Inspired by Trees

I found a contest sponsored by one of my favorite artisans Heather Powers (Humblebeads).  You will find a number of her beads used as focals in my necklaces.  The pink sea urchin on the right side of this blog is one of her beads.  She has a beading book coming out on September 13th.  This book is all about inspiration from nature.   So from now until the book release she is having a weekly challenge. 
She gives one week to complete a piece of jewelry inspired by the weekly theme.  Anything goes, it can include Humblebeads or not, art beads or whatever you have in your stash.  It's up to you and however the inspiration strikes you for that week.  To enter add your photo to the Inspired By Nature Jewelry Challenge Flickr group.  Every Monday she draws one random winner from the week's entries and features them here on her blog.

Inspired by Trees in the Forest

Since my work is inspired my nature I decided this would be a perfect fit for me.  Plus, I have the chance to win some of Heather's beads and win I did!   I won with this necklace with earthy tree-inspired tones using stones, pearls, crystals and brass spacers.  I won Branch Lentil Beads in copper and a few matching disk beads!  I am so excited.  I am looking forward to entering all of her contests.  I have been learning a lot from them.  It is really interesting to see how others interpret the themes.  I can't wait to find out what this weeks will be.

I saw lots of trees on Saturday.  My husband and I took a trip to the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia.  It was 100+degrees here on the East Coast.  I was amazed by the drop in temperature as we climbed the mountains.  There was a good 20 degree difference.  While we were there I took a number of photos to use for inspiration.   Since we don't have hills in Sussex County it was really exciting just seeing these mountains.  Besides the temperature difference it was amazing that these mountains and wilderness are just over an hour outside the Washington metropolitan area.  I am thankful that this wilderness is a protected national park.  My tax dollars are well spent for this.

Blue Ridge Mountains