Time for the Big Reveal!! Bead Soup Party Blog Hop

Yeah!! I can finally show my project!!!

I've titled it " Chase Your Dreams"

Every since I received the wonderful bead soup from Silver Parrot , I've had it sitting on my desk, mulling over ideas... and the thing that kept coming back to me is the horse was running TO something, not away or randomly. So what would the horse be chasing? Dreams seemed like the best fit, as the horse seems sort of like a spirit horse to me with the spiral on it.


Here's my original package

I utterly loved the flame patina clasp KJ included. I've been playing with flame coloring, so I knew I wanted to incorporate more copper in the piece to go with the clasp and cause, heck, it's fun!! I decided pretty quickly to make a back plate for the focal, add "chase your dreams" somehow and use heat patina.



See how the copper I made matches the clasp KJ sent!

I also wanted to incorporate at least some of the beads she sent, and that's the part I tripped over for a couple of weeks. While I loved the focal and clasp, the beads were not singing to me. The beads were lovely, don't get me wrong, I just couldn't get a handle on how to use them in my design.

I finally hit the idea of backing the beads just as I did the focal, and woot! it all fell together at that point!


Making the chain!

Since I wanted everything copper to have heat patina, I had to cut, texture, file, sand and assemble prior to the torch work. I did torch some lose wire to attach the focal and clasp once everything else was done.

Then it was torch time!



Raw Copper and......

Patina from the torch!

Once I got done with adding the color, I used Ren wax to seal them. I'm pretty please on the color... I'm getting much much better at getting the color I want with a torch. ( The copper colors change soooo fast you really have to use a bushy flame and be very very careful!)

Then I wired up the focal to the plate, and wire wrapped the round MOP beads on my copper circles.


I love how my necklace turned out!!


KJ also sent 1 other special piece, a bead with the horse on it. To give the piece just a "dash" of asymmetrical, I used it as the 2ND link in the necklace.

the little horse bead is soooo cute!



close up


I had so much fun with this!! Tell me what you think And if you think I'm alone in my fun, think again... Meet 197 of my new best friends who all participated in this round of the hop!!

Here is the list of the party members!