Sketching

I get a lot of inspiration in the shower.  No, really!  For some reason that mindless hygiene routine allows me to think.  Maybe something about the water, the drops on the shower door, the warm and relaxing water…

I need to spend some time in the sketch book.  This sounds really artsy – ooo, aaah pretty pictures.  Well, not always.  I’m only mildly trained in sketching. But I can put down on paper the ideas in my head, at least. I can’t imagine losing them entirely, so if the sketch is less than artistic, at least it keeps an idea at hand.

The most amazing sketch I’ve ever made was for earrings for my niece’s recital.  She majored in harp and wanted earrings to go with a lovely dark blue dress. I looked online for inspiration and found a harp site with a beautiful, contemporary concert harp that suggested a clean line I could represent in a pair of silver earrings with dark blue “goldstone” beads.

Later, in her senior year, my niece purchased a concert harp.  Without knowing what I’d used to inspire her earrings, she chose the same model I’d seen online. It was a strange convergence of inspiration and art.

Right now a pair of earrings and a necklace are suspended in my mind. It’s about time to get them on paper and start the paper-to-reality process.

Missing in Inaction

My apologies for being out-of-touch for so long! I’ve been totally overwhelmed by my divorce and deciding where my life is going now. It wasn’t what I wanted but now that I’m faced with it, it’s intriguing! I hope to keep my house and have already started to turn my ex’s office into MY STUDIO! Woohoo! I have so many projects on my work table it’s ridiculous, and even more in my sketch pad and brain. Even in the worst of times there is inspiration and creativity. Unfortunately, there hasn’t been much action — but that’s about to change!

The colors are here, the colors are here!

Spring 2011 Pantone fashion color trends, that is.

Whatcha think?  Oooo, and be sure to take the “color survey.”  The current favorite was NOT a surprise for me.

Me, AJP (GIA)

I have been very, very bad, and you all may admonish me for neglecting my blogging.  I’ll beg my way out with a little whining about pain and fatigue, but since all that’s much better now, not a lot.

Part of my distraction has been the Accredited Jewelry Professional course, online at GIA.edu.  It’s a basic course, mostly for people working in jewelry stores, but there was a lot to learn for anyone making and selling, too.

So what did I learn?

• I learned not to call my stuff “handmade” unless it was crafted from wire or sheet. Bezel settings are “handmade.” A necklace that I’ve strung with beads is “assembled.”
• Though you’d think you want “the real thing,” treated and simulated gems are pretty common and acceptable in jewelry.  They may make a decent stone better able to survive normal wear or make a piece of jewelry more affordable – more bling for your buck.
• Platinum is an amazing metal. A six inch cube weighs about 169 lbs.  You can make incredibly delicate pieces with it that still have outstanding strength and durability.
• Diamonds are not the devil.  There are terrible working conditions with many gems.  Some colored stones have amazing value, too, which raises the question: have they been used to trade for weapons or drugs?  Probably.
• And… more…

Will knowing these things make me better able to make jewelry?  Maybe not, though I feel better about some gems I already have and more confident about buying some.  It mostly fed my inner “jewelry geek” and gave me some better ideas for expressing to you what I like in the pieces that make it out of my brain and into my shop.  Seems like win-win for us all!

Loving the stones (little “s”)

I seem to be on streaks with semi-precious stones and pearls.  The pearl streak is hanging on for a long time – there’s nothing like them and knotting is a relaxing and fun way to make beautiful, classic jewelry. But other minerals have struck me lately, too.

I think the jaspers are amazing – such a wide variety and so very versatile.  And let’s not forget quite affordable.  I just purchased a bunch of cabachons for bezel practice and there are a number of jaspers in there.  They’ll make some very attractive jewelry.  At the first bead show I went to, a small one in Columbus, I bought a lot of strands (and so did my friend/jewelry-making enabler Debbie.) I still have some today waiting for their place in jewelry.

Blue Amazonite attracted me at the same show when I found a strand of giant coins, each about 35mm across.  I couldn’t stand to separate them and made a short necklace for myself with them and my first Saki Silver toggle clasp.  I’ve gotten smaller Amazonite beads since – the small rounds are especially nice to incorporate just a touch of that blue or blue-green

Blue continued to fascinate me for awhile when one of the beaders at 1 Stop Bead Shop showed me her bracelet from a Caribbean trip set with Larimar. It’s striking that the stone only occurs in the Domincan Rep., surrounded by a sea that it mimics!  The pieces I’ve seen are perfectly “Caribbean blue” and have white and gray markings that make it look even more like water.  I dragged my hubby into every shop in St. Thomas looking for a cabachon for the beader at 1 Stop and picked up a bracelet and necklace of my own.  I also bought a pair of small cabs at InterGem that may make a pair of earrings when I get more bezel practice.

