FOs on parade!

I've got a bunch of Finished Objects to share with you. First up: my husband's scarf, made with Malabrigo Rios in Pearl Ten and Azul Profundo. It's a Seeded Rib Easy Reversible Scarf. Here it is in a not-quite-finished state, being modeled by our friend Pudgy the moose:

And here's the finished version (with sunlight streaming through the blinds):

It was hard to get a decent pic of the finished version because it's really long! Hubby wanted a long scarf. He's been wearing it constantly. We're both very happy with it!

Next up: my crocheted Quick Top-Down Mitts in Jill Draper Makes Stuff Hudson superwash wool yarn. I had this yarn left over from my Honey Cowl, and I was hoping it would be enough to make these mitts. It was, and I have a tiny bit left over! I've been wearing these quite a bit.

I finally finished my Dew Drop Cowl in Queensland Sugar Rush yarn. I will wear it in the spring. Here it is:

It looks really good after blocking. I should've used a stretchier bind-off, though. The pattern recommended one but I was too chicken to try it. Oops. Anyway, I blocked the heck out of it! It's definitely wearable and looks pretty.

Next, some jewelry. Here is a pair of earrings I made for my friend for Chanukah:

Sterling silver with black onyx and green turquoise beads, and the big round beads are fair trade wooden ones from India. They match a necklace I gave to the same friend a while back. I don't think I ever posted a pic of the necklace in this blog. I am going to remedy that now!

Here's a close-up of the clasp. It's a hammered silver toggle clasp and I really like it.

My friend had told me what beads she wanted in the necklace - I just had to put them together in a cohesive design. I hope she wears the necklace and earrings in good health. Honestly, I hope she wears whatever she wears in good health! She's a great friend.

And last but not least, here is a necklace I made with beads from Olga Manina's Etsy store that were bought for me for my birthday in November 2014 by my grandmother, who recently passed away at the age of 99. I miss her terribly.

I didn't get a really great picture - I would prefer to take one on a white background at some point so the colors in the beads are clearer - but this will do for now. I picked out the beads (my grandma had dementia and probably had no idea she was buying them for me - my mom was in charge of her finances at that point), but I still think of her and remember her fondly every time I wear it or even look at it.

Love you, Grams.

New adventures in necklace-making, other business goings on, and a little crochet

Thought I'd start out this entry with a nice big pic of my smiling face. (Yeah, I probably should've put on some make-up, but my husband didn't give me much warning before he took this!) And what's that around my neck? Could it be...a brand new handmade necklace using fabulous green Israeli ceramic beads? Why, yes, indeed it is!

(If you look closely, you'll notice that I'm also wearing my own personal pair of Bali sterling silver puff bead dangle earrings.)

The ceramic beads are handmade and hand-painted by needy elderly people in Jerusalem, and I buy straight from the organization that employs them--it's a total win/win scenario, because they get the support they need and I get really interesting and completely unique beads to work with. I have a lot of these beads to play with right now, in a variety of different colors. It's very exciting.

I absolutely love this new necklace, which I finished last night. The larger round beads have silver glitter on them, and the smaller beads don't; the smaller ones are a slightly different shade and are textured. I've put fair trade greenish pearls (I say "greenish" because some look pretty green and others look more like peacock pearls) on either side of each of the ceramic beads. In between the ceramic bead and pearl combinations are Japanese seed beads in black, dark rainbow and silver. The seed beads make a nice asymmetrically colored design, which I think is spectacular, not that I'm biased. ;)

I finished the necklace off with sterling silver round beads, sterling crimp ends and a plain sterling silver toggle clasp.

It will be for sale in my Etsy store once I've taken good pictures and figured out what the price should be. Pricing is always a little tricky. It's very mathematical--I don't just pull my prices out of thin air. I have to figure out the costs of all the supplies involved and other expenses incurred in making each piece and listing it on Etsy, and then I have to multiply that amount by a certain number and hope that will make me a profit. Definitely lots of hope involved.

