Here are the results of my first day of beadmaking at the Sundance flameworking class. It was super-fun and inspired me to set up a super-sweet studio in my guest room. Now all my guests have to look at my propane/torch, kiln, and assorted lampworking doodads.

[[Oops!! I stuck a new image in that directory with the same name... now I have to dig up this old pic from my files.]]

Here are the first kinds of beads we made--simple little round ones (or they were supposed to be round). More than half of these broke, because they were so small they cooled too much before I could get them in the kiln.

This was my first decorated bead. The side you can't see has a big gloopy blob of green where I kinda lost control of my stringer.

This simple guy turned out pretty cool. Just a latticino (thin twist of three colors of glass) wrapped around a plain bead. I made the latticino myself, as you can tell from the Pam-esque color scheme (orange and lime green, baby!)

I think this bead is cooler than you can see here. It actually has little bubbles suspended in the glass at the center of each dot. Not perfect, but definitely neato.

This is my favorite from the first day. Very green-and-orange... Very alien-looking... Very me.

Here's the lot from the first day.

And now, for my second day's beads! We learned a lot of new techniques, so they are fancier. I actually kind of like the simplicity of the first day, but you can really see how much I learned from some of those second-day beads.

My first attempt at a sort of "snakeskin" distortion effect. Kind of a bust, but a cute little bead anyway.

A pretty clear bead... just a little off-center, but cool nonetheless.

Trying a new shape--a barrell-shaped bead.

Johnny wanted a heart to hang from his rearview mirror (isn't he cute?), so I leaned to make one. Here is the heart that I eventually made for him.

A funky daisy bead. We learned how to drag dots to make neat patterns.

Supposed to be paisley, but looks more like a tribute to the avocado.

My first clear-encased bead--a calla lily on a blue background encased in clear (for kind of that paperweight effect).

And here he is, the monkey... He's got a lot of personality and spunk, plus a lazy eye. This was my first sculptural bead. I've made a few more since, but he still has the cutest face.