I’ve followed the “yellow” trend in fashion for 2 years and finally added a lemon yellow LeSportsac purse to my collection this Spring.  It caught my eye this week to see a strand of yellow Aragonite on sale at Artbeads.  Though pale it’s an attractive stone and as I dug deeper I found aragonite in a number of colors, some almost completely clear.  Brazilian and Moroccan stones I’ve found on Ebay are incredible yellows and yellow-oranges.

Evil Ebay, though, snagged me for a few hours when I poured over a seller’s South Sea pearls. Um.. drool, drool!  I have a Tahitian pearl necklace hubby bought for me (well, he saw it later, anyway) in Hawaii for our 20th anniversary and had seen the luscious gold South Sea pearls in all the stores, completely out of my price range! I have a bid on a sweet little baroque (not round) bi-color pearl but I really low-balled it, so I expect to be outbid.  In the meantime, if anyone has a spare $3744.00 hanging around, there’s a stunning baroque strand that I’d be happy to knot for you. And it’s on sale!

Learning from screwups

My second-ever bezel setting went horribly wrong in many ways, but it’s been a good lesson – or lessons.

Lesson 1: Slow down. My hands and muscles have been screaming for days for trying to do too much too fast.  I’m going to need to pace myself with things like sawing, sanding, pushing, and burnishing, with many rests.  Most of the pain isn’t immediate, probably why I don’t stop soon enough.  I haven’t been able to sleep on my back for 2 days because of my right shoulder (sawing, sanding) and my “holding” fingers were swollen about 24 hours with the session Weds.  And it’s all not likely to improve much – fibromyalgia muscles are notorious for not responding well to exercise and deconditioning easily, and the muscles in my fingers have some atrophy after 15 years frozen at 45 degrees.

Lesson 2: Trust your judgement (again.) How old do you have to be to learn this one?  I knew looking at this project that the bezel wire was too wide.  Did I change to another, thinner one or sand down the piece I cut and soldered?  No, no!  I pushed on ahead and at the very end, got major pleats as I pushed it into the stone.  And, I didn’t stop then, so my only choice to fix it (prying out the stone) broke the bezel at the weak, pleated spots.  Even after I did get the stone out, cut down, and sanded-sanded-sanded the setting,  there were still breaks.

Lesson 3: Keep reading, practicing, asking questions. I looked online to find the answer to how to fix it as best I could – prying out the stone and reworking the bezel – and found on a forum not only the answer, but also the reassuring “You’re not alone in this problem” reply to the desperate poster.  My only thought before that was throwing the whole thing in the trash.  Silver is, apparently, happy to work with you and willing even to forgive some mistakes, like a good friend.

Lesson 4: Own the experience. The temptation with a screw up like this is to hide it far, far away.  For instance, the bail on this. Not one, but two screw ups – soldering to the wrong end (I gave up on sanding all the traces off,) and soldering it on crooked.  Note my hell-with-it fix – cutting off the half  that was really off center and adjusting the “curled” part toward the center. But now I’m thinking I should wear this OFTEN, to remind me, especially when working on  the next bezel setting.

The green onyx cabochon is really interesting when I look at it under better light and it was surprisingly inexpensive.  I have another oval, of malachite, and after that the shapes are much more challenging than I’m ready for.  One is a totally gorgeous labradorite with a gold shimmer in a rectangle and another is an open Z-shaped larimar.  A bead shop worker got me looking for larimar cabs when I went on a Caribbean cruise and I got hooked on how amazing it is. But for now, I’m off to find some more ovals and rounds and to check on the price of my good friend silver today.

Mother of pearl

My mom loved the experimental seashell and pearl, so I just put it on a nice chain and, voilà, Mother’s Day present!

Seashells by the seashore

Another adventure into metal clay!

I was fascinated with Cold Mold from Rio Grande, especially those little pocket-sized pots.  I could see me running into something while out and about that I’d like a mold of.  I just had to have some and try it out.

It’s extremely easy to mix and use (I watched a Beads and Baubles video on Rio Grande’s website) – all I needed was something interesting to make a negative image of.  I looked around the house and found a small dish of shells we’d gathered along Cocoa Beach in Florida several years ago.

Squishing shells into cold mold

The Cold Mold firms up quickly and lets go very easily.  I could have easily used less, but once you open the pot and mix, you can’t really save it.  I did a couple of shells that seemed like they might make nice pendants.

