Jesse James Free Beads Part 1

Hello friends , fellow artists, fans, and those who like to take a glimpse inside my mind!! It's been a wee bit since I have blogged. My son Liam who is 7 had the unfortunate event of being home from school for a week battling strep throat and an ear infection,  I too am not feeling so well. However Art never ceases for me. It is a constant companion like no other that offers me a creative outlet for my thoughts and emotions. So I welcome you to yet another glimpse inside my mind.
Very recently it's been a running joke of many of you asking for only a few minutes to see inside my mind. I am not sure however if this is a good thing or not as I have many hidden very dark areas surely not even acceptable for even a rated R movie lol, though I am able to offer you some small semblance of things you may see. Take inspiration from it, may it help you to think outside the box, for being outside the box is truly where you find yourself , it's where all of the creative's play before jumping off into their own realms, faery lands, and world's where our art is formed and stories are written.
This journey in particular is a walk in a forest and metaphorically speaks of our journey in life.


Let me start by saying that I don't typically use these types of beads that are in this design. However I fell in love with them after using a set to create a mother's day gift for my mother. It was then I saw that Jesse James Beads has a Free Bead program open to jewelry artists, you apply by giving your basic information and letting them know all the social media outlets you use. You tell them a bit about yourself and your art. I waited a few days very anxiously I may say for the email stating I had been accepted into the program. I was then asked to tell them which colors I would like, to which I responded (as many of you know me knew I would) that I didn't have a preference for colors, I love to be challenged, so they should have fun surprising me. To which they did. Ahh, however they sent me a combination of my favorite colors.. gorgeous browns, creams, and golds....
I received two gorgeous strands that coordinated with one another, they were Brown Sugar #1 A and Brown Sugar #2

 You can see for yourself how gorgeous they are!!

Now bare with me while I tell you a story, an incredible story about life & all its beauty, sadness, trials and tribulations.
This one of a kind design I named " Sacred Garden"
We all have a sacred garden where we store memories of our past, our deep dark ugly secrets, our happiest most uplifting moments, moments of love, loss, accomplishment, failures, where we keep our one true self, the one we rarely allow the world to have a glimpse of, where our vulnerabilities reside, where the things that haunt us,  the things that broke us, the things that have made us grow, live. They play with one another among the lavender fields, and at times break away to remind us of who we are, where we have been, and where we can go.

 We alone are the only ones who can unlock that garden. The garden is more of a Forest area, where we begin our walk among the path of the unknown, this is where we learn early on who we are, who our loved one are, we learn how to speak, to dress, to become a part of our society as a whole, but also learn who we are as a person in life, this path turns and twists, it has hills, and mountains so high it almost seems impossible to climb it. Oh but we do... We do this in the face of adversity, we do this when we are knocked down, when life throws us every dam thing at one time so much so that we feel as though that mountain is indeed sitting on our shoulders, and yet we persevere, we climb that dam mountain thru treacherous terrain and we indeed become the victor, knowing that it's but one mountain to overcome but also finding comfort in the fact that we did it once, we gained knowledge and strength, should we need to face these mountains a thousand times over we will know that we can and will indeed do it!! Coming off that mountain we find ourselves in a meadow, that meadow is filled with the most beautiful flowers one could ever imagine, so beautiful we find an overwhelming sense of peace, gratitude, lust, and love. We begin to feel so comfortable that nothing could ever hurt us again, until we stumble upon the most beautiful of all the flowers and we watch it wilt and wither away, and in shock we cry, we feel broken, we cry so hard that our souls lift from us for a glimpse in time and we feel totally and completely shattered, so much so that we don't for a time realize that the winds of time have held us in it's grasp, that they  pulled the sun from the sky to warm us , and slowly put us back together again... we sleep then as only we can after being broken and torn and our world crashing down around us... we sleep...
Upon the next morning we awake ready for the new day, but we have grown , we have learned that even broken, we can be put back together ,we are just different now and view our world in a new way,  this feeling gives us hope!!
We awake on that plateau, we are given hope,  courage,  opportunity to move forward or remain where we are, which would be rather boring as life is the most precious gift of all, regardless of what paths we chose, Life in itself is meant to be lived, your given the chance to fail in order to truly live, to see beyond the twists and turns, to walk into the unknown with your head held high, to know who you are, to always be proud of yourself, to pick yourself up and dust yourself off. To plant seeds of wisdom, knowledge, love, happiness, sadness, successes, failures, kindness, compassion, flaws, in your sacred garden, as a reminder of your life!! Hold this sacred Key to your Sacred Garden and unlock who you are, do not hide among the thorns, but blossom and grow among the stars, it's okay to fall, remember that mountain we defeated earlier? Well he will always be there waiting for you to defeat him again and again.

And this my friends is but a small glimpse into my mind based on recent events in my life that had me contemplating how many times I have defeated that mountain alone and how many more times I will do it again, and how each time I grow stronger and wiser.

Thank you for staying here and reading the story that inspired this design, a huge thank you to Jesse James Free Bead Program for allowing artists to create and tell stories.

 

-The Beadwench!!!!!

(p.s. As a side note this one of a kind design will be available for sale during my upcoming trunk show held on facebook at LBA Artists Limelight here https://www.facebook.com/groups/1531422820515551/?ref=br_tf  June 29th & 30th with my wonderful friend and fellow artist Kim Sloan)

www.jessejamesbeads.com  #JesseJamesFreeBeads