delicatebylou

February Already

Hi, this year seems to be going so fast, one minute it was Christmas and the next it’s the first of February. I have made two sculptures last month in between doctors’ appointments, setting up my laser cutter and catching up with friends and family. I have also been feeling a bit flat which is why this is my first blog post of the year.

So this is my first sculpture of the year. it is a part of the shapes series and is the biggest one to go in it yet.

for anyone interested it took me 23 days to make this, minus work, a few adventures and doctor’s appointments.

It is a truncated Icosidodecahedron made from 12 Icosidodecahedron halves, 20 Cubacthedron halves and 30 Octahedron halves.

Unfortunately it dose slump a little when it is sitting done but other wise it holds it shape well.

I mostly stuck to a prodcution line style when making this, going from the harder Icosidodecahedron to the easer Octahedron halves, before I started putting it together after some of the Octahedron’s were done.

Unfortunately, it pretty much used up all my yellow and black beads so I will have to wait to add more to this collection, which is a bit frustrating as I have several things I really want to make, some smaller ones but also some big ones.

The next big one I want to add to the collection is this beauty. It will turn out bigger than anything I have made yet and will look totally amazing. it has been on my to-make wish list for ages now and I really hope to be able to make it this year! It would most likely take months to make.

If I have done the math right from eyeballing the photo I will need to make 640 pentagons, 1,100 squares and 400 triangles. I’ll have to get back to you for the bead count on that.

Ugh it is almost time for work so I will finish this up and hopefully manage to write another post tomorrow about the other project I made last month and what else has been happening.

Louise.

Christmas Catch Up!

I sold a number of stars and baubles this year and put the rest up on my Christmas trees on Christmas day.

We had our McNeill family Christmas party at our house this year, though it was only a small one as some of the aunts, cousins and second cousins were away this year.

One of my young second cousins found me in my studio at the end of the night and was super impressed by all of my beadwork which was lovely so I pulled out several pieces and some of the moving work. He really loved the mirrors as much as I do so I will really have to work with them more next year.

Now here is one cool design by Hookin to the beat. I brought this pattern on etsy as a part of a set of five Nightmare before Christmas designs as my Best friend Zoe loves Nightmare before Christmas.
I wasn’t 100% sure she would love the star so I only made the one up, but she want’s Sally and the Grinch so I am really glad I made it finally.

It is a lot bigger than the stars I usually make and took about 2 and a half days to make.

I also wanted to show off the pink jellyfish I made as a custom order, it was a present for someone so I had to wait until after Christmas to post it as I didn’t want to ruin their surprise.

It took a lot of beads to make, like a lot. It is surprising just how many beads went into the frill alone. But it looks good so I am happy with it.

I did also start a purple one so the person who order it could chose between them but I had underestimated the amount of beads needed and will have to order more to finish it off.

This jellyfish also took me about 2 and a half days to make so I don’t think I will be making many to sell, at least not the large frilly ones.

Mum had some Telsta points to burn as they were apparently going to expire so we got a few things with them including a mini Instax camera, which I took photos of the whole household and Anita for my cork board. I even managed to get a photo of Andy, though he wasn’t impress when the flash went off.

They boys tried to find him at Christmas but he was hiding like usual.

I have almost filled up the cork board all ready, it has more shapes on it now, for inspiration and some ones I designed (not the ones in the photo they are all ones I have found) and some of the designs I have drawn up.

On boxing day I brought 2 more toho dress kits

and a co2 laser cutter and engraver, so that I can make wooden ornaments, earrings and keyrings while I am beading. And I got my self a lego London Skyline since I have visited London and the lego Pyramid was still a bit to expensive to buy.

hum other than that I have been making baubles and stars to sell next year and as I mentioned in my last post I have been working on a mock-up for the international project which I will do up its own post for when it is finished.

well, it is already the afternoon so I might get cracking with some beadwork. I hope everyone has a fantastic new year. Louise

Last day of the year

It sure has been an interesting year, with some ups and downs. And it went fast. Hopefully, there will be more ups next year and fewer downs. Here is a recap of 2022.

This year I managed to make and finish a 3D Cross and the small threads collection in January.

In Feb I made three miniature dresses and a flower ball. I started beading on a jar that I have yet to Finnish and made the second flower ball.

In March I started my golden scarf, made a mini jar of stars and do some experiments in CRAW.

In April I made the tours link inspired by Yana of Geometiles who designed the one out of her amazing tiles.And I did some more experimenting in CRAW and with 2d peyote shapes. The mini monster was started.

