The Lima Beads Blog News, Contests, Fun & More

Greetings all, from the Ann Arbor Art Fair!

My apologies for not unveiling a new Tip or Technique this week, but I’ve been super busy unveiling my jewelry at the 45th annual Ann Arbor Art Fair at State Street. If you’re in town this weekend, please come on by and say hello! We’re camped out on the strip of S. State Street, between E. Liberty and E. William. (Right across from local watering hole, Ashley’s– and they’ve been tempting us with hot dogs and beers–sounds like Summer to me!)

I guess it is possible that I am giving away all my trade secrets by broadcasting this, but many of the designs I’ve shared on Tips & Techniques, as well as in the Design Gallery, are beautifully laid out on my table in this sweltering heat. (Big thanks to my little sister who came up from Florida to hang out with me and haul loads of necklaces, bracelets and earrings downtown).

Did you love learning the Ladder Stitch from this video? That piece is here! The Transparent Resin Frame tutorial turned into these cool earrings, also displayed at my humble table. Boardwalk at Twilight bracelet? Got ‘em. Garden Droplets? Check.

This isn’t just one big advertisement for my super-awesome booth at the Ann Arbor Art Fair. But I wanted to let you all know where I have been for the past few weeks (longer if you count all the hours crafting!). Do you participate in Art Fairs? They are a lot of work! As somewhat of a veteran at this point, my number one tip is to always always put your sparkly pieces in the sunlight (eye catchers!) and of course, have a card with your name, contact info, AND location in the fair. Seems simple enough, but those simple things are the easiest to forget sometimes! Those are my tips, but I like to consider myself a life-long learner, so I’d be curious to know, what is your #1 Best Advice when hitting the Art Fair circuit?

First, we’ve added new selections to 3 of our most popular bead artists. We’ve also added 15 gemstone beads to the shop.

Artist Beads

Gaea and Kylie Parry have been doing some great ceramic work lately! We’ve added to the ever-popular selection of Gaea bundles with 12 new color mixes. We’ve also expanded the selection of Kylie Parry birds and pendants. Plus, Ricci at Rustic Charms sent us some beautiful new sterling silver pieces, including blanks, pendants, beads, and findings. Any of these artist additions could easily be the inspiration for an entire piece. See them all now.

Gemstone Beads

I have to admit, Lima Beads hasn’t been covering the gemstone bead basics very well. We’ve been adding lots of large, flashy items and neglecting the essentials that everyone needs. We plan to start adding more basics on a regular basis. Today, we’re adding some smaller rounds and rondelles that make perfect accent beads. They come in the great subtle colors of African opal, fossil coral, chalcedony, rose quartz and pink opal. We do have a few flashy pieces this week. Check out the large chalcedony rough slabs or the rustic orange agate slabs if that’s what you need! See the gemstone bead additions now.

I’m excited about the great selection of stuff we’re adding today! We have pewter beads that start at just 20 cents each, some very beautiful gemstone strands, and a ton of new artist lampwork glass.

Pewter Beads

This line of lead-free pewter beads is fantastic! They come in everything from small spacer beads to larger focal beads, they’re lightweight, and they won’t tarnish over time. Most are available by the piece, so you can buy exactly what you need. Large hole beads are available, which is good because these look fantastic with leather cord. I love the color of this pewter. It’s lighter than the other pewter beads we sell. It almost looks more like silver than pewter. See the entire line now!

Gemstone Beads

If you’re looking to add some WOW factor to your summer designs, you’ll want to check out these gemstones. We’re adding the good stuff — stones like: apatite, kunzite, kyanite, the nicest lapis I’ve ever seen, malachite, pink opal, and more. These are all high-grade strands and the value is great.

Grace Lampwork Glass

We’re doubling the size of our Grace Lampwork selection. Self-taught lampworker Grace Ma made her first lampwork glass beads in October 2002. She insists on high-quality materials and consistency in her line of glass beads, and considers learning a “life-term job.” Grace Lampwork glass beads are annealed overnight for increased strength, and have wonderful character in the smallest details. Check out the new additions!

