Time to show off some ingredients!

Well, what happy news I got from Lois this morning that her bead soup has arrived!  What a relief, as I had that little seed of doubt when the post office tried to confuse the heck out of me.  So without any further ado let me tell you all about my partner and the soup I sent her. 

I didn’t tell you all about Lois Moon de Padilla before, since one of the things I was immediately drawn to on her blog directly inspired the soup I sent.  I saw this peacock cuff and just couldn’t resist.  Seriously gorgeous.  I’m not sure what kind of Voodoo Lori Anderson gets up to with her pairings, but whatever it is that magic is well honed, with this the sixth Bead Soup Blog Party.



When we connected by email basically Lois and I discussed that we were open to possibilities.  Actually, I did say that I don’t care for yellow but if it was part of her plan I would take on that challenge.  Lois quickly and rightly summed up that we both have interest in poppies and peacocks.  Since I had been working with poppies that felt too easy.  Her mentioning peacocks just cemented the initial idea in my mind.  So I plucked a peacock feather from off my wall (it was tucked behind a little framed elephant) and used it as my jumping off point.  I figured it would be hard to go wrong with something as lovely as a feather, right? I did worry a bit about how robust it would be, but really how gentle are birds with their feathers? So I jumped in and made the focal and some coordinating pieces with the feather – hope for the best, right? why not give it a try, right? Can you tell how nervous I was to start!

You see I felt a bit wide eyed rookie paired up with Lois, who already has three bead soups under her beady belt.  Just check them out -  this one is first up


Yummy! Then there was this one



This last one she made, amazing!



Here is where I come in, leaping big, here we go with the focal and accents I made from the feather


Since I was being so daring I really pushed the envelope with the clasp.  This started as a purchased bezel clasp which I embedded some feathers, from lower down the plume, into the clay.  I kept the rest pretty simple clay wise, just a dash of turquoise and a little texture.


Now I’ve followed the BSBP for some time and I’ve seen how much some people add, and while it’s really awesome I wanted to leave some room for Lois to add her own treasures so it wasn’t just “all me”, ya know? I opted for a bit of restraint with the rest of the coordinating bits and bobs.  Here’s all the polymer I made except for some little ones I found in my stash in the next picture.



Here’s the whole soup



I can’t wait to see what Lois does with this starting point.  I can’t wait to see what she sent (note the watched mailbox is an empty one!) and of course I can’t wait to see all the beautiful soups grow up into full meals of wonderful jewelry.