Earrings, Earrings, Earrings........

I've been on a real earring kick this past week, it started with this stunning pair. The sterling domed disks I made by hand!! They turned out so well, I dug into my private vintage stock for the blue rounds... and I'm keeping this pair!! I've worn them to work about every other day so far... I should make another pair for sell, maybe this weekend eh? Next some Botswana Agate with delicate sterling swirls,

Gold filled wire encircles vintage pearly white glass balls, and these.. crazy lace agate dyed a shocking pink and sterling silver. I'm very pleased with these, they are similar in design to the scuplural pendants I make..

I call these my orange fish.. I just was trying to make cute squiggles, but it really looks fishy...

This final pair is pieces from a vintage necklace. You know, one of those glam gorgeous vintage costume jewelry pieces that are segmented? Some of the rhinestones where missing, so I took it apart to recycle the sections that had the full compliment of rhinestone's. They make great earrings! That's all for now.

Week 34: Hip to be Square

OK, I admit I'm not following themes this much this year. I even like this week's theme: Crystal Clear. I'm actually working on a pearl/crystal creation that would work perfectly for the theme.. alas, I don't want to get behind again. So here is this weeks' not on theme item: "hip to be square" I've made one of these bracelets before using traditional round beads, but I wanted to try it with different shaped beads.. these square Sodalite beads are really nice, they have bezels on the edges and everything. I really wanted to feature them in a piece, so what is better than square frames? I'm especially pleased how well the clasp came out. Not exactly square, but angular for sure. This sold almost the second I put it out, and the gal commissioned matching earrings, which turned out great.. regretfully I didn't get pictures of them.



Here are 3 pendants I've made recently. The blue is cat's eye, the middle one is a vintage glass cab meant to suggest opal, and the 3rd jasper of some type. I mostly play in silver, but I know quite a few of my customers appreciate gold also, so I've been making an effort to make some things with gold fill. these turned out pretty well don't you think?

Week 33: "leftovers"

OK, I really won't call this piece leftovers, but that's what it is. If you recall, a month or so ago I made this great piece with copper and sterling with handmade copper leaves. After that project, I had 2 leaves left and some of the sterling links. I ran across them again trying to put stuff away ( I get lazy and tend to shove old bits to the side.. until the sides outgrow the middle of my work desk.. at which point I'm compelled to clean up or find somewhere else to work!) Well I also had this great handmade lampworked blue leaf bead just hanging around, and well, I decided to make another handmade chain necklace. Almost everything on this necklace, minus the blue leaf, are "extras" or bits from other projects. Since I'm lazy, I often put left over beads all in 1 box instead of properly putting them away.. making bead soup as it's called. Blues are my favorite color, so I had lots of bits of blue leftovers... I did have to make more sterling links but overall, this was a very quick necklace to put together, since almost everything was prefabricated. Now of course I'm going to make 2 more copper leaves to make matching earrings, I've got them cut out but not sanded down yet.. I"ll have pics in a week or 2 of them. Below is another necklace and earring pair I've made recently, using banded agate and onyx. The wrap on the pendant is very simple, I just tried to follow the banding of the agate.

Week 32: "God's Tear"

This is my attempt to find beauty amidst the sadness. The "tear" is a beautiful, delicate crystal butterfly. Yeah, I've been depressed lately, and yeah, I'm trying to work through it. Art is therapy both for the artist and the viewer.

The "eye" is a huge (guessing 35mm) buckeye agate, the frame is in 16GA sterling, wrapped I think with 24GA?

Week 31: Yin-Yang

Messing around with pearls again, like that ~never!~ happens around here. Anyway, wanted to do a bracelet with a wire center, and came up with this yin-yang pattern. It's a spiral, naturally! I love spirals. It's made with 16GA wire for the base, and 24GA for the wrap. The pearls are great in this, a very deep metallic blue.