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Tuesday 29 June 2010

Celebration time - GIVEAWAY!

Hi, and welcome to my first ever GIVEAWAY! I wish to celebrate 2 things with this giveaway.

Firstly, I just got my 50th follower of my blog! I can't believe I have so many followers. Thank you all so much for being interested in what I have to say and do. I am really really honoured! You are all people I admire and look up to.

Secondly, I wish to celebrate my birthday which is on Wednesday the 30th of June. I get so much from all of you in the beading community and blog-o-sphere, and I wish to give something back aswell.
I have been thinking about this giveaway for some time now. What kind of theme should I have? I believe I couldn't come up with anything exciting or odd enough. So that's what I am doing, I have put together a soup of odd beads, one of each. They all come from my own bead stash. It is a mixture of high and low, big and small, cheap and expensive. Gemstones (some unusual ones like Gaspeite), coral, sugar beads, clay, porcelein, shell, brass, copper, wood, carved acrylic, metalized acrylic, glass, ceramic, lampwork, resin, charms, pendants, findings, trade beads, african, indian, german, czech, indonesian, american, unusual beads, common beads, patterned, plain, figures, geometric ... There are no art beads though, coz I don't want to give the ones I have away... and there are other beads of mine I haven't put in there, simply coz I have only very few of them. No seed beads and very few fire-polish. It is a kind of soup I would like to recieve myself. Just a crazy mix of this and that! I hope you feel the same way and want to participate in the competition.

So what do you need to do to have a chance to win? I wished to try something different, so ...
1. You have to be a follower of my blog, so if you are not yet sign up now!
2. Write a comment on this post, AND ...
3. ... give me a beading tip in that comment. Something you believe would be useful for ME. Just anything - a great shop, a clever technique, a fun class, a book I should look at, some beautiful beads I should discover, tools, tips on blogging ... Please surprise me - it is my birthday after all!

I will be compiling a list of the ten top tips. Top ten for ME that is! And I will present that list here on my blog. The person who gave me tip number ONE will be the winner of the giveaway. It is all very subjective, isn't it.

The last day for leaving a comment and have a chance to win is on Wednesday the 7th of July (one week after my birthday). And I will present the list and the winner on Thursday the 8th of July.

Please participate, it would mean a lot to me.
Thanks!

12 comments:

Stephanie said...

Happy Birthday! One of my favorite places to look for beads is in thrift stores. I like to take jewelry apart and remake them, my style. I have made some great finds in bags of jewelry sold as 1 cheap lot. Thank you for a chance to win your bag of treasures!

Amy F said...

Start an idea book - sketches, ideas you have, color palates torn from magazine, catalogs, etc. Great for when the ideas run dry, and to inspire you.

steufel said...

Happy Birthday, Malin! May the next year be a great and blessed one. Regarding the tip:

Be careful about the jewelry-makers handshake (a good long stare at another jewelry-makers chest). Some people doesn't take that to well:-)

elisabeth said...

Happy birthday! I am already a follower and am drooling over that stash. Here is my tip: Do not go to a bead show or a bead shop with someone who loves beads more than you do - it will always be dangerous for your wallet (although you will ahve a very good time :-))

Barbara Lewis said...

You have a super cool studio ... and happy birthday!

Okay, let me see ... for the tip. This tip is for connecting beads with wire wrapping. If you want to bulk up the wire by having some of the wire wrap down on the crown of the bead ... put the wire through the bead, on the one end create just a single loop without the extra wrapping. This will secure the bead in place. Leave 8 inches of wire for wrapping, but don't wrap yet. Go to the other end of the wire, do a wire wrapped loop and continue wrapping and wrapping, bringing the wire down over the crown of the bead. Now that the bead is in place, go back to the other end and repeat by wrapping the crown. You have to have the bead securely in place in order to wrap both ends of the crown, you can't simply wrap the first loop with lots of wire without having the bead securely in place. I hope this makes sense. You probably already know this anyway!

Jen Judd said...

Hey Birthday Girl!!! What a great idea! My birthday's next week and I may treat myself to something beadily nice. haaaaaaaaa

My tip for you is about the "business" side of beading. This is the side nobody really likes to deal with. It's probably much different in Sweden than it is in the U.S., but overall doesn't anyone trying to sell something want to know their "ins and outs"? Well, first, I'd recommend Viki Lareau's book: "Marketing and Selling Your Handmade Jewelry"...tons of great and useful tips. Then, second, I'd say for recordkeeping: go manual. A spreadsheet might seem like the ideal solution, but I love a little two-column accounting book and a 12-part envelope for receipts. I can walk in the door from shopping or a show and sit right down to right it out. Plus, it makes me really see what I'm spending on my passion...which can be an eye opener. haaaaaaaaaaa

Best wishes to you for a safe and productive and fun and amazing next year!!

