Around the world in 80 beads-Seattle

I recently visited Seattle (ok, it was over a month ago and I’m just getting around to actually making this post . . . I admit it!) and found myself with a free day. What did I do? Well other than spending a little time in my favorite quirky Seattle neighborhood-Fremont-of course I went looking for bead shops! I was staying near the University of Washington and was easily able to visit both of these by bus. They were two totally different bead stores, each cool for a different reason!

Fusion Beads:
I thought this was a really professional-looking store. It’s really nicely set out and organized by type of bead. They did have some different beads than I normally find where I am, and they have a good selection of popular and useful materials- a variety of metal charms, Swarovski crystals and pearls in all sizes and colors (in fact I bought a whole bunch of them in fire opal and black diamond for a necklace I’ve been planning), cubic zirconia in a rainbow of colors, plus other supplies like resin and bezels, and just about anything else you might want for most common jewelry-making projects. I was most excited about the selection of charms, resin, and bezels as my nearest bead store at home doesn’t actually carry resin supplies, and has a pretty small selection of charms. The charms here were sorted by type and very easy to look through for what you wanted. The prices seemed pretty decent to me-not especially cheap, but definitely not more expensive than other places, either) and they also have an online store which is really convenient for future shopping!

I made the pair of earrings at right for my Etsy shop with some of my finds at Fusion beads. Find them in my etsy shop here

Gargoyle Beads:
After a stop at one of my favorite Seattle places-the Theo Chocolate Factory-I headed to Gargoyle beads in Fremont- it’s a small independent store that, according to their website, has been around since 1933 (but not always in Seattle)! It’s a bit hard to find but totally worth the effort! Was one of only a few shoppers in really rainy weather (I know, you’re thinking ‘it’s Seattle, of course it rained’ but it was raining much harder than is usual there!) The woman who was running the store that day was very friendly and enthusiastic about the shop (I can’t recall her name, unfortunately-sorry about that!)

She chatted with me about the selection of beads, the shop, the weather, and just whatever. She even let me put my soaking wet coat and backpack behind the counter so they could dry and to make my shopping easier. This place had a very unique selection and I got all sorts of beads there that I’ve not found elsewhere-I got a gargoyle (of course!), some pewter beads, two packages of adorable little handmade Indian glass butterflies, and a few interesting charms. They had a cool collection of different gargoyles, pewter beads in bulk, vintage glass and acrylic beads, stringing materials, and skulls galore! Above all I loved the friendly and small feeling of this store, and almost wish I lived in Seattle so I could visit more often! The only downside to this store, for me, is that they don’t have an online store so I can keep buying!

I'll leave you with one of my favorite quirky finds from Seattle's artsy neighborhood of Fremont: the huge Fremont troll, located under one of their big bridges! I definitely recommend checking out Fremont if you're ever visiting Seattle!

Please leave a comment and let me know what you thought of this post-Are store reviews interesting/useful to you? Have you been to either of these stores? Do you have a favorite local bead store or do you do all your buying online? Do you look for new bead stores when you travel, or is it just me? LOL

Copyright 2011. See more at Voyage of the Hyperspace Hippo

Adventures in Crafting-Chai Bath Bombs

Hello readers! I made some fizzing chai bath bombs before the holidays and never got around to blogging about them, but they came out pretty well! I found the basic recipe for these in a book called Melt and Pour Soapmaking by Marie Browning that I borrowed from the library. It’s a pretty useful book, not just recipes but also some basic advice on how to make hand-milled soap, bath bombs, bubble bath, and other things too. I won’t reprint the actual recipe here as I don’t want to step on any toes-but there are tons of basic bath bomb recipes online that could give you the right proportions, or you could see if your library has this book!

In general, though, all the bath bomb recipes I’ve seen have a few things in common-citric acid and baking soda. These are what create the fizz when wet! Many recipes include some kind of salt (either purchase sea salt, bath salts, or simple epsom salts which was what I used) and some add cornstarch. Then they add something to give the bath bombs a scent-usually essential oils. Some also include food coloring or other colors. I chose not to use essential oils as they are generally toxic to cats (I have two, and they both lick water out of the bathtub) and I have heard that some people with sensitive skin react to some types. I also didn’t add any colors. The recipe I chose used simple spices for both scent and coloring. I was able to get all the ingredients I needed (including a tiny spritz bottle) from a local natural/health food store that has a bulk section so I was able to make up little baggies with just the amounts I needed. Obviously the epsom salt, baking soda, and spices can also be purchased at drug stores and grocery stores, but you might have more trouble finding the citric acid there.

First all the powdered ingredients are combined together and mixed. This particular recipe calls for citric acid, baking soda, and cornstarch. I didn’t use all the spices called for in the recipe-I only included cardamom, cinnamon and clove (all powdered)-I wasn’t able to find star anise, so again I left it out. mmm, spices!