For all of our US based customers, I hope you had a wonderful 4th of July. It was over 100 degrees here in Michigan yesterday. Ali and I, for some reason, decided to take the kids to the zoo. It was a recipe for disaster, but turned out to be a great time!

If you’re feeling crafty - You’ll love the selections of new bezels, paper, stamps, buttons, and a huge line of glitter that we just added to the shop!

Not feeling crafty? That’s OK, because we’ve also added a great selection of gemstone beads at amazing prices.

Getting Crafty

The divisions between beading and other crafty things like scrapbooking just keep disappearing. Three years ago, I never imagined that we’d be selling things like paper, punches and glitter, but today we’re adding all of them. This new line of glitter is huge. There are a lot of colors and a lot of awesome, organic textures. With these new additions, you’ll have endless fun with your crafty jewelry projects. If you work with resin, or have been wanting to get started with it, check out the bracelet Ali made using the new glitter and paper with our LimaStudios crystal clear resin.

Gemstone Beads

This week’s additions are super colorful. We’re adding to the always popular impression jasper with bold colors like denim blue, midnight blue, and dark teal. We also have new shapes in the natural color impression jasper. One of the things I’m most excited about is our new pendant sets. They come on small strands that have one large pendant and two smaller pendants — perfect for a necklace & earrings combo. They’re available in midnight blue impression jasper, red creek jasper, and ruby impression jasper. We also have a few new freshwater pearls and some other stones – see them all now.

Craft on!

Summer has arrived and the A/C is pumping! It’s a good thing too, because here at Lima Beads, we’ve been inside counting and shelving loads of new stringing materials this week. Thread, Elastic, Nylon Cord, Leather, Silk Ribbon, WireLace, Irish Waxed Linen–you name it and we’re adding it to the shop today.

Here are some highlights from the big batch of beading thread, cord, and ribbon added this week. There are a ton of new items to see!

Beading Cord: a multitude of colors and sizes in Griffin, C-Lon, and Elasticity cord.

Leather Cord: more leather cord styles, including some awesome metallic colors.

Beading Thread: 100 thread styles in Amiet, DandyLine, C-Lon, and WildFire.

Silk Ribbon: new hand-dyed silk ribbon colors.

Irish Waxed Linen: 2-ply and 4-ply in a variety of colors.

WireLace: 2.5mm, 12mm, and 20mm styles to add to our selection.

Have fun stringing–and enjoy the first week of summer!

We’ve been saving up jump rings for months and today we’re adding them ALL. You’ll also find new gemstone beads, Green Girl Studios, and some nifty wire working tools including the WigJig.

Jump Rings

We’ve added full lines of Artistic Wire and anodized aluminum jump rings. They’re colorful and they come in lots of different sizes and gauges. If you use Artistic Wire, we now have the matching jump rings. Check them all out.

Gemstone Beads

The new gems include fossil coral, Red Creek jasper, strawberry quartz, and Chinese turquoise. I’m really loving the Red Creek jasper graduated ladder strands.

Fun with Wire

There’s a new department in our tools section called wire shaping. In it, you’ll find the super popular WigJig line, a jump ring maker, and a wire twisting tool. Using these 3 items, you can get creative with your wire and make some great stuff!

Green Girl Studios

We’re only adding a handful of Green Girl pieces today, but there are some very special things here that are just fun to look at. An owl with sapphire eyes, bronze bunnies with sapphires, a huge shibuichi fairy pendant, and an intricate bronze toggle are a few of the pieces you’ll see.

With a show of hands, does anyone like color? Yes? OK, read on… you won’t want to miss over 200 new Lillypilly pieces and a handful of gemstones.

New Colorful Lillypilly

We just can’t get enough of the colorful creations of Lillypilly Designs. Today, we’re adding over 200 anodized aluminum sheets and discs. The patterns are exquisite! Choose from a variety of bold colors in different styles. My favorite? The zebra, hands down. Check them all out, and have a peek at our tips for using Lillypilly!

A Helping of Gems

I couldn’t pass up a week without telling you about at least SOME of the gemstones that just arrived at our shop. There’s truly a variety here–no two shapes from the same stone! From 2mm to 40mm, I love them all. See all the new gems.

