

Dumortierite.

 

 

 

That's it. Aren't you proud of me? I could have bought more from the $6 table, but I decided I would only buy it if it spoke to me. "Pretty" was not good enough. Most of the stuff was strangely mute. I just didn't really have any idea what to do with it. Well, I guess I don't really have any idea what to do with those red and black tubes (it was sort of more of a muffled mumbling I heard. Sounded like gas). Or the eggs. And nothing really specific in mind for the orange rounds, but they would work so well in my "sunset sorbet" and brass pieces that I do every now and then. You can never have too much orange. Did I tell you I was a Buddhist monk in a former life? A lady at a carnival told me that. It doesn't look like the spiritual enlightenment part of that came with me this time around (I swore in a yoga class once), but (well, I guess I actually swore through a yoga class once) I still really like orange.

Booty from the Itty Bitty Bead Show

There was a bead show today in Kalispell that I went to. Just the other day I told myself, "No. More. Beads." Because I already have so many that one day when my eyes and my wits and my sphincters go I will still have some left. (The eyes and wits aren't what they used to be but the sphincters are still good.) But then I got this little flier granting me free admission to a bead show...

Well, as I expected, it was a pretty petite little show. About 9 or 10 small vendors. But I found some stuff that was reasonably priced, that I sort of had been wanting. I don't generally buy much locally (I prefer the scandalously low prices I find from the Goliath-sized Internet-based stores), but sometimes I find really cool stuff for a good price.

The stuff below was pretty reasonable, I thought, for regular retail, and there was a lot of gorgeous stuff actually. Fabulous pearls and gemstones. The stuff below is what finally hooked me:

Stick-shaped shell beads in deep iris green/blue, two strands of really reasonable blue-green magnesite, a few porcelain pendants (I like Chinese stuff), and some inexpensive metal beads and bead caps.


I grabbed up these pietersite barrels like Cruella DeVille at Puppies 'R' Us, and was captivated by the little tourmaline rounds; couldn't resist the little pomegranate pearls, needed some more amethyst purple glass beads for my Ultra Secret Christmas Designs, and grabbed the copper cones just because I like pointy things. Loved the ornate brass saucer beads--figured I could whip up some eye catching earrings with those without having to try.


Well, I feel cool now that I got to do my own Bead Show Post. I was feeling left out. I better go make something now.

Delicious Booty from the Sack of Troy

No, no, not THAT kind of booty, you pervert. PILLAGING booty. The spoils of war. My friend Alan said he thought the pendant pictured here looked like something pocketed during the sack of Troy. And by golly it is. Yes it is. Yeah. I bought it from a Turkish collector of antiquities for ONE MILLION DOLLARS.

Nah, actually I made it. The other day. I disassembled a pendant given to me by an Eritrean woman about 11 years ago (thank you, Meaza). I loved the little house pendant, and wanted to combine it with something really stunning. I adore these bronze pearls and thought that was just the ticket. I made another necklace, sans pendant (since there was only one) with more of the oxidized metal beads and pearls. I like that one too. The chain is hand forged by moi, also oxidized, just so, by moi.



I have lots more of the little metal heishi beads from the original pendant, and I think four more of the large metal beads. I don't really know what kind of metal they are--I'm thinking maybe a copper alloy, possibly bronze. Bronzes are fairly common in Africa, and I can see a lot of copper in the pendant. Could also be brass, as brass is an alloy of copper and zinc. But who knows, they don't really have a lot of safety legislation in Africa. Could be plutonium. Don't let any babies chew on it. And maybe you don't want to chew on it either. I wanted to but I didn't.