It continued on into May, when I also moved house and could set up my new studio.

And the mini monster continued again into June. I designed and made some small vases, before finally finishing the mini monster. And then it was onto the Sunflower Wheel and experiments with bubble tea. It was June when I started

designing and working on pentagons for the International Patchwork project. I also started an augmented iocsdodechaedron but ran out of beads to finish it ( and brought the wrong ones when I finally did buy beads). I also started making lots of earrings to sell.

July saw the start of my small jellyfish collection, with the first 2 being made. There were more earrings and pentagons. I also designed a little bead flip picture book and crayon as a gift. And I made my read beadwork scarf.

In August I made a box, ring holder and 2

Vases worked some more on my golden scarf, made some flowers and more shapes.

In September I started beading on a glass bottle that mum broke and made two more mini dresses, both gold. And I made a pair of earrings for a custom order.

In October I made the little night sky star gazer, Had my first exhibition and was in 2 newspapers. I also made 2 more mini dresses and a bracelet. I stared working on my tower again managing to finish the base and first row of the wall.

And November I continued to work on the tower. Experimented with some beads I was given, received the first of the pentagons for the project and made a number of stars and baubles.

And December I finished my orders with a jellyfish and started another one but ran out of beads.

And I started a mock-up for the International patchwork project with squares, to see what the style will look like and if I wanted to go with black for the join rows.

It didn’t seem like much but going through the photos for a recap it has been a fair amount. still, I hope to get more done next year.

I am actually going to write another post to catch up on the Christmas things I couldn’t post before as this was longer than expected.

Louise.

Almost Christmas

Hi there, it has been a few weeks. Life got busy and I’ve been working on Christmas orders and presents which I won’t be able to share with you until after Christmas. I will have to take that into account next year and have some post prepared so that I can have something to post while I am busy making Christmas orders.

I will post the major two I was working on after Christmas for you to see. One, a gift for my friend was a pattern I brought last year and finally got around to making. It was a lot of work so if she doesn’t love it I will hold a grudge forever.

Actually, I will just swap it and give it to someone else as I know a few people who would like it.

I nabbed some photos of my stars in the wild as my aunt who I now live with put up her Christmas tree. And have created an album in my Delicate By Lou facebook group called beadwork in the wild, for anyone who has some of my work to post photos of it if they want to share.

I sold quite a few baubles and stars this year and have saved up to buy a 3d laser cutter so that I can make wooden baubles, earrings and things as I bead.

This will hopefully enable me to make some more money so it is easer for me to buy supplies, pay for my blog, get some accounting software, get more professional photos taken and all the other expensive things that it takes to run a small business and get it up off the ground. So far almost everything has been paid from money I’ve saved from my small wage so making some money from my business it a priority right now so that I can focus more on making sculptures later.

Though I do have a long list of sculptures that I want to make.

And as I have been working on things I’ve been adding to my mini-star collection. I cleared out a few more boxes and my dad gave me a large box as well, though I still have a number of stars stashed in bags in a container, waiting for room.

I’m still not entirely sure how they will eventually be displayed but I have some ideas and it’s not really important until after it’s finished at any rate.

The plan for next year is that JAN/FEB and possible part of March

will be dedicated to the International Patchwork Sculpture, then once it is finished

April and May will be focused on making beadwork ornaments to sell later in the year and then June/JULY and August will be focused on other sculptures before the end of the year which will focus on making things to sell. I will probably be going to the markets with my friend next year so hopefully I will have lots made and heaps of wooden things made as well.

Of course it is a rather loose plan as my plans usual fall apart.

Hum other than that I got approved for the World Record attempt but will have to think about how to make it work as I wasn’t expecting to have two witnesses there the whole time. For something that will take over a year to make that is a hard ask, along with needing a publicly accessible space. everything else like filling the attempt and all the paper work is a lot but doable. It will most likely have to wait for 2024 to see where I am at then. If it is still out of my reach I will most likely just make the sculpture without the record attempt, because it will still be awesome even with out an offical record.

Oh, and I scored a free secondhand pinboard for my studio. We don’t usually do bond cleans at my work but one of the companies my boss cleaned for finished up at the office they were at and the lady said we could take any thing that was left after the salvos came as it was all going in the bin. My boss also got a pin board and lots of printing paper, which was too big for my printer.

Well, I have a doctor’s appointment soon and have to get my stuff ready for work after that so I’ll finish up now.