More Supplies, too…

Rounding out this week’s additions, we have the functional items (they never get as much love as the pretty items above). We now have a Scoop ‘n Pour, assorted beading needles, and a jar of Tool Magic to soften the tips of your metal tools. Enjoy!

Today we’re adding the largest item in Lima Beads history — the Vintaj BIGkick by Sizzix. If you work with metal, you have to see it. We’re also adding gemstone beads and some fab rubber sheet stamps.

Vintaj BIGkick by Sizzix

If you’ve taken the jump into mixed media jewelry design, you’ll love this user-friendly metal cutting and embossing machine. Start with a metal blank and end with something truly unique! We have all the resources you’ll need. Watch the video tutorials to get started and purchase accessories to create more and more! See everything you’ll need to get started.

Gemstone Beads

This week’s gemstone additions are very colorful. We have a hematite donut and faceted round that have been plated in titanium and then fired to create a bold rainbow patina. We first saw this new take on hematite a few months ago and had to try it out. We’re also adding 8 new shapes of ocean blue impression jasper and they look great for summer. See all of the gemstone additions.

Rubber Stamps

These new sheet stamps are large enough to create pattern on any component you may want to use. Made with the highest quality photopolymer, these stamps are a fresh and fun new clear stamp line hosting stamps that will last a lifetime. Unlike many other clear stamps, these are made with genuine trade-quality photopolymer, and work with virtually any ink.

It’s an exciting day at Lima. We have some awesome new golden pyrite beads and two ways for you to save a bunch of money.

Golden Pyrite

Golden pyrite gemstone beads are hot right now! We can’t seem to keep them in stock, so we’re very happy to add a fresh selection to the shop. You’ll find everything from tiny carved roses to large focal beads, all at great prices. See the golden pyrite now.

Check out these colors…

If it’s colorful, sparkly, (or both!) — it might on sale right now at Lima Beads. Steve has selected a huge amount of crystal, shell pearls, gemstones, TOHO seed beads, and Czech glass and lowered the prices for a few days. Now through Monday 5/28, you can save up to 25% on all of these items. These deals are on a first come, first served basis. Some items will most likely sell out before the end of the sale, so get your order in soon.

Our New Last Chance Section

We had a realization a few weeks ago — Lima Beads has never discontinued anything. We have a lot of items in our shop that we can no longer purchase from manufacturers, so it’s time to get them out of here. That’s where the Last Chance section comes in. When an item is discontinued, we’ll move it to this section and deeply discount the price. When it sells out, it’ll be gone forever! You can find the last chance section under the “Deals” menu on our web site. Right now, you can save on Stampt Metal, Green Girl Studios, Vintaj, gemstones, metal beads, and more. Next month, we’ll be doing a big gemstone bead clearance, so watch for that too!

Have an awesome weekend!

We’ve added three lines of products to the shop this week: New sparkly pave beads, all of TierraCast’s latest pieces, and of course, some gemstones beads.

Pave Beads

We’ve decided to try out a line of super sparkly pave beads. These beads are made with polymer clay and then set with hundreds of little crystals on their surface to give your designs a jolt of sparkle. They come in a lot of great colors and can be used for just about anything. They’ve been very popular in shamballa bracelets lately, so Ali made a tutorial on those. Things to see: pave beads – shamballa tutorial.

The Latest from TierraCast

TierraCast is constantly adding innovative stuff to their line and we want to carry it all! Today’s items represent their latest additions. You’ll find some great pinch bails, charms, and my favorite — buttons. They make great clasps.

Gemstone Beads

There is some awesome stuff here. The azurite malachite is crazy beautiful and the new lapis pieces are huge! There’s quite a variety from sunstone to Red Creek jasper, so take a look.

This week, we’re adding 70 selections in Lillypilly metal and over 50 selections in hemp. Also, we found some more African paper beads, but they’re a special buy, so act fast if you want some!

