Pretty Palettes Reveal for August

Hi all!

Wow, what a busy month!  I think I've created and blogged more this month than ever!  And, with our family grape harvest and caring for one of my sweet granddaughters, my time has been full.  But, there's always time for beading!  And, Erin's inspiration was amazing, as usual.  I love how she pulls inspiration from the natural world and is so informative in her posts!  I'm all about info - before the internet, I used to read the dictionary and encyclopedias! Now, I just search the internet!

Here was our inspiration for this month - one of earth's amazing places!

Fairy chimneys formed from volcanic rock, rise to the sky and have been carved out for churches, homes and hotels over the centuries.

This soft, volcanic rock called tufa or tuff is formed when deposits of ash are ejected from volcanic vents.  It's found all over the world from Turkey here to New Mexico to Easter Island to Italy.  Since it is soft and easy to carve, it has been used by many peoples for carving statues and building materials.  (See Wikipedia or your favorite encyclopedia for more info!)

Here's the wonderful selection of beads from Michaels that Erin picked to coordinate with the photo.  There's lots of great texture here with carved soapstone, shell, brown lava, twine-wrapped beads, copper rings and spacers and sparkly glass, but it all stays within a range of tans, browns and coppers.

The beads evoke the natural world and an ancient, tribal feel.  I used the twine-wrapped bead to make a tassel and wrapped it around a horn bead I had for the focal of the necklace.  Beaded copper chain completes the tassel.  I strung the soapstone and lava beads on twine.  Since the carved soapstone beads and copper have a pinkish tone, I picked that up with some speckled reddish seed beads in between the beads.  To end the necklace, I knotted between the seed beads and made a loop and bead toggle. 

Here is my necklace.  I decided to name it Earth Wanderer for all the places I'd love to see on this beautiful planet!

Earth Wanderer Necklace

And, here are my earrings.  The lightweight twine-wrapped acrylic beads and the wood rings make these very wearable.  They'll be perfect for fall.

I hope you will go here to see the amazing creations of Erin and her partner for this challenge, as well as all the other participants.  As usual, I admire everyone's creativity.  I always learn so much and find so many ideas that I want to try! Next month, I'm allocating more time!

Happy creating!

Terry