Pleasing Color Combos Made Simple

Color choices are very personal. And it is one of the questions that someone could possibly ask me that i would have an immediate answer for. Bluegreen. If i'm at the mall and i pass a sale rack of tops, i look for the bluegreen. They may have one, but it's never MY version of bluegreen.

Combining colors that work well together is a science. You don't need to know the scientific details in order to find a certain color combination pleasing. But if you are putting your own colors together, sometimes it's nice to have a guide. You've got your monochromatic schemes, your compliments, your analogs, your triads, your tetrads, and your accented analogs.

When i'm making my lampwork beads i have something like 70 different colors within reach. Although i have come up with some bad combos, my recent bone beads listings use some really nice, scientifically proven, color combinations that work. Sometimes i like to use a free interactive online color schemer like Color Scheme Designer 3. On this website, you can select an initial color, and then it will let you see what various colors will make for pleasing combinations with it. Fun to play with.

That Crazy Cat

I had to come up with a cat bead for a wonderful customer. And that is how this cool design was born, and i'm cazy about it. I want to spend a few days working out some more color schemes for them. But the kitty beads have to wait until i get about 20 sock monkey beads made! More on those in a future blog post. The red crazy cat is available now in the shop.

Paw Print Key Fob

A customer asked if i could make beads with dog paw prints, so i had to make a few to find out. I turned one of the resulting beads into a key fob. I think i shall have to make a few more, as i have several floating keys on my key rack, and the paws look really pretty.

Little Black Dress Beads

I can't help thinking how awesome these beads would look worn as the sole splash of color with a little black dress. I have this set available in my etsy shop now. I wonder how a set in amber and magenta on black would look...

Teal Vermiform Beads

I like the little windows of transparent teal glass in the ivory glass of these "vermiform" (how i've begun referring to this style of bead). This set of ten beads is in my etsy shop now. They feel really nice to handle; their irregular shapes gives them an air of being antique and handmade and thereby "special". lol

New Beads

More bones this week: this is a nice trio of transparent cobalt blue bones with blue blossoms. Definitely not Halloween bone beads. And i made a set of very colorful vermiform beads. They don't look as wormy in bright colors as they do in murky colors. And that's probably a good thing. All of these are in my etsy shop now.

Brenda's Bones

These bright shiny glass bone beads (plus another half dozen) are going to a lovely lady in Colorado who turns them into suncatchers, which she then uses in fund raisers for the canine organizations near and dear to her heart. For example, Stiggy's Dogs, which unites military veterans with rehabilitated shelter dogs. She is just one of the truly special people i have had the good fortune to meet through my beadmaking business.

New Tab Beads

Well, not so new since i made the same kind several years ago, but these are hot off the torch and are going to be made into a bracelet for a friend of my mother. Don't you just love the blue/green!? I call this style faux dichro, because it looks quite a bit like dichroic glass (only cheaper, shhhh). Ya'll feel free to contact me if you need a set of these for your own selves now... :-D

In other doings, i have been making posy tortoises again, and more hearts, also. I remember when i struggled so badly trying to make glass heart beads. I do believe, i've got it down now. :-) See new hearts and turtles in my etsy shop now.

My sales on etsy continue to be achingly slow. The improvements etsy has made to the search options seems to have been the cause. I have revamped all of my titles and tags, to optimize this change as far as i can determine, and i swear i'm having fewer views, and fewer sales. The folks at etsy say it is better that folks can search more relevantly. And they argue that you don't need someone in your shop who didn't ask to be there. I say that has meant fewer people stumbling upon my beads. If you don't know what you're missing, how can you buy it? If you have ever used etsy, you know that the coolest stuff, is the stuff you happen upon by accident. It is part of the greatness of a site like etsy that brings so many diversely talented folks, and their diverse wares, together in one place. Perhaps it is time to try ebay again.

Sparkling Bones

I finally have some more bone beads in the etsy shop. They are listed by color. And speaking of color, don't you love that light purple glass? It's Effetre/Morreti 081 Dark Lavender. My camera pops the pink a tad too much, but you really can see both pink and blue in the glass, at the same time. A very pretty purple.

Mouse Bead

One of my customers requested a mouse bead and this is the little cutie that came about. (She also requested a frog, but that result was too obnoxious to show! and i've got to go back to the torch to redeem myself.)

