Witches Brew Mandala Set (Halloween)

So I've already caught my mom trying to sneak this into her own jewellery box, even though I made it for myself from this awesome tutorial from i-Beads.

 I changed the colours to my own personal taste - pastel bordeaux and black matte superduos, mixed with purple iris seed beads and chinese crystals.

Obviously as this is someone elses design (purplefiona at FionaFiona) I can't sell it - this was made for me personally - and my mom when she decides to steal it!  I also made another one, which I'll post about shortly.  In the meantime here are some extra photos.

=:x

Pumpkin Netted Pearls Bracelet (Halloween)

My mom says this bracelet reminds her of the clementines you get at Christmas in the netted bags, and I'm inclined to agree with her.  Maybe I ought to change the holiday theme for this one?

 I used 12mm neon orange Swarovski pearls and placed them inside a length of black knitted wire.

I then twisted the knitted wire between each pearl to secure it before tying the ends to a silver toggle clasp.

=:x

Camille Bracelet

I thought today I would share with you a bracelet I made for myself recently from a tutorial from Spoilt Rotten Beads.  As I said last week, I've been looking into how to use two-hole beads in my beadwork.  I came across these new beads from France called Khéops Par Puca and instantly I was filled with a desire to own as many as I could afford and find out all the many ways I could use them.  As they are triangular, I can imagine they'd lend themselves to all sorts of different patterns and shapes.  I thought I'd better get comfortable with using them before I started hashing up my own designs.

The Kheops I used for this were the California Graphite - half gold, half gunmetal.  I also used Czech fire-polished crystals in iris brown, and the Toho seed beads outlining in the same shade.

To finish off I used a gunmetal clasp.

I also made my mom one, using silver Kheops and hematite beads and coloured seed beads.

=:x

My First Necklace

As I was going through the jewellery that needed to be re-photographed, I came across the first necklace I made at my therapy class.  This was got me started on this beading obsession.

 

It was just a simple beaded necklace.  I remember they didn't have anything purple in their selection so I chose these small bugle beads.

As you can see, a lot of the colour has worn off by now.  These days I rarely wear it as a necklace, instead I wrap it around several times and wear it as a bracelet.

 It's got me thinking about maybe making some more in different colours.
=:x

Happy Birth/Mother's Day!

I don't usually post at the weekend, especially when it's my birthday!  However I was silly enough to be born around Mother's Day here in the UK so today I have to share the celebration of my arrival on this Earth with celebrating the amazing woman who gave birth to me. I don't have much to offer, so I thought I'd add to the ever expanding collection of jewellery that I have made for her.
As you may or may not be aware, I adore semi-precious gemstones and they are my favourite to work with.  I love the random beauty of natural stones.  I was excited when one of my favourite sites [Beads Direct] to get gemstones were having a sale as it gave me an opportunity to work with a stone I've wanted to buy for a while - Druzy Agate:

Recycled Beads Ring

Another tutorial on Ruby's Beadwork caught my eye, and I thought it would be a nice way to use up some of the old beads I have lying around in my recycled bags.  I don't actually have that many beads in there to play around with though, as most of the stuff is earrings and brooches.
I've been trying to find uses for these milky glass beads that I have - which I think were glass pearls whose coating came off.  I've used them before (On A Sunny Day In England, Sweet Tooth Competition Prize and My Beating Heart) and this seemed like the perfect project to use up the rest of them

Gran's Locket Necklace

On the same theme as yesterday, my Gran also gave me this heart locket which contains a photo of her and my Grandpa at my Mom's wedding.

Grandma's Ring Necklace

Here's my first "make" post of 2015!

This was my first Christmas without my Gran.  Before her dementia got really bad, she gave me her Mother's wedding ring.  She unfortunately lost her own in the care home where she was staying and we've never found it.  This ring is too big for me to wear, and rather than spending unnecessary money getting it refitted, I used my latest love of beadwork to turn it into a necklace.

 

Butterfly Garden Set

Despite hating pink and "girly" things, every once in a while, I do surprise those around me by liking something girly.

My American supplier had a gorgeous pendant with a butterfly embossed on it and some beautiful two colour beads (Rose & Peridot).  I had no idea that by combining the two, I'd end up with something this...well, girly: 

Butterfly Garden Necklace

 All of the beads are glass and you may recognise the silver flower spacers from the Calypso necklace.  As you can see, I'm still having fun with wire.  I threaded the wire through the holes in the pendant and wrapped them into spirals of varying size, which I think makes an intresting focal.  

Hanging from a line of small crystal glass beads is the fringe, which I made from turquoise, light green and lilac beads.  The colors are supposed to represent the gradual change of the colour of the sky throughout the day, with crystal clouds on top of course!

Next I alternated the rose and peridot rice beads with the crystal beads, which to me is the dusky pink of the evening sky in the butterfly garden, slowly turning into night. (I'm a writer, I'm allowed to have imagination!)

Round crystal beads with Rose & peridot beads

Finally, to tie it all together I decided to use ribbon, but I didn't want it too wide.  Fortunately, a friend of mine makes the most amazing candles and soaps (please check out her site - One Stop Pamper), and her candles are tied with tiny white ribbons!  So guess where I got these from? ;)

Candle ribbons

One of those, I'm not sure if it's the left or the right is from her Butterfly Meadows votive candle, so it actually smells like a butterfly garden too!

The Earrings took a little more thought.  I'd run out of the rose and peridot beads and I was fast running out of the crystal beads too.  So I decided to carry on the fringe effect from the necklace.  None of the butterfly charms I had, matched the feel of the necklace, so I used these dragonfly charms instead, which are equally as good.  I hung them from the hoop I made from some left over wire.