Next you spritz the powdered ingredients VERY sparingly-enough to make them stick without activating the fizzing reaction. This is where I made the main modification to this recipe. I thought that it would add to the scent and color to use chai tea instead of water or witch hazel for the spritzing liquid. I made tea from a delicious loose leaf chai that I had on hand from a local tea store, and spritzed the bath bombs with that. To the left, you can see the spritz bottle I used and the tea I made. It smelled sooo good.

You have to be very careful not to let it get too wet-in my first batch the powder started sticking together before the mixture seemed damp to me and the ones in that batch ended up fizzing and expanding in the molds-not good! The second batch I stopped spritzing sooner, and it still packed into the molds nicely and held together when dry. Below you can see how the damp mixture looked before packing it into the molds

I found an ice cube tray to use for the mold. You have to pack the mixture down very tightly into the molds, I found that I could fit a lot more in there than it looked like at first! Most recipes say to let them dry in the molds for a few hours and then let them continue hardening on a cookie sheet overnight before using or wrapping to give away (some say a week).

It’s been a couple of months since I made them and the ones I have left have lost some of their scent, so my advice would be to use them as soon as possible! I still think they’d make a great gift, you just couldn’t make them too far ahead of time. I do wonder if adding the vanilla fragrance oil would’ve held the scent longer or made no difference.

Making homemade beauty products seems like a lot of fun to me. I’ve found a few recipes for body lotion and I’m planning to combine a few and try that out next! :o) Have you tried crafting soap or beauty products? Any good websites or books to recommend? Please comment and let me know what you think!

Copyright 2011. See more at Voyage of the Hyperspace Hippo

Semi-Homemade Cooking: Jazzing Up Store-Bought Pesto

As some of you know, I had my wisdom teeth out not too long ago, and I was eating soft foods for ages. Eventually I got sick of eating mashed potatoes, oatmeal, pudding, and V8 fruit/veggie juice. I wanted to cook something, but I still didn’t have a whole lot of energy. I was craving pesto, so I came up with a super quick veggie meal. Here’s the recipe:

Ingredients:

• 16 oz bag of pasta
• Small amount of olive oil1 clove garlic-minced
• 1 medium zucchini (courgette, for those of you in the UK!)
• 2 medium tomatoes
• 1 container of store-bought pesto

Cook pasta according to package directions. :-p While pasta is cooking, dice zucchini. Remove seeds from tomatoes. Dice tomatoes. Put small amount of oil in a frying pan. Add minced garlic and diced veggies. Cook until soft. Add entire container of pesto to veggie mixture and cook on low heat for a few minutes until mixture is hot. If pesto begins to dry out or stick add a little water (water from the pasta, if it’s still cooking, works well).  Drain pasta and toss with pesto mixture. Serve and eat!

A few notes: I used Buitoni reduced fat pesto with basil, that I found with the fresh pasta in my grocery store. I looked at the ingredients/nutrition info and didn’t see anything weird in there like you sometimes find with reduced fat products-loads of extra sugar or salt for example-and it tasted pretty good even on it’s own. For the pasta, I used Trader Joe’s vegetable radiatore pasta because I love the colors, but any pasta (especially one with nooks and crannies to hold the sauce-like rotelle/rotini) would work.

This meal was from a few days ago, and I’m sorry I didn’t take any pictures. It was actually really colorful and pretty!  We ate it for 2 days.  The first day we tossed in some fresh mozzarella, which wasn’t bad, but I think it was overkill.  The BF did take some to work as a sandwich with some of the leftover fresh mozzarella, and said it was great. It could easily be made without the added garlic if you like, with different veggies, or with homemade pesto. I love modifying recipes to create something a little bit new, and jazzing up prepared foods. Let me know if you like this post and I’ll keep blogging about these recipes when I come up with them!

Copyright 2010. See more at Voyage of the Hyperspace Hippo

The Hippo's Quest: My Etsy Finds, Dragon Edition!

Hello readers, and welcome to the long-delayed and long-awaited (by me, anyway) second edition of The Hippo's Quest, my 'etsy finds' series. This edition's theme is perfect for the pre-Halloween madness. Halloween conjures up themes of myth and fantasy, and one of my personal favorite myth/fantasy creatures is the dragon! Dragon-like creatures were found in both European and Asian folklore. Their image and meaning varied widely from culture to culture. They could be winged, snake-like, scaly, or feathered. They have sometimes been seen as intelligent, as benevolent and powerful or as evil and destructive. Today they continue to fascinate fantasy-lovers, and are found everywhere from Harry Potter books to plush toys, so it should come as no surprise that I sorted through TONS of dragons on Etsy. Here are a few of my favorites. Please click on the caption below each picture to go to the actual item listing on etsy

Lately I've been fascinated by all of the different scrabble and glass tile pendants on etsy. (I think I want to try them out as my next major project) There are a ton of different ones, even just counting dragon-themed pendants. I thought the ones made by mrooart really stood out from the crowd because they were made using her original artwork. And not only that, the tiny artwork is gorgeous and detailed:

Dragon Tile Pendant

Also on the jewelry front were two stunning wire examples of dragons. (I admit to having a bias towards wire, as I love to work with it!) First this little silver dragon, intricately wire-wrapped and suspended in a wire circle by ylfdragon:

Silver Dragon Pendant

And then this example made of copper wire complimented by a green amazonite bead, by serpentsdancedesigns. Just loving all the spirals in this design!

