OK, I Changed My Mind

I DO like making earrings now. I felt all productive and junk this weekend--look, SEVEN things I made! In one weekend! Seven...tiny little things. And it wasn't quite the struggle as it usually is to get them to be the same length. Not sure why that is.

Still hooked on the color thing. I think because it's so dreary here right now. We lost our fall color to a flash freeze--went from green to an ugly paper-bag-brown crispy overnight. Got robbed. And it's socked in, so I've had about enough of bronze, gunmetal, silver and the like. Picked up some scrumptious howlite recently--one strand of dime-sized coins in a vibrant goldenrod-butterscotch kind of melange with nifty veining, and a strand of Granny Smith-apple-green howlite roundels. There was another strand of some kind of pumpkin orange stuff (forgot what it was), had to drag myself away. Probably have to go back and get it. And then I sort of accidentally made these wrapped eye pins. I was going to use them in a necklace, but then I thought they might add some interest to earrings. So I did it to death this weekend. Probably use them in a bunch of necklaces and bracelets too, in different metals. They are a bit labor intensive, but I think they look cool. Sort of adds a little different texture. Going to mess around with it some more.

So here is my treasure trove from the weekend:

Yellow howlite with iolite and sterling silver

Brecciated jasper flowers and turquoise seed beads with sterling silver

Apple green howlite and serpentine with sterling silver

Pink jasper with sterling silver

Blue coral, apple green howlite and wood with sterling silver

Copper, blue peacock pearl and kyanite

I feel like I'm cheating. It's so much easier to do stuff with bright colors!

I'm sort of frustrated by the selection of bead caps out there though. I'm kind of tired of the fancy variety, and just want some plain, round caps--all the bead caps I have are all a bit MUCH. (Anybody know a source?) Best poke around some more on Etsy. I am actually contemplating buying a couple metal punches (one for making big circles, one for making tiny) and a dapping set so I can make my own simple bead caps. Got the tools all bookmarked--itching to click "BUY NOW"!!! I could buy raw brass and copper sheet and oxidize it myself. Got my source already for that too. Maybe get a couple metal stamps. Oh man. That would rock, but the seemingly unending OUTGOING stream of money is making me a tad uncomfortable. (Although these tools are not expensive). Even if it is, sort of, being used to purchase things that supposedly, theoretically could make more money. One day. To some extent. A limited extent.

At least I'm not spending all my money on Beanie Babies or shoes.

Memories of Places I've Never Been

I've thought so hard, so many times, about how cool it would be to go to Italy that I can damn near remember being there. And I sigh nostalgically for all those lovely mental trips. Tuscany was my favorite. The necklace below sort of morphed itself into a Tuscan palette (or what I think of as such) when I was forcing myself a couple weeks ago to NOT do a monochromatic piece. I had just gotten a pile of little gemstone rounds from the crazy people at BeadBabe.com who can't stop having these 50% off sales (seriously, check them out, they're having some sort of August sizzler sale, even their sterling silver is 50% off), and sort of threw them on the table with some of my other stuff and picked some out. For one frightening moment I thought they looked like Mardi Gras (which scares me, also Carmen Miranda scares me, but I do like fruit) but then I was able to talk myself into the Tuscany thing and all was well. (I'm traumatized by bright colors--too many early encounters with clowns). I used brass wire that I had left steeping in the ammonia fumes until it had turned a rich sable brown. The photo below doesn't show it very well, but the wire retained its luster. The stones are golden agate, olive ice flake quartz, plum jade, honey jade, lemon agate (the lime green ones), and freshwater pearls in olive green, gold and coppery plum.




And in conformance with my personal philosophy of conservation of mental energy, I went ahead and made two bracelets from the same design (if something is working for you, milk it until it's trite and irritating; unrelenting originality is exhausting).



This last bracelet is more in a charm style--I dangled the stones from some chain I had made from brass wire (again oxidized to a sable brown--you can see the nice sheen on it a little better in this picture) based on some industrial chain I saw at the hardware store. Sort of twisted S-links. For more information, or to purchase, click HERE.



I'm pretty proud of myself because the necklace and the first bracelet are already spoken for by a good customer in Ohio who just bought a bunch of stuff. Thanks Ruchi! I hope she has lots of friends who like jewelry too.

Okay, enough of that. Today is the last day of my Staycation (I'm exhausted) and I still have loads of stuff to do. Take more pictures of new stuff, retake pictures of old stuff, make more stuff, do another blog post, work up some interesting backgrounds with tissue paper and Mod Podge (not really working out yet, looks like elephant skin without the hair), figure out unit cost for all the crap I didn't need that I bought yesterday because it was 25% off (BFD), take a shower (maybe), eat (maybe), etc. I need a vacation.

It's Not Nice to Plagiarize Mother Nature

Tom and I were sitting by Flathead Lake this weekend and I was seized with a fit of creativity and had a relapse of my childhood rock fetish. Most of the mountain lakes, and the rivers around here lie over and are surrounded by the most astounding assortments of tumbled river rock, in wonderful, smooth shapes and vivid colors. Up til recently, most of my jewelry designs have been largely monochromatic and tone-on-tone, or at least in the same color family. I LOVE that look. I haven't really been enticed into making multicolor pieces. But, once again, Lorelei Eurto (this is getting broken record-y, got to find a new minor deity artistic inspiration) has broadened my horizons. She had this nifty little bracelet on Facebook in pinks and oranges (I'd put a picture here but I think she sold it), and I thought, Eureka, it CAN be done. Of course a lot of her stuff is multicolor, I just wasn't willing to see it yet.

So as I looked at these rocks, I saw color combinations that I wouldn't have considered before. And I thought, this could be a really fun way to explore new palettes for jewelry pieces. I started collecting the best specimens and brought them home and photographed them in different combinations. Granted there's some colors missing (fuschia, lime, any shade of blue, etc.), but there was an amazing assortment of muted tones (a dearth of cool colors, alas). These are some of my favorite combinations:











And lastly my compulsive ode to tone-on-tone.


I feel inspired, although I still have a mental block about cool colors. And pink and purple. I hate pink and purple. I used those pink and purple rocks out of sheer iron will and discipline. Keep loving those fall colors...I should get a house on Mars.