So, it’s Bead Soup Blog Party time again. Don’t know what I’m talking about? Here’s a post from last year, which explains it all. I started putting my soup together a wee while ago. I was ordering a stack of stuff from a certain online shop where you can buy all manner of beady goods, including art beads. I took a bit of a ‘Friday night shop’ approach to it, finding a focal and clasp, then slinging various other matching items into my cart. It was really the focal and clasp that determined the rest of the soup ingredients. I ended up going with a colour that I don’t use much myself - green.

(enamel leaf - CKoop, clasp - Miss Fickle Media)

It’s not that I don’t like green - I do! I just seem to overlook it. There are certain greens I love - like lime and chartreuse. But it isn’t one of my go-to colours. It’s not just the case with designing; I barely ever buy green clothing, for example. I’m not consciously avoiding it. I just find that it’s missing when I look for it. Anyway, enough about my green issues. I haven’t introduced my partner. She doesn’t really need an introduction. It’s Lori Anderson, who’s only the blimmin’ organiser of this whole swap thing! Obviously, I was stoked and more than a bit surprised when I discovered that Lori was my partner. And then I was struck with SIC (Soup Inferiority Complex). ‘How many soups must Lori have cast her eye over’, I thought. ‘Surely mine is going to seem wanting’. But I’d already ordered the focal and clasp and various other bits, so I resisted the temptation to scrap my plans. Here’s the rest of what I’ve sent to Lori. I know she’s received it - apparently, her son, Zack, was very taken with the leaf, which was good to hear!

There’s a couple of strands of recycled glass, which I bought when I got the focal and clasp.

Then I pulled together a mix of other miscellaneous green stuff.

Inevitably, there’s a couple of Petra bits, along with some dark green leather and some czech glass leaves/drops/top-drilled thingummies. I included that big painted wood rectangle as a bit of a curve ball. I’ve actually got two strands of them, one green and one fuchsia pink. I bought them because I liked the look of them but I didn’t have a clue what I’d do with them. Putting this soup together, I actually came up with a necklace design using one, so that was neat. Anyway, I thought I’d challenge Lori with one too. To counter all the green, I added in a bunch of semi-precious - quartzes mainly, and some coffee jasper.

Very Spring-y, I thought. Here’s the whole soup again.

I’m really intrigued to see what Lori comes up with. The reveal day is 3rd May. I have received the most fabulous soup from Lori, which rather puts mine to shame, but hey ho! I’ll be back to share it very soon - hopefully tomorrow!