Copper Dragon Pendant

I also found lots of cute (or scary!) handmade dragon figures, in every material you could think of. The polymer clay dragons were all so colorful, it was hard to pick a favorite but I really liked the ones I found at DragonsAndBeasties. This shop has dragons of just about everyc olor or description, along with unicorns and other beasties. This cute little orange guy holding a gem (makes sense, as dragons have sometimes been described as hoarders of treasure in some stories) looks kind of cuddly. The listing notes that it can be made in other colors, too!

Orange Dragon with Gem

This second one, by the same seller, is a little more edgy, in black and orange for halloween!

Halloween Dragon Figure

And last but not least, some examples of glass dragons from a shop I've had my eye on for some time. The glass figures by Glasmagie are some of my absolute favorite etsy items. They're attractive, detailed, and just have personality!
The mini dragons are my favorite thing in her shop but she has several dragon figures, a dragon pendant, and dragon orchid rods.

Mini Glass Dragons

That's it for this edition of the Hippo's Quest. Hope you enjoyed looking at the finds, please check out these lovely etsy shops! I haven't decided on a theme for the next Hippo's Quest. Is there a theme you'd like me to cover? Just leave a comment and let me know!

Copyright 2010. See more at Voyage of the Hyperspace Hippo

Handmade From Top To Bottom

Hi all! I haven’t made any new jewelry in a while, so I’m pretty excited to have something new to show you today! I bought these interesting beads with a blue and white bulls-eye pattern quite a while ago at my local bead store, and hadn’t come up with any good ideas to use them. So, I was staring at them and trying to get inspired again a few days ago until I got a whim to combine them with some of the Swarovski pearls I have left over from custom-designing a friend’s wedding jewelry. The blue and white combo is perfect! I played around with a few combinations until I had a combination of beaded links that I liked (made from 22 gauge sterling silver wire).I’ve also been determined to create something that was completely handmade, apart from the beads, that is. I used a couple of books I have on hand to get ideas on forming the chain and clasp. I connected the beaded links, and created the chain using small, simple figure-eight shapes made of 20 gauge sterling silver wire. Then (and this is the part I’m most excited about) I figured out how to adapt some of the hook-and-eye clasp designs to make this necklace expandable! (I do this for most of my necklaces and bracelets, but using store-bought lobster slasps). I started out making a regular hook-and-eye style clasp, but instead of simply making a hook and a wrapped-loop version of the eye, I made a short extra length of chain with larger loops by creating three links similar to the wrapped-loop eye. Now the clasp can be fitted into with any of the larger loops, to adjust the size of the necklace for the buyer!So, what do you think? It’s definitely a more complex and time-consuming piece than the others in my shop, but I’m pretty pleased with how it came out! If you’re interested, click here to see the Etsy listing!

If anyone’s interested in what books I am currently using for inspiration, they are: Teach Yourself Visually: Jewelry Making and Beading, and Inspired Wire, by Cynthia Wuller. I got them both at the library!

Also, a quick update-I know I told you all quite a while ago that I was working on an 'etsy finds' post featuring dragons! I'm going to try and get moving on that this week, so you can let me know on twitter (@HyperspaceHippo) if you know of any listings anything you think I might want to include!

Copyright 2010. See more at Voyage of the Hyperspace Hippo

Creating a Gift

I’ve just heard from my friend Melissa, known to most of the online world as Dr Snit that she received the bracelet I’ve spent the last several months (off and on) designing and working on as a special gift for her. I’vewanted to blog about it for some time, in part to share a little bit about Melissa with the world, and in part to express the thoughts and sentiments that went into designing this bracelet.

Just to give you some context, I met Melissa on Facebook a couple of years ago via a little application called (fluff)friends. Unlike many of my online friends I have since had the fortune to actually meet her and her adorable little doggy in person. (Or, ok, full disclosure, she was determined enough to push me not to be too shy to give meeting up in person a shot!)