Louise.

Tower base WIP

One of my beading goals is to make a large 3d castle. But I am still experimenting with the best way to make it happen. One of the my experiments is a 3d tower in CRAW (Cubic Right Angle Weave) stitch I modified for my Fibonacci project so that it would work given it needs to be mathematically accurate.

I started this tower in Jan 2021 and worked on it a bit on and off till July 2021. It is the slowest most time-intensive beadwork stitch I have yet to come across. Trust me to make things harder for myself.

Anyway, I stated back up again in late Oct of this year and managed to get up off the base and first row of the tower.

I won’t end up using this stitch to make the castle, but I do want to finish this tower as it is a cool project in its own right, even if it will take forever.

It is in some ways very different from my

usual style, given that it is rather solid and while still based on a geometric shape it is not a polyhedron. Though it still has the minimalism of my usual style and it is made with one colour.

The rainbow grey looks great as a choice for a tower IRL but is not the best in photos and can make it a bit hard to see details in the photos though the shadows do help.

The tower is also one of the few projects where I drew up a basic design before I started, to help me keep a track of the 3d design as I worked given it is not the same on all sides.

Not that it has stopped me from changing the design as I go along. You can see in the photo how the windows use to be smaller, and were changed to be bigger, because as my cousin pointed out it was a lot of work to make the stairs if you couldn’t really see once the tower was finished.

I ended up settling on the windows being combined so that they are five rows wide, after all, it’s not a functioning tower so it doesn’t need to be defensible with small windows. I also changed the walls, unfortunately after I started going up, so it is a bit painful

adding in the outer layer now, but I felt that one row was just too thin. and also what really decided it was that I broke two beads and had to add new ones in but they ended up bulging out. I’ve learnt not to make the rows too tight, and the mistakes will be hidden in the middle of the wall now.

I’ve learnt a lot making this, like if I ever do something like this again in this stitch I will leave a gap in the floor under the stairs and hide it by having the stairs be covered in. This will give me room to move on the lower stairs as I am adding them in. As it was I broke some needles and had to use my pliers to get the needle into some of the beads and through them as the angels were all wrong and I couldn’t get my hand in the space. I might also try adding in the outer layer of the stitch on the sides,

instead of on the top and bottom. It would give the walls a different look.

Still, I am happy with how it is turning out though it most likely not be done until late next year at the earliest as it takes so long to do and I have other projects that need to get done.

Hopefully, people find it as interesting as I do as it is one of my passion projects. Not that any of my beadwork is not a passion project, but I really do make the things I am interested in and want to see. How ever this is one that I have been wanting to do for a long time and have continued to work on despite the set backs I’ve had with it.

Anyway, I had better get a move on with printing off my patterns for order and writing out the word charts so I can get them made. My next post will have some news about the world record, it’s a bit complicated but will hopefully work out.

Lou.

3d Beadwork Stars

My minor obsession with stars has been an ongoing thing through the years and so has this growing mini-star collection. I’ve been emptying out my old beading containers as they are no longer useful to me for beading and have repurposed for the moment to sort out my star collection. It’s not the best solution but is the best one I have come up with so far.

The end goal of the collection is to make as many unique stars as I possibly can, using every single Delica colour available. each star will be unique with it’s colour combination and pattern so that I hopefully end up with thousands of unique stars.

It is also a good way to use up smaller amounts of beads and smaller bits of thread, that would go to waste otherwise. I typically make them as I am making other projects as I end up. with bits of thread long enough to make a tiny warped square but nothing bigger. But some times I put the thread aside to use later.

Currently, I am working on orders and making extra stars and baubles for Christmas but have also been adding to the mini-star collection.

With the beads I currently have, (I’m waiting for my current supplies order) I’ve been working on using up what beads I have and making stars will all the patterns I’ve made so that I can get photos of them for people to see when they want to order, so that know what can be done.

I will go back to working on the tower closer to Christmas and then in Jan and Feb, it will be time for the international Patchwork sculpture to be the focus again.

It has been a hot summer so far so we’ve had the aircon on at home and normally 13 would get shitty if I accidentally flung the cover on her but she decided it was cool enough and stayed snuggled under. My vicious little beastie looks so cute. ❤️

She has decided to give me a tiny lick when she wants pats, but she still claws and bites when she wants me to stop giving her pats. Oh well.

Unfortunately mum has covid at the moment and while I’ve been testing negative I’m only going out when I have to for work or food.

