Twisted Sistah Class with Diana Frey

Day two at ADORN ME was a class called TWISTED SISTAH by my friend & mentor Diana Frey. I was so excited to be back in Diana's class & had the honor of helping her. Diana had emailed me weeks before the event & asked it I would help her set up her class & also help her at Vendor Night. I was so pleased that she asked. I will share the beautiful gift she brought me later in another post but, let's move on to class. I think you can tell why she named this beauty such a name. This was out class example.

And here is the sweet & talented Diana teaching us her wonder. She laughs when I tell everyone that a class with her is like be exposed to CRACK! One class is never enough! At the end of class EVERYONE agreed with me. Diana just blushed but, it's true.

Below, is one of the pieces (examples)that Diana shared with the class. I ALMOST bought this wonderful treasure. I just loved the unusual chain she used & all the unique elements in this necklace. Another one of my lucky classmates bought this at Vendor Night. But, I had already decided I would make one myself. After all... I took the class. That's good reasoning. RIGHT? Then why do I regret not buying this necklace EVERY time I see it?

See the vintage coins & the little silver French religious figure. And a wonderful vintage button along with a soldered charm & a silver charm orf the Eiffel Tower to add to the French flair. As well as the beautiful & highly decorative items there were few surf polished stones Diana had picked up on the beach somewhere.

Another example was this eye catching example done in all sorts of green. The charm on here was a bubble charm done by Sally Jean Alexander. Diana has been to Sally Jeans studio to study in the past & she really loved this charm & necklace. It had a cute saying about ART on it but, I am sorry to say I can't remember what it said. Diana could not decide if she could part with it or not but, in the end another classmate Karen Art (from Canada) talked her into selling saying "It has my name on it" Good for you Karen.

This next piece had less twisted & more stones. Done in a soft lemon sherbet mix of colors.

Well, those are Diana's & below is a shot of the "BEAD SOUP" for my necklace. I have seen a pattern of neutral colors in my work lately. You know those "safe/goes with everything" sort of colors. Before going to this event I chose to take a lot of colors to work with. I wanted to challenge myself to get out of my "Comfort Zone" of neutral & use COLOR! I chose green because I loved the touch of green & brown I saw in Diana's bird in the bezel she did. To start the project you choose the image for your bezel & then you start piling beads & trinkets together. I really didn't have any trinkets so most of my elements were beads & pearls. Sorry for the glare on this photo. I thought I had touched up all the photos but, I can see by the glare of the flash (it was hard to get good lighting in those class rooms) & WAY too much bead mat I missed this one.

One thing I had brought (not knowing I would use it for this) was a brass flower. Most of the other girls used a patina & made their wire dark. I used a little but, I really liked the beautiful colors of the wire after I had torched it. So, when I saw the brass flower I thought "that works with this" & I added a beautiful peach colored prism inside the flower. Much to my surprise it has a beautiful bell like sound when there is any movement to the piece. Below, is a close up of my little bird (that started out black & white) that I colored with water color pencils before filling it with resin.

As you can see I am not quiet half way through with my necklace. I still have a long way to go. Do you like the long shell on the right(see bleow)? I think it looks like a bird feather don't you? Of course after I get all of the beading done I will need to find just the right chain or ribbon or?????? to finish this up. I CAN'T WAIT TO WEAR THIS!

I would like to share a few of the other girls work. Remember I told you that it is not uncommon to finish a class like this & have to complete your piece at home? I think there were 19 or 20 gals in this class & only one completely finished her piece.

Sweet Carol ALMOST had hers done. But, she wanted to add a few more things she knew she had at home but, you can see in the photo below that she is close to having it ready.

And Karen Art from Canada decided to not use her bezel for this piece (she used it for a piece she did in Diana's Thursday class) so she used a wonderful vintage piece of BLING as her focal point. GOOD JOB GIRLS! A DIVINE class Ms Diana. THANK YOU for sharing your wonder !!!!!

That's it for today. I have one more finished TWISTED SISTA that is to die for but, I'm saving it to show you for PINK Saturday. Bet ya can't guess what color it is. Hee Hee. I'll be back in a few days to share the other class & what I learned from the marvelous Deyn Mentock. Thank you Linda for putting together such a great event. Are you guys already starting to plan for next year so you can join us? Linda was already starting to plan the next event. Have a wonderful rest of the week.