She is a comedian, writer, geek, poet, lifelong student, improv-er, and a friend and supporter to many people near and far Since meeting her, I’ve also seen her living with a seemingly endless parade of life-changing chronic and auto-immune illnesses. She has become an active advocate and supporter of others coping with similar illnesses through her writing and social networking, including her blog Living With Lupus-But Dying of Everything Else, and her Chronic Snarkopolist column on the Dear Thyroid website. Visit her links if you're interested in a very unique, open, raw, and real portrait of a person living with lupus and auto-immune thyroid illness. Not to go any farther into the most personal details, let's just say she’s been having a difficult year. Beyond trying to be an emotional support when possible, I really wanted to send something tangible her way, a token, that would let her symbolically carry the support of friends with her, to pull out when she is sad, or lonely. To that end, I spent a long (some might say an insane amount) time choosing just the right materials for this piece.
Jade animals: I’ve been told that the year 2010 has the potential to be rocky for those, like Melissa, who were born under the Chinese sign of the tiger. To counteract that, I have included jade versions of the tiger’s ‘allies’ (the horse and dog) and ‘secret friend’(the pig or boar) as focal pieces in the bracelet.
Tiger’s eye: Tiger’s eye used in jewelry has been thought to bring good luck and protection from the evil eye. It also works as a grounding stone to bring calm and clear thinking. It is also supposed to alleviate physical pain and stomach problems. The tiger is also a very meaningful animal for Melissa. I love tiger’s eye, and bought these beautiful round tiger’s eye beads at a little bead store in Connecticut, especially for this project.
Copper: Copper has often been used as a healing metal, and some sources say it is especially good for arthritis, rheumatism, and blood or metabolic disorders. Copper is also thought to help enhance the healing effect of other stones. For this project I used beautiful bright red-orange copper magnet wire (a type of enamel-coated copper wire normally used for electrical applications) that I found on etsy to make the beaded links. I made the bracelet extendable with beautiful solid copper jump rings, a lobster claw clasp, and a short length of chain (and some copper advice) from A Beaded Affair. I’d also like to give some appreciation to Bailey Belle for copper advice and support via twitter.

The final element of the bracelet is the Hamsa, or Hand of Miriam: The hamsa has meaning in Jewish (especially Sephardic) culture, as well as some Middle Eastern or North African cultures. It is used to ward off the evil eye, and is supposed draw positive energy, happiness, riches, and health. It is often hung in the home or worn as a charm or amulet. Aside from its obvious positive and protective meaning, its relationship to Jewish culture symbolizes one of the many connections I feel with Melissa.
After months of choosing and designing just the right elements, and searching for the actual pieces, this bracelet has finally come to life and been delivered. This is why I so love making individual gifts, even when the specific meanings behind them are not as clear as this one. While I don’t believe that certain stones or materials truly have inherent ‘magical healing powers,’ as a student of psychology I believe that materials in a human or social context have meanings, that gifts, tokens and symbols can have a psychological and emotional effect, and that the mind and emotions have an effect on physical well-being. I sincerely hope this bracelet will help bring her joy, healing, and support. <3

Copyright 2010. See more at Voyage of the Hyperspace Hippo

Really Good Excuses for Falling Behind!

I know, I haven't posted here in ages! I've had so much going on in life outside of the internet (what's that??) I went to Greece, I got a second cat (with one blind eye and a heart murmur), AND I've been dealing with family stuff and looking for a job! So busy . . .
But I've been just so excited to tell you all about Greece! First, we spent a week in Athens. We managed to get a cheap-ish hotel in a very central location, with a view of the Acropolis and everything!

Athens is just so much fun. A bit dingy in spots, and definitely HOT. But there are some really nice little squares, loads of history-very well-signed archeological sites and museums, and tons of shops and FOOD! The food was great, I've never had so much and such good feta cheese! Souvlaki, kebabs, pita, spanakopita, tomatoes, everything was delicious!

And then we went to Santorini! It was basically a full day's trip on the ferry, but totally worth it! It was much cooler there than in Athens, and everywhere you turned was a breathtaking view. We stayed in the village of Oia, which is gorgeous and perched on the edge of the cliffs overlooking the ocean.
There are pedestrian streets and stairs and so many places you can't reach by car. The food here was amazing too-lots of things made with local tomatoes. There were also tons of shops all over the island selling jewelry made from local volcanic rock, but my absolute favorite shop was simply called "the Bead Shop." It was the only shop I found that sold mainly beads and not pre-made jewelry. Among lots of beads you could find anywhere were beads made of black and red volcanic rock, and also many of the little blue 'evil eye' charms. Of course I had to buy some, who could pass up the opportunity to make your own souvenirs??


The other thing I loved about Santorini was the unique beaches. There were lots of black sand and pebble beaches, and even a red beach with pebbles and sand made of red, black and white volcanic rock. The rocks are very light and full of holes and unusual shapes. I picked up quite a few of the smoother pebbles here and hope to find a way to use them in jewelry! I'd welcome any ideas on how to use them :)


Copyright 2010. See more at Voyage of the Hyperspace Hippo