Lillypilly

I must say that Ali and Cathy went a little crazy on our latest shipment from Lillypilly. Today we’re adding a bunch and it’s only 1/2 of the shipment! If you’re not familiar with Lillypilly sheet metal, you have to check it out. The new colors and patterns are fantastic. They offer full lines of both anodized aluminum and copper sheets and discs in a variety of colors and funky patterns. Some of the sheets are so thin, you can cut them into any shape you’d like. There is a huge variety of uses for these sheets. See all of the new Lillypilly now.

Special Buy: African Beads

We found more! Last year, we got our hands on these for the first time and they sold out in record time. We found more quantity this time, but there still aren’t many, so you can find them in the special buy section. That means — when they’re gone, they’re gone! There’s a great story behind paper beads too — learn more.

Hemp

We’ve just added quite a bit of hemp to the shop. There are some great colors and even new packaging. You can buy packages that have 2 small spools, which saves you from having to purchase the large spools if you don’t need so much. See it all now.

We have three product additions this week: Ezel Findings, a new raku artist, and some sparkly high quality gemstone beads.

Beautiful Sparkly Gemstones

We just received a shipment of India-cut gemstone beads. Most of these are hand-cut from high quality material with great color. I think the golden pyrite is my favorite addition — here are 5 sparkly little shapes! We’ve also added hessonite, labradorite, pink opal, tanzanite, tourmaline, and more. The labradorite freeform slab is the nicest labradorite we’ve ever had in the shop — it glows. See all of the gemstone bead additions now.

New Ezel Findings

Today, we’re expanding our line of Ezel Findings. The additions are full of links, pendants, and bead caps. Ezel Findings manufactures high quality metal components. They are always releasing innovative new designs in fantastic metal tones. See all of the additions.

Amy Mealey Raku Beads

We’ve been looking for a great raku artist for almost 2 years. We were pleased to find Amy. She has intricate pieces as well as simple accent pieces. Amy created pottery for 10 years before moving into raku. If you’re not familiar with raku beads, you have to check them out. The colors and textures are so beautiful!

Here it is on an iPad

Over the last few months, we’ve been hearing a lot of people asking us to let them shop the Big Green Bead Machine on their iPads, smartphones, and computers that don’t have Flash installed. Well, a couple of weeks ago, we did just that.

One of the goals of our new website was to make sure that everything looks and works on mobile devices just as well as it does on our desktops and laptops. Now that we’ve updated the Big Green Bead Machine, every product is shoppable, every video is viewable and every page is accessible from your smartphone or tablet.

How Lima’s Big Green Bead Machine Works

For those of you who prefer to think of what we do as “magic” and don’t really care exactly how this stuff really works, you can tune out now.

When we first developed the Big Green Bead Machine back in February of 2008, the iPhone was just over a year old and nobody had ever heard of an iPad. Back then, we had to use a technology called Flash to build  interactive features on our site. Now that iPad and smartphone usage is on the rise, Flash is one of those things (along with mice) that is being left behind in what Steve Jobs called the “Post-PC Era.”

Most of the new web browsers out today allow you to build things that are pretty and interactive without the use of Flash. In fact, even Adobe, who owns the Flash technology, has decided to move away from it in lieu of these new browser technologies.

Now that we’ve removed the Big Green Bead Machine’s dependency on Flash, you can use it just about anywhere.

Over the last two years, look at how much mobile web browsing has grown! In March 2012, 13% of all visitors to our website were using a mobile device. Last March, it was 5% and March of 2010 was 1%. What do you think these numbers will look like in 3 years?

We hope you like this update to the Bead Machine. If you have any questions or feedback, feel free to leave a comment!

It’s a huge week today at Lima Beads. Did you expect us to say something different? Haha. In all seriousness, we have 160 new products including designer Czech Glass, gemstones, and new freshwater pearls.

New Czech Glass

Our line of designer Czech Glass has been so popular that we couldn’t help from expanding it. Back on March 15, we added about 100 shapes. And today, we’re adding another hundred. They’re absolutely awesome! We have some new shapes, too… my favorite is the ammonite fossil. There are also some tiny little teardrops, daisies, ovals, and even a few owls. Check out all the new Czech!

