Chloe: future "bead lady"... She's hooked!

Dave caught Chloe in a very funny moment...

He says it's great "shameless self promotion" for Marsha Neal Studio pendants, so he tweaked it and uploaded it for me...

Chloe's Video (click here)

She is SO going to be a bead lady when she grows up!!!

A small necessary disclaimer... beads and pendants are small and are potential choking hazards.

Beads & Friends

I am having SO much fun seeing all of my friends at Bead Fest Wire!!!

And Bead Wire Fest has 1 more day!!!

Sunday, May 3, 2009

11am - 5pm

Stop by and see us in booth #1801!

Darlene (D7 Studio) is helping me run the booth, and we have a lot of beads for sale that are made by other artisans other than just myself:

Lisa Kan

Nolly's Follies

And some other cool glass work that she picked up in Tucson this year...

Also:

Jangles (earthenware beads)

Gaea (stoneware beads)

Earthenwood (porcelain beads)

Mazet Studios (wood fired ceramic pieces)

Off Center Productions (stoneware vessels)

Italian Wire Mesh (2.5mm, 6mm)

Hand Painted Silk Strands: 2mm, Silky & Fairy Ribbons

Jewelry findings to help complete your projects

Kumihimo disks

... and more!

Also, get to see the new glazes first hand. I've had a few customers suggest some names, but not too many. So if you give me some suggestions, you may have a good chance at winning a $50 gift voucher to use through MarshaNealStudio.com

Hope to see you there!!!

Bead Fest Wire Is Almost Here!

I am so excited about Bead Fest Wire - this next weekend!

May 1-3, 2009

Fri: 10am - 7pm

Sat: 10am - 6pm

Sun: 11am - 5pm

Valley Forge Convention Center in Valley Forge, PA

Marsha Neal Studio will be in booth #1801

Right now I've got a kiln loaded and firing with a few remaining bead orders, stock for my upcoming trunk shows, stock for BFW along with a handful of new glazes!

At Bead Fest Wire, I will accepting potential glaze names for these new colors.

If I pick your glaze name you will receive a $50 gift voucher to use through my online shopping cart.

If the rare chance happens that the same name is suggested, I will put your names into a hat and pick the winner. Actually, I'll let Chloe pick that winner - let her have some fun in it!

More details to follow...

Hopefully I'll see you there!

Oh, and I'll also put info up here so people not attending BFW will have a chance to name the new glazes and get their gift voucher!

Last Day of April Sales Special!

Sunday, April 26, 2009

I've been running a special for my newsletter customers as well as anyone that has placed an order through my website or Esty shop from March 15 - April 26, 2009:

For every $30 you spend on my porcelain pendants during these dates...

You can earn a $10 gift voucher to use through my online shopping cart by 6/31/09.

See side bar for details....

Happy Shopping!!!

...If you missed out on this special, sign up for my MarshaNealStudio.com newsletter and get this kind of stuff when it first comes out!

Thanks for your continued support!

Potential New Glaze Colors

I just got some new glazes just the other day and couldn't wait to run a test firing.

This may not look like much more than a bunch of lines of frothy colors, but in person, there are some yummy details that have some great potential for becoming new glaze colors for my pendants. Most of the colors are brown/tan with a combination of blues, greens & purples.

The way I test glazes is in two parts:

First is on a pendant fired vertically - this will give a result close to how the actual pendant will look. These start as one color only and can be somewhat mediocre by itself.

Second is on a larger test tile as you see above which is fired horizontally on the kiln shelf.

This particular test tile has 5 glazes, each brushed once vertically, once horizontally which gives me 15 squares of different color to see.

If I'm not too particular with trying to keep it neat and perfect, sometimes there is a 3 glaze overlap and additional potential glazes can be found (enough to make a girl all giddy with color joy)!

The color of the actual tile is so much more vivid than the picture - and once I do more testing I'll post new pictures.

I'm thinking that for my Early May challenge may be a "name the new glazes" drawing where the person that submits the name I pick for the glaze will win a gift certificate to Marsha Neal Studio Online Shopping Cart.

And I'll have the new glazes available for seeing, voting and purchasing through my booth at Bead Fest Wire over the weekend of May 1-3.

Also, if you are interested in getting a free one day pass to Bead Fest Wire, my friend Darlene will have a few of them available at her booth (D7Studio) this weekend at the Innovative Beads Expo show in Edison, NJ. Once they are gone, that's it - so get there early.

Wire Wrapping Insanity

The sun was shining...

Birds were out gathering nesting materials...

And I took some time to sit down and get into obsessive wire wrapping on my porcelain pendants...

This is what my work space looked like...

Some of the close up detail of the pieces I'm putting up on Etsy for sale:

This makes me feel good since I haven't had time to really sit and enjoy myself like this for a while...

And there are lots of ideas too so I'm ready to get into the studio to make new porcelain pendants to go with the Vintaj pieces.

Makes me think too - I've got some more images to upload...

Probably going to stagger them though...

Any feedback on my updated Etsy shop would be appreciated...