Sylviebead Journal

Well, here we are... full circle. I'm at a point where I'm really ready to blog again. It was just about 7 years ago I started this thing. I know!!!!! I can hardly believe how time has flown.

So, since many of my readers might be new due to Facebook (ok... mom and Angie and Blair... I know you're probably the only ones reading this, but my site stats say differently). ANYWAYS... for any of you who wandered in here without knowing what in the heck is going on. Here's the recap...

I'm a glass beadmaker. What this means is that I take rods of glass, melt them in a flame and sculpt them into something that has a hole going through it (which makes it a bead). Most of the pieces I'm known for (pretty cool that I'm "known" for something) are my whimsical girly sculptures of mermaids. These pieces, although they can be used in jewelry designs are usually bought by collectors OR used as ornaments. I also make more basic beads to be used in jewelry.

For those of you who need a bit of a beadmaking education, google "lampwork glass beadmaking" or something similar. I'm sure you'll find some sort of info. You can also look at the books "How to Make Glass Beads" by Cindy Jenkins and her follow up book (that I'm in!) "Beads of Glass" or ISGB.org which is the International Society of Glass Beadmakers.

Wikipedia has a very basic explanation of lampwork glass beadmaking. Click here to read it.

The main question that I hear all the time about my own work is "so when do you paint the glass?" My work is not painted. Every bit of color is applied with molten glass. For lack of a better explanation, I "paint" with molten glass... mixing the colors in the flame ahead of time, making thinner strands of glass that I can use as my "brushes" when applying. This might not make sense, but hopefully it does... a little bit, anyways.

In addition, I design jewelry and beadwork projects which incorporate my glass beads. If you're not a beady person, this probably will bore you to tears... I'm just letting you know that now. Sometimes I have funny stories to tell and I almost always have music to talk about or coffee drinks to review, but the majority of what I talk about is "work" oriented.

Ok... back to the recap...

2001- I start an "online studio journal" to document the things that I'm creating in the studio. Mostly because I was getting e-mails from customers who bought pieces from me in person that were different from others that I was selling online. There were a lot of people who thought there were 2 "Sylvie Elise Lansdowne"s. Crazy, but true. I was getting several emails asking me if I knew there was someone else making beads with my same name!!

2002 - Due to my housefire, I lost the first few months of my blog (by then I knew that what I was doing was called a "blog") and started the new one. It's archived, but not on blogger. For someone feeling the need to catch up with my life (and needing to be put to sleep) there is a link on the right.

2002-2006 - I made beads and blogged about it, along with random entries about my life. At some point, I moved the blog to blogger and the look is a little different, but the substance the same. (It does make it easier!)

2006 - I had some health issues that made making beads very difficult due to tremors and I had to take a break. The leave of absence extended due to my becoming a single mom. I needed some time to devote to things at home.

2008 - I miss beadmaking. I'm ready to come back!!!!!!!!!!!!! (but I'm scared at the same time. It's been a long time in bead-years!!) I plan on setting up my studio again this weekend when my kids are away with their dad. I thought a good way to MAKE me get started would be by making a fresh start with my blog.

So, here I am. I'm taking the blog off "private" again and just putting myself out there.

I'm excited about what's to come!!!!!


and for you newbies... here's the deal with the coffee and music...

I once figured out that i had a horrible day in my studio when I didn't have coffee, so I started always noting whether I'd had coffee or not when I talked about my day in the studio. I also noticed that my work changed depending what sort of music I was listening to, so I decided to document that as well.

So... here's the little blah blah blah of today...

Coffee - made it myself for the 2nd day in a row!!!!! I'm letting go of my daily starbucks habit and have started making coffee in my very own kitchen!!! I'm thinking about getting some of those starbucks paper cups though... so that I can write my drink on them when I "order" and put my name on them in case I get confused which coffee is mine! Today's drink - Coffee with LOTS of milk and a bit of Tiaramisu Coffee Mate creamer.

Music - actually listening to a book on the ipod right now. It's "The Secret" which is a little new age-y for me BUT is full of some really good concepts for positive thinking. I think it's actually made a huge difference in how I'm looking at things right now.