Gemstone Bead Additions

We added a smorgasbord of gemstone shapes & sizes to the site today. There are 30 total, and they range from small rounds to big drops in a variety of stones. Many of the stones bring back the memories from almost 10 years ago when we first started selling gemstones online–mookaite, bronzite, carnelian, tiger eye, and more. There’s also a little titanium druzy nugget that caught our eye–love it! Check out the pics for all the new gemstones.

New Freshwater Pearls

It’s been a while since we’ve been able to tell you that we added over 20 freshwater pearls. So we’re happy to do it today! The freshwater pearl additions include 8 pearly white shapes, a few peacock shapes, and some brand new colors.

Today, we’d like to announce a new feature on our website that we think will make it easier to stay on top of everything that’s going on at Lima Beads. We’re calling it What’s Fresh and you can find it by clicking the “Fresh” option at the top of the website. We really hope you like it.

What’s the big deal?

I’ll be very honest with you all. With the hundreds of Fresh Picks, design ideas, tips & techniques, new products, restocks, and more that happen here every month, it’s really hard for us to keep track of it all. So we started thinking of ways to combine it all into one easy view, organized by date. We’re thrilled with the results.

When we were creating this page, one thing was abundantly clear: we have our customers to thank for so much of what goes on around here. We’re grateful for everyone’s willingness to share their design ideas, Fresh Picks, comments, pictures, and more. We wouldn’t be here without you.

Your feedback is important to us!

As always, we would love your feedback on the new What’s Fresh page. You can leave your comments below!

TOHO 11/0 Round Seed Beads

We’re continuing to grow our TOHO seed bead selection, and we’ve got almost a hundred new 11/0 rounds for you to see. There are tons of bright colors and fun finishes. Check out all the pics.

New Gemstones

We have some new brightly-colored agate, druzy pieces, cool drops & some old favorites. See all the new additions.

Glass Garden Additions

Now if these aren’t the coolest embellishments, I don’t know what are! These bottle caps and glass pieces from Glass Garden remind me of summer–and are extra cool because they’re recycled materials. See if you recognize anything from the list of additions. I knew a few, but didn’t recognize them all!

Well, it’s on from one thing (Easter Egg Hunt) and onto the next (Spring Rain Contest Wrap-up). The winners have been selected… and you’ll find the results below.

The Winners

There were 50 Spring Rain designs submitted, racking up over 700 “Add to Favorites!” Based on the number of favorites and activity, here are the three winners of the Vintaj Spring Rain contest:

First Place: Spring Rain – Dance in the Rain by JustImagine – Val

From the designer:

“Made from the Spring Rain Necklace Kit. I did a little play on words and made my own “Spring(s)” for this design. This was so much fun!”

This was by far your favorite design in the contest. Not only were there a ton of favorites, JustImagine – Val also received a lot of praise in the comments. Here are a few comments:

“Very beautiful and creative. A one of a kind piece.” – R Grizzuto

“Absolutely stunning! The “springs” are a wonderful detail! I love the colors!” – Violet D

This is such a beautiful piece and so creative. I would love one just like it. And the photos to display it were very unique. Good luck, Val!

Second Place: Raindrops & Posies by D Beach

From the designer:

“The thing that I love most about Spring rains, is how the lingering raindrops seem to bring out the beauty and color of the flowers. I wanted to create a bracelet that combined the beauty of raindrops and flowers.”

Designer D Beach mentioned in her comments that this was the first time she entered a piece into a contest! So much for practice makes perfect…

Third Place: It’s Raining, It’s Pouring! by Bucci Handmade Jewelry

From the designer:

“I made this piece for the Vintaj Spring Rain contest. I made dangles of all the glass and pearl beads and hung them from some Arte Metal chain. The simple S-hook clasp allows you to adjust the length of the necklace to suit your desire.”

The pearl and glass drops in this necklace are the perfect metaphor for the “Spring Rain” theme. It’s great to see how far super-creative people like Bucci Handmade Jewelry can push the limits of a basic kit.

All of our winners will be contacted shortly with their gift certificate codes. Thanks to everyone who participated in the contest, and we want to give a special thanks to Vintaj. This was our first time working this closely with them, and we hope that you had as much fun as we did! We’re looking forward to working with them again in the future.

