RIP Mr Oxycon

I mentioned earlier that I thought my oxycon was on its way out and tonight he officially died. He's done well - they reckon a reconditioned oxycon should last two years and mine has been going for over three.

So now I have to buy a new one and this means I can't make beads until it's delivered. Rubbish!

Mind you, I'm up in Cambridge this weekend so no beads would have been made anyway. Let's just hope I can get a new oxycon delivered next week .....

Red Beads Past

Oooh, I've had a hectic couple of days! I went to London on Tuesday and I had a good old wander around the British Museum. I've never been there before but I've always fancied going. So many interesting things to see - the famous Elgin Marbles, the Rosetta Stone, Egyptian mummies and fabulous Japanese stuff. There's also loads of ancient jewellery. The Greek gold jewellery was beautiful and there were some Egyptian carnelian and stone beads that were seven thousand years old!

I did try making beads yesterday but the change in weather seems to have seriously affected the performance of my oxygen concentrator and it took over three hours to get working properly, by which time I was more than a bit miffed with it. I think I'm going to have to get a new one as this one really is on its last legs.

Nicky came to visit today! It was so nice to see her. We spent the day chattering and catching up. I haven't seen her for six weeks so we had lots to talk about!

Okay, bead talk. Because I don't have any new beads to show you I've put together this photo mosaic of red beads. I've had quite a few emails recently asking for red beads. I've only got a little bit of red glass left (must place a glass order soon) so I will make some in the not-too-distant future but in the meantime you'll have to make do with photos of red beads past!

More Luminobeads

I told you that I had lots of these in the pipeline .....

I suffered a random beadmaking injury today. I was placing a dot on a bead and I put it in the wrong place. This happens often and I undo the bad dot placement by nipping off the raised dot of glass with tweezers which is exactly what I did but the piece of glass that I tweezed off shot straight up my left nostril. That sounds funny, I know, but it flippin' hurt! Hot glass and noses do not mix. I was kind of half-laughing, half-yelping and my eyes were watering like mad. What a crazy thing to happen! I did manage to save the bead I was working on, though. Result.

Winner

While I was on the phone to Chris last night we were talking about my bead giveaway. He wanted to know if I actually do write all the names on slips of paper and then draw them out of a hat or if I was pulling some Blue Peter type scam and just choosing a name from a list of emails in some kind of lacklustre can't-be-bothered fashion.

I assured him that yes I really do sit and write many names on many pieces of paper, fold them all up, put them in a pot (in this case one of my glass rod jars) and then get Dad to draw a name. I told Chris that to prove I'm not hoodwinking anyone I'd take photos of the draw tonight. So here you are. Up there is the pot full of names and below is the winner.

Well done Helen! I'll email you for your address and I'll get the beads in the post to you.

Thanks to all who entered the draw. I shall do another one next month .....

All Aglow

Luminobeads, as requested. I have more waiting to be cleaned and etched but in the meantime I thought I'd show you these ones.