I Was Going to Just Show You Porn

But then I up and made this stuff so I'm showing you that instead. (The porn just made me feel dirty anyway and I don't always enjoy that). I also thought of showing you pictures of some beads I bought but I didn't have time to take pictures.

My little "mostly functional" window (which occurs between the malaise/fatigue/pain/debilitatingly low blood pressure of the perimenstrual period and the irritability/depression of the premenstrual period) just happened to fall on a weekend this month, and I seized the opportunity to make four pendants and four pairs of earrings. I am, frankly, shocked at myself. This is unusually productive for me. I've had these items on a to-do list from anywhere between six months to three weeks. I was tied up with custom work for a while, and with watching reruns of CSI that I've already seen at least twice, so they were on a back burner.

I did up this little green flower a few months ago, when I was doing my wired briolette flower thing, and it sat on my glass-topped Japanese-style work bench with a copper toggle clasp ever since. I had a vague idea what I would do with it, which did not include most of the elements in the photo below. The coppery brown pearls were a spur-of-the moment addition, and then I decided to use this wonderful copper-colored silk string (which was billed as some sort of brown, but it's really more of a copper), instead of only chain, but then it just looked too flimsy so I added a strand of green pearls to make it feel more substantial. And then the green pearls echoed the copper pearls, which was unbearably exciting, and there you have it. Copper beadcaps, connector rings and toggle clasp by MOI. Copper rolo chain from Lima Beads, I think. The flower is made from Czech "dagger" beads in green "lumi" finish. The two glass rounds are the same color and finish.

Pond Blossom Pendant

I've had these little earrings in mind for the last couple weeks. I pulled out some of my pewter charms from Happy Mango Beads that I had bought in pairs, intending to make earrings from them, and put them on my work bench. And there they sat. And one day when I was idly perusing my junk pile (also on my work bench) I saw some spare coral dangles I had done for a bracelet but not used, and some blue glass beads lying around, and EUREKA!!!! Genius struck. Unfortunately, when Motivation struck some time later, I ducked. Which is why it took me a couple weeks to get to these. I needed to make the ball headpins first, and I was low on wire, and then they had to be pickled, and then antiqued, and then wrapped, and then cleaned up by hand, and then tumbled. That whole thing did not appeal to me. But then this weekend, I acquired from some unknown source the proverbial "wild hare" (something I sat on apparently) and I became a dynamo. This was the eventual result of that long, tedious process and my fit of dynamism.

Happy Little Handbag Earrings

I rather like them. I love red with light blue. They're like little handbags. The boyfriend applauded my initiative, getting ready for Valentine's Day sales (hearts). I looked at him blankly. I then discovered much to my astonishment that I had made not one but THREE pair of heart earrings. Well, I'll be. I'm such a born marketer I even do it by accident.

Klimt in Black Pendant

The pendant above was designed around Kelley Wenzel's fabulous etched black raku beads, the bebe version (I was determined to stop hoarding these beads, so to compensate I blew them all in one piece. And now I need more). I love the matte black finish--it's almost charcoal, I'm a big charcoal fan--and the Klimt-like spots of rich color. I've combined them with butterscotch-stained wood beads, some little dyed donuts in olive green (not sure what they're made of, I'm guessing bone or wood, I cannibalized them from a store-bought piece of jewelry), more of Kelley's bebe beads in translucent grape, little seed beads in matte black, and pewter and sterling silver accents. The longer portion of the pendant is on knotted silk string, the shorter is on fine-gauge black Greek leather (although you can't see it). I finished it off with black silk ribbon (first time I ever used ribbon in a piece of jewelry). Oh, duh, the pendant is a "Tuareg ring" pendant in pewter from Happy Mango Beads. Isn't it cool? You could do some serious damage with that on your finger. Most likely to yourself. ("Hey, you like my cool ring and my eye patch?")