We have 3 big product additions this week: Czech glass 2 hole tile beads, incredible Patricia Healey copper, and a huge expansion of our Soft Flex line.

Czech 2 Hole Tile Beads

We’ve added about 50 colors of these 6mm tiles. 2 hole tile beads have been very popular lately. Because they’re flat and square, they’re perfect for joining two strands together. They can also be stitched together on a loom or by using a variety of different stitches. The possibilities are endless!

Patricia Healey Spring Collection

Patricia has really outdone herself this time. We’re in love with this collection of beads, charms, pendants, findings, and even CHAIN. It’s all in her ultra colorful copper finish and the designs are so much fun. If you like the look, shop the entire line of Patricia Healey copper.

Soft Flex Expansion

We’ve added about 40 new items to our Soft Flex line. You’ll find lots of fun colors and finishes. Many of the new styles are meant to match gemstone colors. These include: tanzanite, red jasper, turquoise, emerald, and more. They’re beautiful.

Vintaj called us early this year and asked us to be their April online bead partner. They wrote a nice blog post about us and posted some photos of Ali’s work. You can see it here:

Spring Rain Online Bead Partner – Lima Beads

This was exciting! We’re really enjoyed working with Vintaj on the Spring Rain promotion this month. They’re a talented group of people!

The 2012 Easter Egg Hunt was a crazy ride! 4,338 people hunted for eggs and every egg was found at least once this year. I’d like to announce the winners and address some of the concerns from this year’s hunt.

The Winners

First of all, congrats to the winners of the 3 $25 “Golden Egg” gift certificates! Here are the winners:

• GypsyMom
• Jeanne S
• B Miller

If you’re one of the three winners above, we’ll be sending you a gift certificate by e-mail. Congratulations!

Now, for the moment you’ve all been waiting for. The winner of the $250 Lima Beads gift certificate is… J Pilkington! She found a total of 77 eggs, which put her in 9th place on the leaderboard with a chance to win the big prize. You can watch the video of how we picked her name on Facebook. Congratulations, J Pilkington!

The Second Prize is a $100 Gift Certificate, awarded to Snowy, who was in an 8-way tie for 65th on the leaderboard with 55 eggs found.

Congratulations to you both! We’ll contact you directly with your prize.

The Golden Eggs

We never imagined how quickly the golden eggs would be found this year. We thought the hiding places were super hard! Here’s a picture of where the three golden eggs were hidden:

The pictures above show the golden eggs on the following pages: the 12mm Winter Shell Pearl Mix, a search for “golden egg”, and on the “Add to Fresh Pick” screen for the Abalone 1″ Silk Ribbon. Congrats to those who found the golden eggs first. We’ll contact you directly about your prize.

The Hardest Hunt Yet…

It’s been widely publicized that the hunt was more difficult this year than last year. We agree! We thought it would be a nice surprise to launch a new web site for the hunt, but doing so made the eggs difficult to find. We weren’t able to gauge how good our hiding places would be because we hadn’t had a chance to spend much time on the new site. As it turns out, they were very good hiding places. We’re sorry it was so difficult. We hope that the extra prize helped and YES, it’ll be easier next year

Shipping Fees

Some people expressed displeasure with the shipping fees. Our goal is to make the Easter Egg Hunt as cool as possible, and we wish we could ship the prizes for free–but we just can’t afford to. We always put a statement in the rules about how normal shipping rates apply to set expectations, but some people were still disappointed–and we want you to know that we totally understand. We know it’s not the cheapest thing out there (in fact, it costs us MORE than the $4.95 we charge you). Even though it’s a little more expensive, we keep using USPS Priority Mail because it’s fast and trackable. It wasn’t the most popular choice, but rest assured that we are never out to make money on shipping fees.

Thanks Again!

Even though it was hard, we hope that everyone had fun finding those blasted eggs. We’re turning our attention to the rest of 2012 now, and we have some awesome things in store. One thing is for sure… we think we have the best customers on the planet, and we’ll continue to try as hard as we can to put together fun & crazy promotions for everyone to enjoy. Thanks again for making this the most exciting week of the year for us, and keep your eyes on the blog for more fun in the future.