New Glass Book in the works...

Beads by Jeri Warhaftig

I’m generally not good at tooting my own horn but I think I’d like to announce a little something – let the cat out of the bag – although, we have all been given permission to do so at this point. Lucky me, last year I submitted my resume and bio to Jeri Warhaftig for consideration to join the “focus group” to participate in her newest glass beadmaking book. (Tentatively titled: Creating Glass Beads). Insert my happy dance here! Wahoo, I was included in that group – an original batch of about 16 that eventually was whittled down to about a dozen. So what did we do in this focus group? Ah, we got to participate in creating beads for all of the great bead projects you’re going to get to see in the book. It was wonderful! We got advance instructions and I really enjoyed participating in learning some new skills. Plus, Jeri kept us all in the loop during pre/post production so we all got to hear about the process and what stage we were/are going through. Do you get a sneak peak, nope? Sorry. You’ll have to wait until the book is published (I believe it will be spring of 2011), it just wouldn’t be fair any other way. Can I tell you it’s going to be as good as its predecessor, absolutely!

And, as a side note (an important one), for those of you who haven’t tried puffy mandrels to make hollow beads you should go to the Jeri Beads site and get a few from Dr. Fab (Jeri’s DH). I’ve used these mandrels since Jeri and Neil (Dr. Fab) taught a class in sandblasting (those are Jeri’s iridized and sandblasted beads pictured above). There is nothing like those puffy mandrels for making a great light weight bead. I should have included a photo of some hollow beads but you'll have to go to Jeri's site to see those. If you love marble sized beads but hate the weight of a heavy bead on your neck these mandrels are the way to go!