March 26, 2008
Here in my world…
Things are a bit slow here. I’m thinking about all sorts of new stuff for jewelry, but having a bit of a motivational problem. I’m also working a bit more this week, so there’s just not enough time to do everything that I want to do. Hang in there, I’ll get back into the swing of things.
In the meantime, my tumblers are still working away. One finished up with stage 2, but there was too much material loss for the material to be moved on to stage 3. So I started up another batch with stage 2, and when its done I’ll combine them. There are lots of cool colors coming up… will post them, and they finish up.
March 18, 2008
A bit behind schedule
So officially part 7 of the tumbler series was the end of a complete cycle of the tumblers, start to finish. But I’m constantly tumbling more rocks. And I’ll continue to post pictures of the neat ones as they progress. I should have checked the tumblers on Friday or Saturday, but again, life got in the way, so I have yet to check them. Its on my list of things to do this afternoon, as this morning disappeared faster than I imagined.
And I’m trying to get my creative juices going again, so that I can make some new jewelry out of the pieces that came out of the polish phase last time. Life keeps getting in the way, and distracting my brain from the creative process. But soon…. new jewelry soon……
March 1, 2008
How many addictions can one person have?
Ok.. so mine are fairly calm… Although I might run a few people off the road trying to get to a bead store, or a rock shop… but hey I’m not driving drunk.
I’ve been composing a bracelet in my head for a few days. On some sort of whim I bought root beer, smoked topaz, and powder almond beads. For those who know me, I’m not a huge fan of brown…unless its mud splashed all over my truck, because I just drove through a huge mud puddle. So I’m working up these browns, and I have a design I like, and then I added to it… and now I can’t figure out how to add a clasp. Or what kind of clasp to add…. so I have this beautiful band… unable to be worn… with threads hanging out and I NEED to finish it. But how? So it’ll be another day while I work it out in my head.
In other news… my other addiction… feeding this blog. After I finish one post, I’m ready to post another… even when I have nothing to post about. Given that February was the first full month I was really promoting my blog and my Etsy shop, I was looking at the numbers…. The readership is steadily growing. I had 509 views in January, I was hoping to meet that in February. It was getting close, I was kind of worried, watching the numbers… can I really meet my goal… then bam…. 509 was passed… Hmmm, the way this is going I wonder if I can have 100 more views. Yep, had 100, maybe 200? Ok, not quite 200… topped out at 688, just 21 shy. Not bad. So, thank you everyone for reading, and surpassing my goals.
Don’t forget, next friday, I should have happily polished rocks for new jewelry, so check back.
February 8, 2008
Chain maille
Before Christmas, a local big box craft store had a whole display of kits to do various projects. I kept looking at them, thinking about it, and then decided no, I ought to wait. Well I waited too long. After Christmas, the only sign that the display had ever existed was a lone beat-up sad box on the clearance rack. I hemmed and hawed, searched high and low for a reasonable kit online. I don’t want to make my own jump rings, I don’t want to design my pieces, I just want to open baggies and put something together to find out if this technique is something I can and want to learn.
Now, back to the kits online, I’m sure they are high quality and all that jazz, but I’m not quite interested in a $70 kit using sterling silver rings, as a *learners kit*. I want to spend $20, and use copper or aluminum rings but no such luck. But, I found out that my local bead store offers basically free classes (ok, I knew they offered classes for months and months). If you buy the materials at their store, they don’t charge for the class, and you get a discount on the materials. Woohooo.
So I found a chain maille class that didn’t require a ton of experience, and signed up. The class was yesterday evening, and interesting. I’m half way through my bracelet. I’m not fond of the silver rings used. They are a hot ‘new’ silver (Argentium) which is the .925 pure silver like Sterling, but the other .075 is something other than what is in Sterling. They are supposed to be tarnish resistant. But they are also stiffer, and more difficult to work with, that’s what I don’t like about them. But I like the design for the bracelet. I’ll post pictures when I’m done.
January 30, 2008
Creative block?
I’ve been somewhat busy making earrings. I’ve seen and purchased a few new chandelier type findings to help in the expansion of the style of earrings that I’ve been making.
But while I’ve been doing that, I have a couple of loose necklace pendants sitting on my work table. A piece of amethyst and a piece of amazonite. They are begging to be made into a necklaces, only there hasn’t been a good combination of colors or beads that really go with these two focal pieces. So they sit there… still screaming at me…and I can’t quite figure out what do with them. Hopefully, I can figure something out soon, so that they can become finished pieces.
Handmade from the Heart Stone and Glass Jewelry 