Butterfly Garden Earrings

Irene's Present

In April, my Gran asked me if I could make her a necklace as a birthday present to give to her next door neighbour.  I then found out her birthday isn't until November!  I showed her the beads I had and we deliberated for a very long time.  Mainly because my Gran, unfortunately doesn't have much of a talent for visualising.  To make it easier for her I asked what Irene's favourite colours were and I could build around that.  My Gran replied that she didn't know, she'd lived next to the woman for over 50 years and still didn't know that much about her!  My head hit the desk.

Anyway, we eventually discovered her favourite colours were red, black and green and I got to work mid August.  When I took the finished necklace to my Gran for her thoughts, she was admiring my bracelet (the one in this post).  We agreed I'd make one as an addition to the necklace for Irene.  


Now I've got photos of the necklace, but I forgot to take photos of the bracelet before I gave it to my Gran.  When I next go over to my Gran's I'll try to remember to get a photo.

My Gran wanted something light and long enough to fit over Irene's head so she wouldn't have to fiddle with a clasp.  I used the rest of the red seed beads I had left from the Americana set and alternated with black fire polished beads.  On the right side I added a copper petal connector, which I manipulated into a flower.  On the second strand is a mix of emerald green seed beads and more of the black Czech glass beads.

As a focal, I peyote stitched black coral and green seed beads together and wrapped it around the strands to make it look knotted.  On the ends of the strands are red acrylic bicone beads and light green Czech glass beads.  I hope Irene likes it.  I'll let you know!


I posted this to give you a glimpse of the customisation process.  This design was loosely based on one I made my Gran for Mother's Day (Sorry I don't have a better photo):

Girls 'n' Pearls Set

I bought some beautiful vintage style findings, cabochons and cameos from America and I've been dying to use them in something.  I mixed them with my great-grandmothers pearls (fake), which gives it this really elegant look.  Although not when I'm using my hot wheat pack to show how it hangs!  I really must invest in some displays!

Girls 'n' Pearls Necklace

Girl with Nightingale cameo on Oxidized Brass setting

Earrings

I've plenty more of these antique/vintage style findings (I went a bit mad!) and I love making this style of jewellery.  You can be sure that there will be more like this, actually for sale soon.

If you would like me to make you something similar to this, please feel free to contact me at: kymberligee@gmail.com with "Girls 'n' Pearls" in the subject line.

Fun with wire & beads

The last few weeks I've mainly been testing out new techniques and having fun with new designs.  These aren't for sale, but they give you an idea of what I've been doing and what things you can expect to be coming to X99 Jewellery.

Celtic loop ring

Purple & grey Lattice Bracelet

The lattice bracelet is customisable, as I'll show you later with one I was commissioned to make for my Gran.

Peacock Set

I've had this peacock feather (bought when I was a kid) lying around, and it's always getting lost.  So I thought, why not make something out of it that won't be so easily lost, so I made this for myself.

 

First I cut the feather as close to the plumage as I could, but I didn't throw the other bit away.  I'll show you what I did with that later.  I wrapped copper wire around the top and around a copper jump ring several times for security. 

 

I used the many different coloured semi-precious stones I had to emulate the graduating colours of the feather itself.  I started with Goldstone flecked Bluestone chips on either side of the feather pendant.

I didn't have any purple beads that matched the shade I wanted, so I went for turquoise instead.  This is "S" shaped Blue (dyed) Lemon Turquoise.

 I then threaded different sized Antique Bronze metal beads onto pins and bent them into a marquise shape and hung these pear shaped - Turquoise (dyed) Picasso Jasper beads from them.

 There's two thin lines of brown either side of a bright green before it fades into the beautiful dark green colour on the feather.  So to emulate this, I got to use my new brown acrylic beads and lime silver lined seed beads.

 Finally I ended with one of my favourite semi-precious stones - Malachite.

 And it's all connected with an antique bronze barrel clasp.

 So what did I do with the rest of the feather?  I stripped it and made earrings!

 A couple more malachite chips and Capri blue beads for distinction...

 

and voila! Peacock earrings.

 

I have no idea what the price is as I was just having fun.  I can't replicate this design at all, it's just something I made for myself.  I do plan to do more work with feathers though, so keep checking back!

Wavy Cage Ring

I was playing around with aluminium wire the other day and ended up with this really cool ring:

I manipulated the wire with my pliers and ended up with this wavy pattern.

I finally have a ring mandrel so I'll be able to recreate this.

Email Me for more information!

Greek Earth Set

This is the set I made my Mom for her birthday.  She wanted something striking, so I mixed semi-precious stones with a mixed selection of brown glass beads. The list of semi-precious stones include; amethyst chips, smoky quartz chips, lapis lazuli chips, and wooden agate beads.  The rest of the beads are; Czech fire polished light green glass beads, antique bronze spacers, and some lime silver lined spacers.

The pendant is "S" shaped light green veined Jasper topped with wooden rondelles that were off an old pair of earrings.

 

On the earrings, the beads are a mixture of glass shapes, amethyst chips and smoky quartz chips hanging from Greek metal pendants.

 

This set isn't for sale and cannot be recreated. Sorry. :(

Amethyst Chip Set

I bought this necklace for my Mom...

When I got into jewellery making, she asked if I could make her some earrings to match...

Not only did I make the earrings, I also made a ring...

...and a bracelet.

This is the whole set together.