Carribean Spice Tutorial

I listed this set today. It is so warm and exciting! Makes me crave summer! I used a really cool color of Lauscha for this set. It is a striking orange encased in clear. I pulled stringers from it for the little white beads with the raised dots. It makes the dots look swirled, they also glisten when light passes through them. I also used that rod to make the puffy petal beads. It makes them look layered in clear and orange. It is fun making these puffy petals. You need to make sure you have a good pair of thin scissors, I use some old cuticle trimmers I have, they work perfect. Then you want to make sure you have your stringers pulled if you want to accent between your puffy petals. Also, if you want to use frit for your puffy petals. You can decorate them however you want before you actually shape them. Once you have your base bead made you can decorate it. I rolled some of these in frit on the base and melted it in all the way. Once melted in you take the bead out of the flame to cool just a couple seconds, until your glow is gone. This will keep the bead from distorting and keep it evenly balanced while making your puffy petals. I heat one side to a glow then take my scissors and clip from the outside of the bead towards the center, be careful not to touch the mandrel. Then I make sure my petals are evenly balanced, if they aren't centered you can usually just barely push them into place with the point of the scissors. Then I turn the bead to the complete opposite side across from the petals I just made, to make sure I cut evenly, and follow through with the same steps on each side of the bead. You are making a total of 4 snips. Once you have cut all 4 sides you want to make sure the petals are all evenly separated and even, using the tips of your scissors to push them into place. Then I reheat my bead in the flame keeping my mandrel rotating at an even pace, watch your petals they should be rounding out but not closing in. Once you have your petals shaped the way you want them, use your stringer to evenly place a dot in between each petal. I like to use transparent colors for this, but you can use any color you like. Then you keep turning your bead in the flame till you have melted the dots a little, but not melted in, you want them to stay raised. They look like little jewels in between each petal. Voila! You have your puffy petal bead, make sure you anneal your precious petals in a kiln to eliminate any stress. I hope you can use this to create some awesome beads. Please feel free to post me some pictures of your finished product. Thanks for visiting my blog. I will post more tips on different styles of beads I make in the future. Until next time Happy Beading