Desert Sands Necklace and Earrings

~Necklace on the Left, Earrings on the Right~

Here's a necklace I've had on the site for a couple of months, but I never get to tell the story about it. I was in a bead store last year and I saw this gorgeous, huge carnelian bead in the display case. It wasn't in my budget, but, of course, I had to have it. I had no idea what to do with it, but I bought it anyway and took it home where it sat on my dining room table all night. That night I had a dream. I dreamed of sand, hot under my feet and swirling on the hot wind into my face in golden colours of yellow, amber and brown. I saw the aqua sky, and burning red sun. I woke up at 2:30 in the morning and couldn't sleep - the necklace had planted itself in my mind and needed to be addressed. I drew it for an hour or so, went back to bed and created the necklace that very same morning (though at a decent time of day). I strung the carnelian for the sun with a small spiral of gold wire at the bottom (although I was envisioning the Sahara desert, the Celts see the spiral as a symbol for the sun) for the centerpiece. I then layered gold-plate beads, multi-hued amber chips and yellow aragonite for the sand and spaced them with Czech glass beads in an aqua shade for the sky. I created a custom toggle clasp with more gold wire and strung the aqua beads along it. I then made matching earrings with more Czech glass, amber, gold-plate and aragonite beads (with gold-plate daisy spacers for a polished look) on 14karat gold-filled ear wires. I love this necklace! It is long, about 18 inches or so and the carnelian pendant sits just at the decolletage. It feels really nice against the skin, even the amber, which at first I thought may be rough, but not at all. Very luxurious!

The necklace is available for sale with or without the earrings at http://www.littlestudio.ca/

Enjoy! I'm off to make more jewellery, blog you soon,

Meghann