Bead Soup Beginnings...

I'm a little late blogging about the forthcoming BSBP 7 and to be honest that's because I was late getting my act together and sending a mix to my partner Silke Grober.  Fortunately we are in the last reveal on April 13th and Silke is from Germany which in the grand scheme of things, is not that far away from me so hopefully her beads will arrive before too long.

Silke is an Engineer by profession but also makes the most beautiful lampwork beads . She is particularly inspired by nebulae and landscapes and you see some of her wonderful creations by visiting her blog Just beads.

Or... you can stay right here because Silke got herself organised much more quickly than me and my soup ingredients arrived on Tuesday, each piece beautifully presented in its own organza bag with a description of the contents - and how delicious they were too...

These rich earthy colours are so me and the whole collection is so beautifully coordinated. I didn't just get one focal either, nor two but three beads with this fabulous organic design in greens and golds with a touch of plummy purple and some reactive silver leaf I think...

To go with these were an equally stunning set of smaller matching beads and spacers...

I'm already feeling very spoilt but there's more to come in the shapes of these Rudraksha seed beads and some little brass beads that I am totally smitten with. They have a lovely weight and quality to them and I've not seen them before so I may have to beg the source for those from Silke.

And last but not least is the pretty coiled copper clasp that Silke made for me and a deep purple silk ribbon which arrived wrapped around a large block of bitter dark chocolate but that is no more! Yum!

I think I could quite happily dive into this soup and start creating without even having to dip into my own stash but one thing's for sure - it's a match made in heaven for bronze...should the need arise!

Thank you so very much Silke - If you like your ingredients half as much as I do these I will be happy. And just to round things off, here's a little teaser of those ingredients and I'll reveal more once I know it's arrived at it's destination.

Lesley