I also have a really gorgeous unakite and sterling silver necklace that I will be listing soon. It also needs to be priced first, but at least I already have the photos. I had never worked with unakite before. The more I looked at it, the more enamored I became with the gemstone's color combination of moss green and coral.

Here's a picture of it:


In other Smiling Turtle news, today I shipped off 2 sets of stitch markers to Chile (a woman ordered them for her aunt who lives there), and I will soon be sending a set to Minnesota. I've also had items featured in 2 treasuries (links below):

I'd Rather Make My Own Gift, Thank You Anyway! by PlainJane4 (A cool DIY-themed treasury! Right up my alley!)

and

My hearts a flutter by glamourpusscouture (Hearts and butterflies! Um, also sorta right up my alley.)


As far as my crochet goes, not much to report. OK, nothing to report. *sigh* Most of my creative energy and time is going toward beading at this point. I have yet to start that baby hat I wrote about. My Stitch & Bitch group is working on hats and scarves for a local children's hospital. I started a scarf at our last group, but got really bored with just a simple single crochet pattern, so I'm trying to figure out a good stitch or pattern for a kid's scarf (gotta be unisex for this).

I looked on Ravelry for kids' scarf patterns, but couldn't find anything that fit the bill. (I wouldn't know how to modify an adult pattern to fit a kid--I don't know kids' sizes that well, and I don't really know how to modify patterns.) I should check Donna Kooler's Encyclopedia of Crochet, which I have at home.

Any suggestions from my stitchy friends? (Crochet only, please!)

More stitch markers and some gemstone necklaces

I have been making a lot of jewelry and stitch markers lately. Not so much crochet...I do need to finish my friend's scarf for next week, though! Yikes! Well, OK, I don't have to, I just would like to have it finished by the next time I see her. Better get crackin'.

I made a whole bunch of stitch markers last night, including a special order for a set of 6 coffee bean stitch markers and a new set of hummingbirds and flowers stitch markers. I also made some with larger Czech glass purple flower beads, but I haven't listed them yet. And I listed the little flower stitch markers I'd mentioned in my last post. The picture came out looking like it was on a blue background, which is weird since it was on white; the colors of the markers look pretty true, but I will probably try soon to get pics that are not so blue-looking.

I made some labradorite goodies recently. I love labradorite; it's one of my favorite stones. It's generally gray, with a blue or green "flash" to it. This is a necklace I made for myself:


And with the leftover beads and some beading chain, I made this one to sell:

(The picture above is the same necklace as the one below, just wrapped around 3 times so you can see the beads a little better.) I wouldn't mind keeping this necklace for myself, either; but I'm going to try not to be greedy with the labradorite! The necklace is a little more than 20" long. I've been into long-ish necklaces lately (I probably would've made it even longer if I'd had more beads to use).

After finishing that one, I made a necklace with some lovely unakite beads. Here's a picture of that necklace in progress, in my "studio" (ha ha):

I had just started stringing it when I took the picture. As you can (maybe sort of) see, it's got unakite cube beads and oval beads, separated by little sterling silver spacer beads. It came out to be about 20" long. I took a chance and used a clasp that isn't silver, but that I thought went with the feeling of the piece. The only sterling silver toggle clasps I have are very small and plain, and this is not really a small and plain necklace, in my opinion.

I have the day off tomorrow, so I'm looking forward to working on that scarf some more and maybe making some more jewelry (I'd love to make a unakite bracelet to go with the necklace! And maybe some earrings?!)

Jewelry preview - not yet listed

Here are a few things that haven't made it into The Smiling Turtle Etsy store yet, that I just wanted to show off.


This is a choker made from pink Czech glass coin beads and purple Czech glass fire polish teardrop beads, with some fair trade Bali silver beads. It has a teardrop and Bali bead dangle on silver chain, as well as a silver chain extender on the end of the choker.


Jade and fair trade Bali sterling silver necklace and earrings. The necklace has a fair trade Thai silver rose pendant in the middle.


Light jade and Chinese crystal earrings and bracelet. (There was a necklace, too, but it was sold before I got a picture of it!)

Click on any of these pictures to see larger versions.