I had been hoping to get back to the Mackay Art Society this week as I missed last week but it wasn’t to be. Hopefully, I can get there next week.

I had also wanted to go to days for girls as I had managed to get a whole lot of material for free for them, and had washed it on Friday so it was ready but hopefully I can get there this Saturday as it is the Christmas party.

I also have a lot of leftover material for my friend but it will have to wait as we don’t want to risk her boys catching covid even if I am testing negative.

There was actually so much material that I washed for DFG I actually got a little sunburned taking it off the washing line. I filled up the big one and the small one and used all the pegs we had. Despite the time I took to sort it out there might still be some that is not suitable as it can’t have words, or faces and a few other things as well has having to be cotton. Still it will all get used by someone.

Other than that I’ve not been feeling the best, it is possible stress or just being a bit burnt out. So I’ve let a few things slip. Trying to get things moving on the business front is difficult and the timing with the state of the world isn’t the best but oh well.

It is what it is. But hopefully, next year will be better.

On the work front the school we are cleaning won’t be doing covid cleaning so they are going back to having one company so we are not quite sure how next year will work out as the team I am in currently only has the one office lined up, which is about a 2 hour job for the 2 of us, which is not enough. Our boss is looking at taking on other contracts so hopefully it works out as I don’t want to have to look for another job.

Oh and I’ve been having trouble posting up the video tour of the seed beads exhibition which is why it isn’t currently up. Hopefully, I can get it up today. I’ll also be writing a post about the tower wip so far, and then I have to print out some patterns I designed yesterday for an order.

all the best Lou.

Seed Beads First Solo Exhibition

Hey, it has been a little while since I have written a blog post so I am going to catch up with all the updates now. My first solo exhibition went well, it had coverage in two local newspapers and both the Mayor of Mackay and our Member for parliament tuned up for the opening night. Unfortunately, the canvases didn’t turn up in time but the lovely team a the Jubilee Community Centre found out that they had turned up they offered to hang them up for me for the last few days.

Glass print of Green Thing Beadwork Sculpture

I did also buy an amazing glass print that brings out the colour of the beads really well.

I’m thinking about offering to sell prints and canvases but will have to look into it, however you can find digital prints online now on my buy me a coffee profile and in my etsy store.

I might also do an art calendar next year (for 2024) if I get enough interest in it. Business is not my passion but to keep creating sculptures I’m going to have to work at getting it functional as a business.

I do have some Christmas orders and will hopefully get a few more this month.

And some lovely people have donated some money and beads to help me keep creating which is beyond amazing.

Mum was away for the start of my exhibition but on the second weekend she came with me to open up and we crafted in between visitors. She was making a pair of shorts for a friend and I was working on my tower project.

One of the ladies from the art department came over to tell me how impressed they all were and how many people came in during the week to see the exhibition which was great.

dress collection of seed beads exhibition during set up

I took a few photos when I was setting up but forgot to take good ones when it was all set up without the wires on the walls. Some times I am completely hopeless.

I did take a video after it was set up so I will try to upload it onto my facebook page.

I will write another post for the non-exhibition updates but I’ll add some more images to this one so keep scrolling.

Mackay and Whitsundays Life Newspaper clipping

Julieanne Gilbert MP Member for Mackay, Louise Cater and, Mayor Greg Williams

Beading the night sky

I’ve been feeling a bit under the weather so I haven’t done much more than making this Night Sky meteor these last few days and a starter for the Triangle love project.

This little meteor is a star viewer, where you can peek in and see the night sky, or a representation of it at any rate. I learnt a few things making this, and will hopefully be able to make a larger more cool star gazer in the future when I get more matte black beads and silver lined gold and crystal to make the night sky. I’d also love to make an outer layer in

blue to look like the daytime sky, or to make it look like a cave or something.

The hardest part of this was adding the metallic black beads over the herringbone stitch to cover the gaps and help stiffen the sphere up so it held its shape. It is not completely dark as the small gaps between beads let light in but you can cup your hands around the meteor so that it only lets light in through the top to get the best effect.
It would be cooler If it had a second layer to block more of the light and had lights to shine in onto the sliver lined

beads so that they sparkled even more when looking in.

Still, I am happy with how it turned out given my limited supplies for the project and my lack of knowledge on how to make it work and I now have serval ideas on how to make a better one from making it. After all the best way to learn is to do.