It became clear, after they set, that I’d made a bit of an oops – the molds were fine, but they were deep.  How was I going to get a thin layer of metal clay pushed in there?

I opted for the shallower mold, on the left in the finished molds photo. I used a chart included in the PMC3 instructions to figure how thick to roll the clay.  It was about a 4 card thickness – again, a light sheet that would be hard to push into the mold.  The best thing I could think of to use?  The eraser end of a pencil.

Not using a finger made it slightly hard to feel, so I was super-cautious of pushing too hard.

Finished molds

Unfortunately, it took several tries and by the time I got it right, I had folded the clay into itself  to remix it with too much Slik on it.  The bottom section ended up as a separate piece.

The pieces dried well – I let it go for a few days anyway because I was busy.  They were pretty fragile, so I tried to be careful handling them.  I was able to smooth out quite a bit with sanding before sintering, something I’d only read about recently.  Using the torch went fine, also, though every time it’s a bit nerve-wracking.  I can’t image how it must be to use a kiln – at least I can see while I do it, and if it starts to melt, I can back off.

Since I’d ended up with separate pieces, I used some easy solid solder to tack them together.  It didn’t quite look right and as I started filing a bit to make the fit look better, I dropped it onto the concrete basement floor.  A problem with making things with stiff, misshapen hands – they have to be durable, too.  I’d obviously not soldered well because it let loose into two pieces again. I decided to try liquid solder instead and that seemed to make things more solid. ( I dropped it on the floor again later just to be sure – or maybe I just had trouble holding it again.)

Shell with pearl

I wasn’t sure what to do with the piece once I was finished and I left it out on my worktable to ponder.  The back had a nasty unfinished look to it from the two soldered pieces, so I eventually got a teeny grinding head for hubby’s Dremel that looked like a shape I could fit into the very concave back.  It worked well at the lowest speed and made things look a little more finished and uniform.  While I was at it, I got out my teeny Dremel bits and drilled a hole slightly off-center at the top for a jump ring.  (All this was with hubby’s coaching and a hand when needed.)

I found a stray pearl in one of my bead boxes that was a bit irregular and goes well with the very natural-looking shell.  I’m still not certain this is a finished project and might try adding a patina for some contrast, though is seems like everything is patinated lately.  I may just stick with lovely, shiny silver.

Fall 2010 Fashion Colors

Pantone predicts a pretty rich palette this Fall.  I love, love, love “Lipstick Red.” I’m also scoping their home colors for a nice sage-ish green…

Time flies when you’re making stuff

Since my venture into metal clay, I took a class in bezel setting at 1 Stop Bead Shop from Leslee Frumin, who’ll be teaching the same class at Bead Fest.  It was another fun one and now I’m definitely hooked with the metal/torch thing!  I bought the tool kit we used in class and have a table on order to put in the basement for my metal “annex,” basically using the torch in an area not quite as stuffed with vital papers as my office.  I also won’t have to put away my hubby’s tools first to use his bench.

Bezel set cabachon

The bezel is made with “bezel wire.”  Several steps are involved, such has soldering the wire into a ring you’ve sized for the cabachon, soldering that ring to a Sterling plate, and cutting out some of the Sterling to form the bail at the top and soldering it on.  Lots of sawing, filing, and sanding to make the wire and back piece look like one, and lots of torching, pickling, and polishing.

I’m interested in combining the metal clay and bezel setting.  I’ve seen some beautiful pieces online and “Art Jewelry” and “Jewelry Artist” mags.

A few other things going on.  My unusual pearl necklace, 2 knotted strands with keishi and button peach pearls and peach crystals, is already up online in the April “Bead Trends.”  I’m not thrilled with the photo – a little too much orange in the background to show the delicate peach colors off – but I’m certainly flattered again that they used it.  Things like that really help remind me I do have some sort of eye for it.  By the way, when I put this piece on myself to see how it looked when finished, I though it was damn sexy on bare skin!

The other thing happening is I’ve made room in my schedule to have Fridays all for jewelry stuff.  I wish it included just making, but there are so many other things to accomplish.  Still, a whole day dedicated to it should really help.  This Friday, for example, is the Intergem show.  It comes through town several times a year and is stuffed with vendors selling semiprecious beads, pearls, and silver beads and findings. Oh, and there’s finished jewelry, too, but of course, I’m on another mission there!  I have so much semiprecious I think I’ll be on more of a focus for cabachons and maybe pearls, although I’ve got a good selection of them, too.  It’s also mostly to cruise and see if there’s anything new and totally inspiring.

Oh, and 1 Stop has a Czech glass and semiprecious trunk show, too, so I just can’t go wrong tomorrow!