I've had these cool Czech glass beads from Happy Mango forever, bought them back when I was into squares and rectangles (and then shortly thereafter inexplicably lost my taste for squares and rectangles and never got it back), and have always wanted to use them. I pulled them out and put them on my workbench, as I am wont to do, where they sat and sat. Then one day I happened to glance from them to the heart charms that were also sitting on my bench, and EUREKA!!! Genius struck again. But not the Motivation so then blah blah, etc. And then this weekend I finally stuck them together. With some earwires that were also sitting there on the bench with their little olive green accent beads.

I Heart Paul Klee

These beads remind me of a Klee painting.

The wild hare continued its frenetic romp in my nether regions so I kept going. This pendant had been on my to-do list for some time as well, and these delicious carnelian wheels had been in my stash since a bead show late last summer. The turquoise (a LONG and gorgeous strand of graduated discs I got for a great price from Fire Mountain Gems) had been in my stash since summer as well. This was more of a traditional design (silver, carnelian and turquoise, ho hum) so it didn't take as long to put together. I have been perversely using these pewter sun totems in pieces that evoke anything but sunshine, so I restrained my natural contrariness and forced myself to be literal. Just this once. I'm not knocked out by the design, it's fairly run-of-the-mill, but I just love the focal and the carnelian. I have more of that carnelian, and some green aventurine in the same size/cut.

Tangelo Sunset

Well, these earrings were already half done--they were just waiting for earwires to get tumbled--so I went ahead and threw them together. Ceramic rings (make me think of moldy Cheerios, or even better, snake bagels), little matte aqua glass tile beads, and copper accents. NEXT!!

I was coasting on adrenaline now, and it was still daylight, so I made this:

Winter Seashore

I had been visiting this fossil coral drop in my stash fairly regularly (I'm obsessed with barely detectable colors, which unfortunately do not photograph well), stopping to caress it wistfully in its plastic bin labeled "pendants", when it seemed time to move it from the bin to the work bench. There they await their turn. Or they go back in the bin. I really wanted to do something with this stone--I had gotten all in the mood for neutrals after doing Christine's bracelet (see my December 26 post)--and I knew what beads I wanted to use already--but I couldn't come up with a clever enough bail for it. Tried this and that, and didn't want to just do a ho-hum wrap job on it, but I couldn't think of anything revolutionary so I just did a ho-hum wrap job on it with some little hammered ball accents. It would just have to do. Here it's combined with both smooth and carved bone beads, labradorite, a little bit of Greek leather in a wheat color, hand-formed sterling silver S-clasp and connector rings and this really cool silver plated box rolo chain from ArtBeads. I just got a little of it because I didn't know how big it would be and now I wish I'd gotten a lot more. It's so cool! It's like a square silver snake. And the links are open which is nice.

Lastly, I wired up these ceramic hearts a couple weeks ago but didn't have any regular French earwires to put them on. I finally got some more done up so I patched these together. I don't know why these big blobby hearts are appealing to me. Something so homely about them, and I couldn't resist these green ones. So Wicked. They're like really bad livers.

Really Really Wicked

After that, I only had enough steam left to take pictures, but not enough steam for mannequin pictures, pricing or writing descriptions. Dressing my mannequin takes a lot of energy, especially if she's wearing anything with buttons. I've switched her to tube tops. And of course pricing (which includes costing out all the materials in each piece) is unbearably tedious and exhausting. That had to wait for Tuesday. And then I had to redo part of the Klimt piece because I wasn't happy with it and I didn't get to that until last night...

So now that all this is out of my system, I am taking yet another vow to create simpler items. That I will probably break. It's probably because I have too many beads. Someone should take away all but three of my beads and then I could maybe do it. I would probably put them all in one earring and then beat the living crap out of the person who took my beads until they gave them back. So that wouldn't work. Anyone have any ideas for achieving self-restraint? Maybe I should do yoga. Tie one hand behind my back? Only use my feet? If I made jewelry with my feet it would have to be simple because I don't have much dexterity with my feet. Or any. Or at least I don't think I do. I've never actually tried. I don't think I would want to wear jewelry that had been made by feet. I don't like feet. At least not other people's feet. But I digress.