Jen

Rebecca said...

Happy Birthday Malin! I hope you had a great day. My beading tip.....Jeezo, I'm not good at thinking up things like that! My tip will be to KEEP LOOKING. Look beyond other beading artists; look to decorative/high/folk artists and see what they do and how they can inspire your work. Look beyond the obvious and you will find inspiration everywhere.

Great bead soup! I'm keeping my fingers crossed!

Rebecca

songbeads.blogspot.com

Doris said...

Hallo Malin,
Congratulations, my tip for you: rummage in bead- and jeweleryblogs and you will find every day inspiration and links to cool shops.

wish you a great birthday
Grüßle
Doris

Pretty Things said...

I've been a follower -- and as a bead tip -- never let anyone tell you you have enough beads, LOL!

Unknown said...

Hi Im a follower! Nice collection giveaway! A tip..well sometimes when my bead trays not working, the beads want to fall over or dont fit..what do I use? Rice. Sound silly? Its amazing and the beads stay right where I opt them and in the direction! I spread the rice out on a dinner place..they never move and stay for however long I wish. Long grain btw lol!
Thank you for this chance!

Maneki said...

Writing in English this time. Congrats, both on your birthday and your many (well-deserved) followers.

I'm afraid my tip ended up being really long... Almost an article for my blog rather than a comment o brief tip. And in a way perhaps more aimed at myself than anyone else... I'm a tool junkie, don't know if you are. (But I guess the general idea can be applied on many other things as well.)

I guess one good tip that I like is: Buy tools, but not too many. Buying tools is fun. There are many useful tools that can save you time or aid you in other ways. Having the right tool can be crucial. Have extras can be useful. But that is also a problem, all those interesting looking tools you can choose between. You really can do a lot with just a handful tools and sometimes the sheer novelty of a new special tool can be too enticing: you end up buying tools you rarely use. (Even worse: you might end up spending money on tools you never use and then have no money to buy tools you really could need.) Buying beads like that is often not a problem seeing that beads can be cheaper than tools and usually you do come up with an idea eventually. Having tools you don't use is just a downer: they take up space, they remind you constantly about one's bad judgement. If you're lucky, you'll later get interested in something that does require that dusty old tool. But you can't count on that happening.

I usually look at tools and say "oh, I want that!". But before even thinking of buying it I try to analys my "need" for it: when will I really use it? Am I just attracted to the news value or does it actually do something I've felt a need to do when working on my jewellery? Can it be used for more than one thing (this will increase usefulness)? Can I do the same thing with the tools I already own? Is the price worth it, e.g. does it really save so much time that it's worth buying that instead of supplies or does it do the same job as my current tools but better/more precise? Do I use the tool for a technique I'm likely to give up soon or something I'm likely to keep on working with? If usure, can I easily sell the tool to someone else if I don't end up using it?

Boring? Perhaps, but the more expensive the tool, the better to think through it before buying. I try to really follow the idea of "multipurpose use": don't buy it unless you can use it for more than one thing. If it can only do one thing it has to be a good reason for it (like a bezel setting tool or a general tool like a drill) or I can probably do that one thing with tools I already own. And save the money for buying beads and other supplies.

Claire Maunsell said...

Hey Malin, that's a nice collection that looks like great fun - great idea!
This isn't much of a tip and I forget where I found it (or would give credit) but I have found this very useful. Working in polymer clay generates a certain amount of scrap and this is a great way to use that lump. (You might want to buy a packet if you DON'T work with clay...)
When I'm putting together a necklace it is nice to be able to rearrange elements and have them stay put. I make a coil of polymer that is the length of the necklace I want to make (diameter of the coil is the size of my little finger or a little less) and lay it out like a beading board. Since the polymer is soft you can embed the beads and elements in the clay in the order you want and as close as you want. Then you can change it and change it ad nauseam...the advantage over the bead board is that it works REALLY well for oddly shaped elements or really large beads that wouldn't sit well in that channel on the board. Then string them when you have the perfect design - voila! And you can reuse it...Hope you find this useful!