Stinky Dog Beads Part I

My fabulous friend Kitty has started a webstore with a truly awesome selection of beads (including art beads), findings and textiles--I've not seen this mix of items anywhere else. I give you: Stinky Dog Beads.

Evocative, yes? I guarantee you won't forget! Especially after you visit and peruse the inventory--you'll also be pleased by the great prices, regular discount offers, and quick shipping.

Here is a little taste of some of my favorites:

Among her unique offerings:
Art beads and findings by Lorelei Eurto, Golem Studio, Genea Beads, Birgitta Lejonklou, and Gaea Cannaday among others
Mykonos beads and findings
Shibori ribbon and Japanese Chirimen cording (even the really fat 7mm stuff!)
Wooly Wire
Lots of fabulous Czech glass
Rhinestone rondelle spacers (in black and brass finishes--squeeee!!!)
Czech superduos and rullas
Super funky chain
. . .  and lots more!!

I've become especially fond of the Mykonos items--they just scream ANCIENT GREECE to my pasty W.A.S.P. ears (my mother got Anthony Quinn's autograph in a restaurant once, I think this makes me an honorary Greek. Second generation twice removed.). I made this pendant below with one of the large rings:

Zorba's Treasure

I LOVE this super-rustic undyed waxed Irish linen cording--it's thicker than the regular 4-ply. I got a giant spool of it from Element Beads. Round copper beads and teal glass seed beads from Afrobeadia.

I finally found a home for my "book chain" experiment with this one, and used another large Mykonos ring, a bumpy drop (love dem bumpy drops), and a pair of cones:

Zorba's Other More Expensive Treasure

Those big teal glass ovals in both pieces are from Happy Mango Beads. I LOVE these big glass ovals, I wish they had more. I should have bought five strands of this color instead of one, because what will happen when I run out???? I can't say exactly but it won't be good.

Another item from Stinky Dog (it's catchy, isn't it?) I have become obsessed with is the Unicorn lampwork drops, particularly the "Midnight Special" color:

Trippin' on this

They're strange little beads. I admit I was completely perplexed how to use them at first--you can really only see the glass design when you're looking head-on at the bottom, the way they're oriented up in the picture there. When they're just hanging there like a regular drop, they don't look like much. How to get them to face forward like that all the time....EUREKA!!!

Star Factory

I fashioned little brackets for them from heavy gauge copper ball headpins that I hammered flat--when they're hanging on a wide strip of metal (as opposed to just a round piece) they don't turn around. I WIN. Keirsten-1, Naughty Beads-0. SHAZAM.

Zorba likes it. A lot.

Stay tuned for more Stinky Dog projects!

Four Questions

I recently received a blog comment that I had been linked to a post on another blog, Honey from the Bee, the blog of the delightful Janet Bocciardi. I clicked on the link and found I'd been tagged to answer four questions. I adore talking about myself, so I was thrilled, and it also introduced me to three blogs that she'd tagged that I wasn't familiar with. It's a way for me and you to discover something about four bloggers I admire as well, if I can come up with some clever and interesting questions of my own. If you like, if you are one of the four bloggers named below, you can answer my questions on your blog, and in turn choose four bloggers to pose your own four questions to.

Janet Bocciardi (Honey from the Bee) asked these Four Questions:

1. If you could take a trip anywhere in the world, where would you go and what would you want to see and/or experience?  I would like to go to Greece (although maybe not right now), and the Greek islands.  I would love to see all those cool historical sites that remain from the heyday of Ancient Greece (and before! like the Minoans)--what a phenomenal culture, and how much we owe to them for our ideas on government, mathematics, philosophy, science, etc. I would love to see the Aegean, and the whitewashed villages, and the sun. I miss the sun. We don't have that here. And I would love to experience authentic Greek cuisine. Every. Single. Day. I ADORE Greek food and Mediterranean food in general. I could eat it every day. I would eat falafel for breakfast if I knew how to make it right. And lunch and dinner. With tzatziki and pita. With a side of stuffed grape leaves. And some olives.
2. What is your favorite craft tool and why?  I would have to say my basic chasing hammer; it echos my interpersonal style. And you can turn metal wire into cool stuff with it.
3. White or dark meat?  White. Unless it's Blair Underwood.
4. What do you wish you invented? An utterly foolproof method to make absolutely convincing counterfeit money.

Now, four questions of my own:

1. Tell me one big thing in your life that you had the opportunity to do, but didn't, and always wished you had.
2. What is the most favorite outfit (clothes) you ever had? Of your whole life? Describe it to me in detail (sequins, fairy wings, go-go boots and all).
3. What is your favorite thing about yourself? It can be an ability, a learned skill, a character quality or a personality trait. Or maybe it's your hair.
4. If you had all the time in the world, every day, to devote to some completely frivolous but wickedly fun pursuit, what would it be?

And hopefully answered by:
Melissa Meman of Melissa Meman Design
Leslie Zabel of Bei Mondi Jewelry
Beryl Morago of Beryl Street Crafts
Lori Anderson of Lori Anderson Designs

An Aegean Adventure

In your mind. Without even leaving home. Or getting dressed. Except for this one thing.

Fathomless, glassy teal blue quartz like the sea; Soochow jade in translucent terra cotta, soft olive green, creamy celadon and caramel apple; golden jade in a dusty apricot; two lonely serpentine roundels in variegated moss green and black; and burnished copper.

Focal made in Ghana, West Africa--a stylized leaf medallion in a rustic melding of copper and brass; hand-formed copper chain and beadcaps; and Delica glass seed beads in captivating finishes--matte denim blue, and opalescent palest peach. Focal from Happy Mango Beads; seed beads from Fusion Beads.

Oh man, now I want some spanikopita. Really really bad.