Vintage Lucite Cabochons

Cabs? They have no holes! What can I do with them?

In the 18 years I’ve been working with beads, I’ve heard this question more times than I can count.  It was in fact, a question of mine as well when I began with beads.  Well, the Forrest Gump way to answer the question (in the ‘Shrimp is the fruit of the sea…’ fashion) is, you can…

*Seed Bead Bezel Cabs

*Free-form Wire-wrap Cabs

*Wire Cage Cabs

*Glue or Use An Adhesive to Mount Cabs

*Drill Cabs

*Embed a Wire Shank in Cabs

…I could go on and on. 

We have classes in beadweaving & wire-wrapping cabs in our shop.  However, I consider myself more of an instant gratification designer.  If I see a component I want to use, I want to use it quick and now.  Since we specialize in vintage lucite cabs & have a hee-uge collection of them, I’m going to focus on cabs made of lucite vs. gemstones and glass.  Here are a few quick simple ways to use a cab or cabochon:

How to Drill a Lucite Cab:  You can easily drill a hole using a Dremel Tool & some jewelry sized drill bits.  You don’t need to use

Vintage Lucite Cabochons

With a Simple Dremel set-up you can make your own custom components

diamond tipped drill bits: they’re expensive & you want to save them for drilling your glass, shell or stones.  However you may need a collet adapter or ‘chuck’ in order to make your tiny sized drill bit fit into your drill.  Even though it’s not imperative that you drill lucite under water (such as it is with glass, shell and stone), I still prefer to.  This way I know my drill bit won’t get to heated and break.  And I like to keep the debris floating underwater vs. airborn.  So grab a low-sided dish (a small casserole dish works well) and fill it with a couple inches of warm water.  Find a piece of wood or foam to use as a base to drill into.  Now have at it.  You’ll get your groove after drilling a few pieces.  Cabs and flat pieces all have varying thicknesses so you’ll find that some pieces will drill easier than others.  Don’t be scared!  Grab a Dremel and try this!  You’ll be amazed at how quickly you can turn cabs into quick to use jewelry components different than many others will have in their jewelry designs.

Mounting Cabs Using Adhesive:  While there are countless ahesives, glues & epoxys out there, my favorite for mounting lucite cabs and components is E-6000.  This is because it adheres and stays.  It doesn’t dry fast.  And I know, I said I was an ‘instant-gratification girl’.  But I want my pieces to last.  Even though it takes an hour or so for this glue to set up and then almost 24 hours for it to hold fast, you can glue almost any material to another and know it’s secure: think glass to metal, lucite to wood, sequins to shell, etc.  Your tube of E-6000 will last forever.  Make sure you are careful not to puncture the tube: just a little air and it will be useless very soon.  I like to use a toothpick or darning needle to apply my adhesive in small amounts.  There are countless mounts and settings you can adhere lucite cabs to.  But that’s a topic for another blog.

Vintage Lucite Cabochons

Don’t overthink what to do with your cabs.  It’s amazing how when you allow yourself to play with a few new simple techniques, a whole new world of components opens up to you.  “Anything with a hole in it can be considered a bead.”

Customer Appreciation Wine & Cheese

Our 2010 Customer Appreciation event was a huge success!  It was so great to see friends old & new at the Wine & Cheese event on Friday night as well as all weekend during the soiree’.  Everyone loved the free gifts from Crystallized by Swarovski (while they lasted) as well as other free gifts including capipers & need packages, vintage lucite bead packs, seed beads packs and more. 

Another fun facet to this celebration was that we gave away 2 Bead Treasures chests, each containing

Treasure Chest Contest Prize

a booty of beads with over a $1000 retail value.  For ever $25 that was spent either in the store or online, each shopper got an entry to the drawing for each: there was one Treasure chest winner from the store shoppers and one from the online shoppers.  And our winners are…

In store winner: Colleen Flynn from North Yarmouth, Maine

Online winner: Heidi Hart from Nome, Alaska

Thank you all for a great event & we can’t wait until the next one!

-Heather

Old & New Friends Visited the Wine & Cheese soiree'

Connie, Deb & Lisa

Cindy & Jan

Celebrating Spring

*blink* *blink* Celebrating spring? whaa???

I can’t help myself.

Here in NC it isn’t so bad in the fall. It is pretty temperate all year actually. The problem lies in my mind – there I said it.

In my mind November is cold, frost on the pumpkin, crops comin in out of the fields, sweaters, blazing fire places, dark mornings, and gaining 15 lbs.

I am already projecting myself into April’s cool moist mornings, fragrant with freshly tilled earth and early blooming flowers. That is the inspiration or mebbe even the desperation that channeled this bracelet.

Close your eyes and think of spring and the grass that is trying to grow. Clumps, spotty through the yard, with tiny violas, jonquils and crocus’ pushing their way up. I am there, barefoot, wiggling my toes in the cool morning grass.

I used the LUC4525OR Vintage Lucite Tangerine Moonglow – 7mm rounds from Beadin Path as one of the strands.

Pink fresh water pearls or the second strand.
Lampwork, crackle quartz and opalite for the third strand

Give them a good mingle.

Three strands for a bulky sunshine-y spring time celebration bracelet.
I’m ready.
Want to see more of Tish’s work?  Follow her blog here: http://justatish.blogspot.com/.  And check out her shop here: http://www.justatish.com/.

Pink Filigree HairClip

Purple Lacey Plastic Filigree Hairclip

…There are two new Lace Barrette colors…
(Coral Pink is already available, check back soon for the Chocolate Brown!)

I’m also SO loving her Funky Flowers bobby pins using our vintage filigree flowers. 

Bunny Baubles Funky Flower Bobby Pins

Lime & Blue Funky Flower Hairpins

Here’s the down-low on our 2010 Customer Appreciation Event:  We hope you can join!

You could Win this! Every $25 spent during this event gets you 1 chance!

The exciting part of this event, (aside from the bead swag, the great sale, bead bucks, and treasure chest), is our Wine & Cheese on Friday evening from 5-8pm.  It’s always a party style atmosphere with lots of other bead lovers shopping, eating, having a glass of wine or a glass of iced tea & talking about beads.  It’s my favorite event of the year because I love seeing old friends.  I hope to see you there or any time during the weekend.  And if you can’t be in Freeport this weekend, I hope you enjoy our event online.

-Heather

The first thing I think of when we find huge metal or lucite pieces, as big as saucers (or maybe not quite that big), is: earrings.  I’m into fantastically big earrings. I love the boldness. Bold beaded earrings and some big movie star shades & you can run out make-up-less and feel somewhat glamorous.

The lucite chandelier pieces to the left were made by Carisa Gerrity.  They’re super light-weight, despite they’re great size.  She’s accented the custom-dyed lucite chandelier pendants with a cluster of crystals at the top.  Easy, fabulous & attention-getting.

My favorite new components that seem to just beg to be made into instant-gratification earrings, are

Earrings with Vintage Matte Metal Components

the vintage metal components that we’ve been having plated in sterling silver & 24k gold with a matted finish.  These have an antiqued quality to them with the look of high karat metal.

I’ve been playing with leftover pieces & scrids of chain lately.  Leftovers from necklaces & more substantial pieces, become the perfect component for earrings.  It only takes less than an inch to make a grand earring statemment with chain.  Layer them, no matter the length or style, on a hoop or earwire for instant & chic ear adornment.

Plumb Bob Lucite Earrings with Chain

The plumb-bob lucite beads to the left are on their way in.  We found them as vintage lucite hole-less components & are having them drilled.  Please watch the lucite section for them to make their appearance soon.