Rumply Rope Beads

...or something... i don't know what to call them. I can imagine something organic being used as spacers (agate, wood, horn) between them for a bracelet. These are in the shop now.

Trying Owls

oh boy, i really tried not to jump on the owl band wagon, i did. But when you have a little niece that is owl crazy, you have to think of owls often. So i tried some owl beads. The were born in order, l. to r. I'm not happy with any of the wings and tails, and one of my kids pointed out kindly that "not all owls have ears, you know," and one of the beaks fell off. But i do like some of the eyes, and feathers, and colors. I shall persevere.

And this is our sweet new little guinea pig. Her name is Sudsy, and she is the nicest soft colors of white, cream, and dark grey.

Toothy Sock Monkey Smiles

A series of toothy sock monkey beads will be entering my shop soon. Please meet "Wesley," first on the scene.

Goldfish Bead

"Girls Who Keep Goldfish"

by Jazz Butcher

Girls who keep goldfish
Interest me strangely
Girls who keep goldfish
Fascinate my mind
What are they doing here?
Why are they here at all?
Chorus:

Hey I'd like to know - Those fish are awful small (x2)
Goldfish are silent under the water
Girls who keep goldfish
Are sometimes quite loud
Is there a reason?
Should it happen at all?

Chorus

Goldfish or Mondays are life as it should be
Goldfish are grateful for sun and for food
Is there a secret?
Oh is there a secret at all?

Chorus (x2)

Red or Green?

Here is my entry for the July New Mexy Etsy Team Challenge. The challenge was to make something that was inspired by the question: red, or green? For non-New Mexicans, this question means "do you want red chile or green chile with that food?"

I made 14 glass chiles and strung them as a ristra. I made a green chiles glass bead, and a sombrero-wearing sock monkey lampwork glass bead. I fashioned them all into a rather bold pendant using sterling silver findings and chain. Sombrero sock monkey and I like both red AND green, and appreciate the option!

Sock Monkey Classics

It has been a while since i made sock monkey beads, but a customer recently requested a couple, which got me thinking how neat they are, and so i made a few more. The classic Fez, and touque versions, are currently in the etsy shop.

Also, a really nice crusty old tortoise. His shell spots are actually made with copper green glass that reduced around the edges, but i don't why it did that since i didn't remember overheating it... But cool beans, i'm glad it did reduce like that! (I probably couldn't replicate this result.)

The Black Sheep

A nice little black sheep glass bead, with gun metallic wool is in the etsy shop today. I'm very pleased with the dimensions on this one and the head has a perfect attitude, in my humble opinion. :-)

Some Pretty New Crow Beads

Finally! New beads. These are in the shop now.

I like beads that look handmade, as opposed to being made in a bead pressing machine. I like a little variation, particularly in color, but a little variation in size and shape doesn't put me off usually. But since i'm in the business of selling beads, not buying them, i get into this mindset where i don't think my beads are perfect enough for public consumption. Eventually i always argue myself back to a position of: i make beads that i like and people don't have to buy them if they don't like them. And then my job/hobby is enjoyable once more. :-)

Dirty Pink Tutu

>snort!<

How's that for a descriptive name for these beads...?

Available in my etsy shop The Bead You Need.

Dirty Limerick Beads

You know how it's so much easier to say "That would be a great name for a band!" and then plan on some day getting that band together, rather than sitting around with your band and trying to come up with a name? It's a moment of inspiration. Or at my age it is more often "Wow, that would be an excellent title for a book!" and then plan to write that book some day. I'll never write the book. And i'm pretty sure i'll never have a book sitting there on the desk all written and i'm trying to come up for a title for it. I often have a set of beads already made that i will need to come up for a name for in order to list them on etsy.

But sometimes we actually act on those backwards eureka moments. Yesterday i had this thought: "Dirty Limerick would be an excellent name for a set of beads." So i made some beads to go with the name. I don't think i'm quite finished with this pattern and these colors yet, so it may end up being a large set.

I'm fond of limericks and wrote a dirty limerick especially to go with the beads. It goes something like this:

A girl named Elizabeth Schmidty
Had a big hairy mole on her titty.
Her foot was a stump
And her back had a hump.
She said "Thank god my left elbow is pretty!"

And no one wants these beads now! lol