What happens in California doesn't always stay in California!

This post was written by Lynn and posted by Carol Dean. (Lynn wanted to stress that she is a beader, not a professional photographer.):

When The Best Little Bead Box arrived on my doorstep, I was ecstatic….ok, to be honest I was practically drooling, but rightfully so! The Box weighed in at 14 lbs. when it was delivered at my door, and I wondered if the overwhelming temptation I felt to open it immediately was similar to that of what Pandora experienced. Perhaps, but unlike Pandora’s Box, this Box was filled with nothing but pure rapture!

I went through each bag in the Box very carefully, but with the eagerness of a child. It was so much fun unwrapping everything, and before I knew it my table was covered with 14 lbs. of deliciousness. It was quite difficult to choose what I would take from the Box (and not be too greedy), so I made my selections carefully…I chose the things that captured my spirit.

I must say that it took enormous willpower on my part not to take all of Linda Roberts’ exquisite cabs and buttons. I am such a huge fan of Linda’s work, and I just had to have three of her dichroic cabs, one dichroic button, and one of her beautiful lizard cabs! Her work is so incredibly detailed, and I absolutely love her sense of color and design.

Next, it was on to Jennifer Cameron’s contributions and, once again, I found it challenging not to take too much. I chose a pretty wooden bead pen, a strand of labradorite chips, a little bag of Mykonos beads, some pretty green briolettes, and two sterling silver toggles.

Since I am a huge fan of Marianne Kasparian (aka MAK)’s work, I chose one of her gorgeous raku cabs, and found some colorful iris metal seed beads from The Bead Parlor to match. Thank you, Shelley Nybakke! I also chose a strand of Shelley’s black Picasso beads. They were simply delightful, and I couldn’t resist.

Last but not least, I chose three items from Marcia DeCoster’s contributions: a beautiful Swarovski cab, a small bag of tiny margaritas, and a strand of beautiful fire polished beads.

Now it was time to add to the box, and I wanted to make sure that I left it bigger and better than when it arrived. I added several strands of beautiful Czech daggers (copper, gold peacock, chartreuse peacock with matching rounds, and some smaller iris daggers). To match the iris daggers, I added two packets of gorgeously iridescent beetle wings which I purchased from Alice Darke.

Next, I added some discontinued and hard-to-find rhodium squares, along with some beautiful black peacock triangles. I threw in two packs each of matte metallic copper and metallic green iris Tila beads from the Hole Bead Shoppe. I also added two different colors of lentil beads, copper hex beads and triangles, as well as some pretty two-toned Czech glass leaves.

I am a huge fan of Lisa Peter’s work, and have collected a lot of her pieces. I wanted to add an assortment of her gorgeous artwork to the Box, and so I added about two dozen or so cabs, buttons, connectors, charms, as well as a focal bead.

And now it was time to add some serious bling! I contributed the following Swarovski beads, pendants, rivolis, and chatons:

Last, but not least, I added one of Anderson Coats’ beautiful glass-blown Lotus Pendants.

It was great fun participating in The Best Little Bead Box project!! The Box now weighs in at just over 16 lbs. It was challenging getting everything into one box, but somehow I made it work. And now, I am hopping into my car and am off to the post office to send the Box to the next lucky beader… Enjoy!!

...........................

P.S. -  I just realized that I also included five beautiful glass buttons, as well as two gemstone cabochons.  One of the cabs was a Stichtite in Altantisite freeform that I purchased from Sheila Hoag.