Beading For Charity

"Bead-it-Forward" is an annual project in the beading world, where beaders worldwide contribute little 2-inch beaded squares to an auction which raises money for Breast Cancer research. Originally the squares were to be made into one big quilt for auction. But the project grew too big for that (and the quilt would be terribly heavy), so now the squares are auctioned individually, or in small groupings of 2 or 3. 
In my online beading group, there are two fantastic women who collect all of the squares from our group, one in Europe and one in North America. They finish the squares with tiny frames, or group them onto a ribbon, and forward them along to the group running the sale. Our items are listed together so we can bid on each others' work. 

This is my second year contributing to the project, and it will be my third year bidding on it. Each year there is a theme. This year's theme is "Wild About Finding a Cure," so squares are requested to have an animal theme.  Here are my three contributions. The third one also fulfills this month's theme challenge for the online beading group, which is to use a song title or lyrics. After deciding to do "Elusive Butterfly of Love," I decided to give song names to the other two as well.

"Bungle in the Jungle"

"Wildfire"

"Elusive Butterfly"   

Last year's theme was "Turn the Tide on Breast Cancer," so the squares were ocean-themed. 

These were my contributions: 

And these are the squares I bought last year:

When I learned of this project in 2013, it was too late to contribute, but I was able to buy these two squares in the auction. The theme was "Stitching to Find a Bloomin' Cure."

Not only is this a fun and worthwhile project to participate in, but it also provides me with a heart-warming physical connection to women living half-way across the world, whom I only know online.

I'm looking forward to seeing what everyone else came up with this year, and bidding on the squares when the auction occurs.

http://bead-it-forward.com/about/