Island Dreams...the March Art Bead Scene Inspiration

The colors are amazing aren't they?  And the combo of red and pink is so interesting to me.  As a kid one of my "what you are not allowed to wear" rules from my Mom was that red and pink could not be worn together.  Don't know why really, but even now I have a hard time putting them together.  I didn't have any art beads that were in these colors, and Lord knows I don't NEED any more beads, but I couldn't let this challenge pass me by, especially when Gaea had a set of beads that would fit so well:

I wasn't sure if I would get them in time, but one of those magic padded envelopes arrived in no time at all.  And amazingly, I found myself at home, alone, for several hours this afternoon.  It was an incredible gift, and did so much to restore my harried soul.  Yep, I am really that simple.

So I pulled out a couple beads, definitely wanted to do something multi-strand, definitely wanted to feature the hearts, and definitely wanted to use some rose quartz beads that I bought last summer in Tucson.  I have this amazing pile of waxed linen I won from Jewelry Accord, and two of the colors worked with the beads.  This necklace is inspired....you know, I was about to come up with a bunch more fancy-pants descriptions of the "creative process," but really it's an inspiration picture, some inspiring beads, and adding and subtracting stuff I had piled here and there until I was happy with the result.  Really that simple.  The silk ribbon finish is partly because I underestimated how long to cut the waxed linen and partly a desire to make the final length adjustable.  Hope you like it...

You can check out the rest of this months ABC Challenge entries here.  And my Mom dress rule?  Only one pattern per outfit :-)