Monday, April 21, 2008

Exasperation!

Don't you just hate it when you have the best (or what you think is the best) inspiration for a design, and you set out everything you need, and you begin...only to spend hours on it before you realize that you hate the design that just moments before you thought was the best thing since sliced bread?

Today was such a day. I have had these lovely strands of creamy white Akoya pearls in my stash for ages, toying with different plans for them now and then, until deciding that they really should be hand-knotted on silk. And today would be the day when I would teach myself hand-knotting, with the help of a couple of different techniques that I'd printed out and had beside me.

Once I got over the initial fumbliness (is that a word?) of my unpracticed fingers I strung a few pearls, divided by 18k gold beads, before I decided that the awl and/or tweezers just wasn't working for me and I started using just my fingers. Worked like a charm! I got to the middle of the necklace (a few hours after my early morning start time) and I already had the perfect (or what I thought was the perfect) idea in mind for the centerpiece of the necklace. Keeping it simple, I had planned on using a large, perfect lemon quartz center-drilled bead. But then for some unknown reason I ditched that idea and went with two small peridot rondelles on either side of a very large 18k gold bead...which I thought looked great, until I strung and knotted several more pearls and gold beads...and then it struck me that I just HATED the centerpiece! After all of that knotting! And now of course, I was nearly out of silk thread. Arrrgh!

I then did the smartest thing of my day so far...I put it away (after taking a quick pic of my faux pas to post here), along with the silk and all my other tools of the trade, poured something cold to drink and buried myself in a book. And tried to forget that I'd just wasted several hours of my day. :(



Not a total waste, though. I did learn the hand-knotting thing!

2 comments:

Unknown said...

i like it.

it is really different.

i love hand knotting. i have several necklaces for myself that i hand knotted. i taught my self.

i admire someone who can thread by hand. i would have pulled my hair out. i use griffin silk and i love the self attached needle.

MarDi said...

Thanks Misti, but I think it's really awful. Definitely in the "what was I thinking" category!

I used Griffin silk with the attached needle as well. I just found it more difficult to position the knot and tighten it with tweezers, so just did that with my fingers. I'm a real hands-on kind of person! :D

2nd attempt today, as soon as I get myself off to the local bead shop for more silk...IF they have it. Wish me luck!