This pendant, made for the sibling who acted in my stead at the funeral, features one of the 7 or so beads I made in this series: one for everyone in the family who wanted one.

To make the bead, I used the following frits:

• Double helix gaia fine (green)
• enamel white
• 060 Cobalt
• 6-20 mesh TE 9453 (steel blue)

Thompson Enamels (9000 series)

• 9453 sky blue
• 9350 pine (dk) green
• 9330 apple green

And shards (made for me by Fran who notes she made “many”:

• blue-green
• amber
• amber cased ivory
• DH (reactive) purple, cobalt & terra nova (obviously from unlabeled shorts)

Or if you want the original notes:

on a base of pale cobalt, probably using some nice 13mm rods—so much easier to make bigger beads with thicker rods, once you have the flame to support that. I've had Brega the Brava for 5 years now, and I still love this torch. I don't seem to have recorded anything about the canes I used for the tree branches and the bird's wings and tail feathers but if they weren't stuff lying around, then I suspect they were pretty simple; the head and body were black and white respectively.

I tend to stay away from the diamond-sparkle cut sterling because it tarnishes so readily, but of course that doesn't matter in a grave good, and I figured the recipient would prefer matching beads. The pmc bail goes back to...about 2006. That's sitting around for long enough, time to give it a new home.

Despite the dangle being in rather soft focus, the thing I'm honestly happiest about is the photography.

Unless otherwise noted, text, image and objects depicted therein copyright 1996--present sylvus tarn.

Sylvus Tarn