Final Genea Beads Cup of Bead Soup -- and an Auction!

It's that time -- time to say goodbye to this month's sponsor for the Cup of Bead Soup project, Genea of Genea's Beads.

Genea sent me some gorgeous handmade lampwork glass beads that were absolutely in my favorite color palette, but were in shapes and styles that challenged me.  You can click here and here to see the other goodies I made with the cheerful beads I received.  Today I'll show you the last three pieces, and you'll have a chance to bid on all three in a very special auction.  More on that in a bit.

The first piece was made with the bits-and-bobs bag Genea sent from Yvonne of My Elements.  I've had a lot of fun using these little bits of fun in my other pieces, so I made a delicate necklace that would work well for a fun-loving adult OR a teenager.

This is called "For Caylin", and you'll see why in a minute.  The sterling silver necklace is 16" long, and the painted plexiglass, crystal, and anodized aluminum pendant is 1.75" long.

The next piece is a pendant I named "Ballerina" because it reminds me of those amazing, long tulle creations I always longed to wear.  The handmade glass is 20mm tall and I added a cluster of glass flowers beneath, along with a gorgeous sterling silver star.  The bail will take up to a 6mm chain, and the pendant measures 2.25" in length.

Lastly, I have a chunky necklace made with one of Genea's amazing hollow beads, nearly 1" in size, in berry colors with subtle purple polka dots.  I added two of her purple lampwork glass spacers, four vintage lucite teardrops in a glowing hot pink, and two luminous purple glass beads.  The beaded length is 7", and the remainder is made up of matte dusty rose seed beads.

The necklace measures 16-18" with the sterling silver chain extender and lobster claw clasp.

Now for the auction!

I became acquainted with Kristina Proffitt recently and her work with increasing awareness of Type 1 Diabetes.  Her daughter, Caylin, was diagnosed on March 2, 2011, and now the Proffitts have created a fundraiser to not only help fund diabetes research.

Caylin

The first part of the Caylin's Cure fundraiser raised over $2100 for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation. I think we in the beading community can raise even more.

 

Why do I care?   I have a lot of friends with diabetes, both Type 1 and Type 2.  I've made awareness jewelry on my web site for diabetes for a long time to help support research.  It runs in my family, and I get tested often.  But mainly, I can't imagine a child having to deal with needles and pain and everything that goes into this.  I can't imagine a family that has to worry about something like this.

Here's the first phase.  

I'm auctioning off all three of these pieces, with 100% of the proceeds going to Caylin's Cure.  Then in a few days, I'll post about how you can join a blog hop to auction off a piece of jewelry at whatever percentage you choose.  You can pick something out of your existing inventory -- you don't even have to make anything.  

 How to Bid

To bid, just leave a comment with the name of the piece and a price.  I'm going to take comment moderation off, which means we'll probably get some icky spam, but it's the only way to be fair on the bids.  

Anonymous bids are welcome -- 

just give yourself a name, and if you win, email me for payment information.

Bidding ends

Saturday, June 4th, 3pm

Thank you.

Lori Anderson creates jewelry for her web site, Lori Anderson Designs, and wrote the blog An Artist's Year Off.  She's also a contributor to Art Bead Scene.  She is also the creator of the Bead Soup Blog Party.