Thank you to all the Mayday Attendees!

Mayday Underground was a success!
We had a steady stream of attendees and I heard lots of positive feedback on the quality of the vendors. I also received lots of complements on my pendants and loose beads for sale, and better yet had lots of buyers.
Thank you to everyone who came to the show, everyone who commented on my beads, and especially to everyone who loved them enough to part with valuable cash to take them home.

These are now sold! Thank you!

The Pendant Game

Here's some of the new pendant designs I'm working on, bad photography and all:

Somehow I managed to order glass rods that are either too small or too big to make the pendants I originally intended. And the murrini wasn't nearly thin enough. So, perfectionist that I am, I put in an order for yet more glass. Funny, I do the same thing with seed beads. Not the perfect color? Buy more! Good for art. Bad for the wallet.

At least I found out that my little torch will cut through 1" clear rods. Good to know.

My first show of the year is in one week! MayDay Underground - April 28 at The Village Gate in Rochester.

See the NEW Show Schedule section to the right? Now you'll know where I'll be this summer. Just in case you see something you like....

Kelley

The Countdown Begins!

Are you up for a virtual craft and art fair scramble? I'm not, but I am getting prepped for real this year! Follow along as I try to get all my ducks in a row for my first real-live, three-day, need-a-tent festival.

So where are we going? Not just to any ol' place, but back to Ithaca, NY. Back "home" as it were. I was raised there, graduated college there (Cornell, class of '97 for those that care), got married there, and moved away 13 years ago for sunny Florida. Now I'm back in NY and looking forward to vending at the first art festival I ever went to and thought, "Hey, I want to do that."

So where am I in the process? I have tables and displays, pendants and earrings, and some beading kits based  on designs I made for classes last year, but everything needs a good re-vamp. The table coverings need to be lengthened, glass animals need to be made, lampwork beads, pendants and more beads, and kits need to be put together. A tent, of course, and new signage. My head is spinning.

First up: making murrini for the center of my new "water" theme pendants. Glass is on order and will be here tomorrow! (So happy I found Wale Apparatus, a glass distributor on the east coast. They ship same-day, and it gets here in only 1 or 2 days!)

Here's the pendant I'm making more of:

I sure hope my little Mega Minor Burner is up for the job!

More soon,

Kelley

www.kelleysbeading.com 

Summer is Coming!

The warm spell that hit the Northeast these last few weeks is gone, but it impressed on me that summer will come again! With that, I got busy applying for summer shows.

This year, I'm targeting the mid-size show scene. For the first time, I'm also applying for shows that require a tent. I don't have a tent, yet, but I do have my eye on the new 10X10 TrimLine that many other artists are raving about. It has a skylight to help light my work, and a vent opening in the front and rear canopy areas to help keep things cool inside.

Somehow, in my mind, you've "made it" when you have a tent full of items you'd keep if you could. Ever since my first festival  in Ithaca, NY--where I was raised--I've wanted to be a part of the festival scene. I didn't know until much later that my love for the little glass figurines my parents collected would turn into a fascination with glass that I could fill a tent with, but now I get it! I've moved my little studio inside the house so I can work in any weather (not the gas tanks, though; they're still outside where they belong). 

So far, I can tell you I'll be at Mayday Underground Crafts & Art Fest on April 28th at the Village Gate in Rochester, NY, and at the Damascus Shriner's Cruz Nights--with their awesome classic cars!--on Fridays on Bay Rd in Webster, NY from May 11 throughout the summer. I'll list more events as I hear back.

Since I can't have a post without a picture, here are some of my new beadwoven rivoli earrings, on sale at summer shows, and on Etsy. (I know, they're not lampwork, but a girl's gotta have more than one trick up her sleeve!)

Happy Spring!