Charmed Kisses

Combine these PMC charms and clasp and Sarah Moran's Smooches button and what do you get? Yep, new work. Finally. This is what I took out of the kiln this afternoon (after, you know, brushing, burnishing, dipping and polishing). I'm particularly happy with the way the heart-and-arrow toggle clasp came out. I was originally going to make three dimensional box beads for the letters, but I liked the play on words "charmed kisses" or "charming kisses", so I ended up just making simple silver charms, instead. Hopefully, it will work, once it's all strung together. It feels good to be finishing up another piece. Lately, it seems that I just haven't had enough time to spend working on PMC and lampworking. (You'll have to imagine me shaking my fist here and saying something pedantic, like "Damn you, Life, how dare you get in my way?")(...Erm, on second thought, don't.)

Having said that, of course, I did have enough time to visit the bead show on Sunday and throw myself recklessly in the way of temptation. This is a bi-annual show that's held by our local art center. It's small, but it usually has a good selection of vendors and artists in attendance. Plus, it supports the local art center which is always a good thing (I have only altruistic motives when I go, of course).

I did run into a bit of a puzzle this time - half of the exhibitors, when they said hello to me, started cocking their heads to one side, sort of like the way a parakeet does when it says "Polly wants a cracker, squawk" (or whatever - does any bird actually say this? Such a cliche). Various wild scenarios ran through my fertile imagination, to account for this odd behavior. After rejecting a number of them, I finally encountered an exhibitor who commented that she'd never seen a fortune cookie fortune used like that before. I like to test-drive my new pieces at bead shows to see what, if any, reaction I get - and, of course, I was wearing my "Good Fortune" necklace with the sideways dangling fortune cookie fortune focal. Yep, it turns out that everyone was just trying to read the fortune on the necklace. On the whole, I interpret this as a good sign for the necklace, although maybe it just demonstrates how peculiarly irresistible those little fortunes are. Or (although I hate to admit it), maybe they were all thinking that if anyone were eccentric enough to actually wear one around her neck, it must be unusually profound? Not that it's bothering me or anything.

Anyway, I know I promised a photo of my haul from the show today, but I'm afraid I'm coming down with a cold (caught from the Husband, undoubtedly), so I'm going to try to finish up my chores for the night and toddle off to bed. I'll have the photo tomorrow (I know you are all waiting with bated breath for this one).

Thanks for stopping by!