I have been mostly busy with my up coming exhibition which is approaching fast! but have also been working towards doing interviews for the blog and am making a new cover for the international patchwork sculpture group. Ana’s awesome photo of a number of the pentagons she has made will be in the banner, along with hopefully a number of other photos from other members of the group. If you are participating in the project and want photos of your pentagons in the cover please let me know so I can add them in when I update the cover.

Ana’s photos has her own pentagon designs, the Swirl pentagon design by Debby Zook and some of mine, all made by Ana with her unique colour choices. She has such a lovely colour palette going on and I really need to buy more opaque beads in future are they can be just as amazing as the silver lined ones.

You can find some of the designs in the files of the International Patchwork Sculpture group on Facebook and the tutorial/pattern for the pentagons in the group as well as on the International beading week website.

Well I don’t have much else to say so I will get back to it and get a move on. I will hopefully have another post for you this week.

Louise.

Out of my comfort zone

Well, today I went around the city centre and handed out some flyers. I didn’t go into every shop as I couldn’t bring myself to talk to that many people but I did hand a few out. I wore some star earrings and my red decorative scarf, which ended up as a funky bracelet before I finished. It was going to be longer but it works fine so I might actually leave it at the length it is. And my face is a little red from the heat and from being embarrassed as I don’t really like going out of my way to talk to people I don’t know.

And I’ve been getting replies from the Mackay council members I’ve emailed and so far everyone who has got back to me has said they will check it out

when they can as some of them are out of town for the first week. And some said they will come to the opening so that is exciting.

My decorative scarf had to be wrapped around my wrist as it gained length to stop it from pulling as I worked, as the weight would pull it down. And then it had to go over my shoulder as it got longer as it was too bulky to work with around my writs.

I guess if I leave it at the length it is now it will be more of a necktie than a scarf.

And here is the DIY earring display from last week. It is not the best but it works and that is all I really wanted. And it has room to spare! The display my cousin Kea gave me is now empty and can be filled up again so I can make lots more.

Other than sorting out my exhibition not much else is happening so I will leave it at that. Catch you next time, Louise.

Custom Order

Well, it has been an interesting week, that has gone by way too fast. I can’t believe it is already Sunday evening but then again it is almost Oct as well.

So I got this awesome dodecahedron earring order and I love them, they will be heading off to Austria tomorrow as a gift for a lady who collects earrings!

And one very kind lady offered to send me some beads after I relied to a tweet (what is your dream for yourself) with a photo of several of my empty bead containers and that I dream of having full ones to work with. The bigger dream is to have

enough money and income to be able to buy what I need when I need it. Some people are truly angels.

Progress on the WIP is done for the moment, I did finish it and it is strange and staying on the desk for further thought.

I did spend a few days making fringe earrings and now have too many earrings for my earring displays. It was going to be too expensive to buy a big enough one so I brought a picture frame, spray painted it and will staple wire across the back to hang earrings from.

here is a photo of the back of it. I couldn’t get the metal tags out but will just press them against the frame out of the way. And bonus I managed to buy a secondhand frame that could stand up by its self. It is a decent size so I am happy with it but even from the op shop it wasn’t super cheap. Still I saved a fair chunk of money by making a DIY earring stand and it will be one of a kind. Maybe I should get some more frames and sell earring displays? Only if people ask otherwise it would be a wasted effort and money as I don’t make that* many earrings lol.

I found some of my old photos from about 2008 – 2015. not many of them but some I had thought were lost forever after my mum accidentally spilt wine on my back up hard drive and her husband for some reason downloaded movies onto my lap top (without asking) and wrecked it a few days later. The A*hole. Apparently I had some saved in google photos. Some of which are on my current phone but a number of them are not.

This one of the croc was from a reptile park down south, I actually gave them a copy of the photos I took there and I hope they managed to get some use out of them.

For several years I was seriously considering photography as a profession but people kept asking me to take photos at their weddings and would keep asking after I said no so eventually I was put off and then I changed from glasses to contacts and for some reason couldn’t get the view finder to get just the right focus. So I gave it up as a hobby. By that time cameras did have viewing screens but its not the same and while I could take it up again as a hobby there are so many photographers other there that it seems a little pointless.

Some of my earliest beadwork was on barbie doll clothes, it was kinda cool if a bit painful. It was good to find the photos of them though to see how much my beadwork has changed. I am super grateful to have found the 3d beadwork movement and all the incredible things I’ve been inspired by and been able to dream up and make myself.

Anyway, I should actually get some beadwork done so I shall catch you later.

Louise.