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So Close!!

We are just five squares away from a full year, how exciting! It's nerve-wracking too, as there is a whole lot going on here just now, culminating in the Bead&Button Show in 3 weeks. 3 WEEKS?!

I'll make this quick:

Working in my beloved tweeds the last couple of weeks gave me the idea of playing around with the arrangement of the colors. I wanted facing quadrants featuring a single color to blend along the sides. So here there are facing quadrants featuring green and lilac striped with neutrals, and then all four colors are blended along the sides. It's pretty, but maybe not as striking as it could be with stronger contrast. Notice that I chose to work the 4-color sides so that the green and purple create 'horizontal' bands leading toward the stripe ends.

As always, you can find the basic Warped Square threadpath HERE. These patterns are shown worked in size 11 Delica beads. Bead kits still on SALE!

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Yes, more sunshine and green green green:

I have never enjoyed springtime so much as I do here at Lake Tahoe; our garden is looking lovely, the birds and animals are romping around, and the air is just heavenly. 

But this square is really more about the concept than the colors of sun, sky and grass. In my bead box I ran across a stray triangle like the ones I made for my folding lotus bracelet:

I still really like the way those stripes line up when joined to create their own fields of pattern. They  blur the line between triangles and make you question what you are looking at. And I think the individual triangle look cool too, with their strong colors interrupted and kicked off balance with this bold graphic section. Looks good in a square, too! And of course the squares can be joined in various ways, including into stars and twisty ribbons!

Basic WS pattern is available HERE. 

And I still have bead kits available at half price in the shop. Right now I'm offering the 'Prism/Phoenix' and 'Primer/Temple Prime' kits. Each of these has been featured numerous times here in the blog and in CGB patterns like the Exploding Sets.

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I'm not sure just what I had in mind as I started this week's square; I just thought it would be interesting to have the geometric shapes kind of spiral out in size...and then I forgot and made the blue and green ones the same width! So I stopped and took a deep breath and thought about what to do...

I had some reminders this week of earlier squares using this colorway (Primer/Temple Prime bead kit, still On Sale!), and remembered how effective it was to float the bright colors over a 'tweed' field.So I used that for a border and I'm really happy with it!

It reminds me of those sort of flag signs for railroads, hence the name.

Don't forget, the basic Warped Square threadpath can be found HERE, and bead kits are half price!

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This week's square is a bit of a color study, using different combinations of yellow, blue, and green. While I worked on it, it felt like an expression of the many shades of green emerging in the early springtime. When it was finished it just reminded me of Wasabi Peas, yum!

And now I need a snack.
Enjoy!

43

So. It's spring.

I guess you may have noticed by now that I am a person who would delight in eight months of winter. But the fleeting nature of snow season is part of what makes it precious and special, so I am reconciled to having four seasons in the year.

We've had mild temperatures for a while, but a couple of cold snaps have brought us a bit more snow.

This week's square features springtime colors, but the addition of white and that odd duck, Bitchin Camaro, give it a frosty edge. It would be easy to manipulate the quadrants here to create the stripe of your choice.

Try making a pair of harmonious but not matching earrings!

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Here it is Tuesday afternoon, and I don't have a photo of this week's square. I don't actually have this week's square.

How Embarrassing!

I made a sample, a starter for the square I wanted to make, but it just doesn't cut the mustard. It's close enough, though that I was able to draw up the pattern for how it should look, the square I was shooting for.

True to my textile mania, this is an attempt at a plaid pattern. It's something I have wanted to do for a long time! It would look fabulous made into bacon or another joined design. I just couldn't decide what color to use for an edging--black or silver?

Should I manage to rock up the square this evening or tomorrow morning, I'll pop in a photo and add it to social media as well. In the meantime, here's the pattern, making interesting use of that strange metallic, Bitchin' Camaro, which masquerades as black. Note that translucent matte blue, aka Stranger Danger, is represented as gray in the pattern, and BC is dark green, for the sake of of legibility.

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I really can't say that this is favorite color combination. I made this one with the intention to make a pair of earrings to match one of those Pendleton bags my friend Mika makes.

 I went looking for an image of the original blanket that this scrap came from, it's probably part of a very beautiful composition--those Pendleton folks are sneaky good that way. While I didn't find that, I did find something similar, and hilarious! Yay doughnuts!

I really enjoy the asymmetry of this square, and I think I'll do something similar for the 2018 Warped Square packet that I will be using to teach this year.

If you plan to attend the Bead&Button show this June, I hope you'll join us. If you feel you have had just about enough of squares (I confess I have), I'm also teaching the exciting Flying Fivewing Cocktail Ring and a fun needlefelted bracelet.

It is going to be a crunch, finishing up the blog (11 weeks to go) and coming up with 5 new pairs of earring squares. I hope I can manage it!