Earrings.................... And things I am thankful for .

The last several posts have been pendants, pendants, pendants... so here are earrings, earrings, earrings. The kewl thing is all of these earrings have sold, I've just been behind posting pictures.

I especially liked the red swirl ones. I used 20GA sterling on them, and Czech glass lentil drops. Seriously playing with wire is just the best thing!

Today, 15 years ago, my husband and I got married. I guess there is something better than playing with wire!

Then there is my wonderful almost 13 year old daughter.

Ok, playing with wire is the 3rd best thing in my life!

Art shows and new friends.....

Last weekend my art shows started back up after a 3 week break. On Sat (7/18/09) Jerry and I set up at the Art Store in West Des Moines. I had no real expectations, as I didn't want to be disappointed and since the show is mostly free, all I am out is alittle time if it doesn't go well. The main goal we had was to promote home jewelry shows, sell enough to cover costs just enjoy the day.
Sales wise, I was very happy! I actually made some! We handed out jewelry show brochures to anyone we could. The weather was cool, and not too windy, and traffic was low, which means I actually got to make jewelry on site. This is going to sound strange, but from a "boredom" prospective, I either want a really busy show, or a really slow show. The in between type shows drive me crazy.. where there is just enough traffic I have to pay lots of attention, but I'm not doing well so I go crazy. At least if the show is super slow, I can sit and make jewelry or read or something. You know, I probably shouldn't admit the above... heheheh. After all I am a cat, cat's don't do bored well.

But we made crazy profit in one area: we made new friends! My next door art neighbor was
Angela Meijer and her friend Carla Myers, selling wonderful colorful paintings. you can see her booth on her blog: http://angelameijer.blogspot.com/2009/07/artstore-des-moines_22.html#links All the pictures in the blog today are courtesy of Carla.. who went nuts with the camera. thanks for the pictures Carla! Angela's paintings are very kewl, very colorful and like any great art, invites the viewer to invest themselves in the meaning of the painting. We had great fun looking at her paintings and seeing things in them that she hadn't realized where in there. It's like pulling pictures out of clouds...

Anyway, it turned a potentially OK day into a great day, and I hope to see them at future art shows!

One of my failures........

I don't admit failure often, but I'm yelling "Uncle!" on this one.

I started this back in October. the large circle pendant is a vintage pin that was missing one of the rhinestones and the pin back was broken.. I got it cheap at a flea market a few years ago, in a baggie of broken bits I've used in other projects over the year. I wanted to make something big... I was thinking maybe regency period ( think Pride & Prejudice) evening necklace... large, multi-stranded drapy pearl necklace with a large medallion and crystal drop.. dripping in pearls and crystals. I wanted something that screamed other than my time period... I ran across this pin again, and realized it would be prefect as my center piece! So I gathered my materials and went to work on the drop. Right away I ran into problems.. getting the drop to drape correctly.. I gave up ( for that week) and it went into my traveling pile of projects..


I always have a pile of traveling projects. I like to have projects already to go, in case I get invited to bead somewhere else, like a bead pot luck at one of the local shops, or over to a friend's house... all I have to do is grab my tools and a couple of projects and go! I sometimes hit my pile when I've hit a temporary block... or feel like beading at work ( on breaks /lunch of course!) instead of reading or something. Several of the projects are seed bead in nature as they travel well. I have a few repair jobs in there; and occasionally something like this pearl project, where I had a road block, so I'll kit it up and work on it later. Sometimes I just need time to think about it in my unconscious and I solve my problem! No such luck with this one....

Anyway, I pick it up again in Feb, and another rhinestone had fallen out of the pin. I found this one and I glued it back in, and work alittle on it. Same story a few months later... some more glue and I'm back in business. I also ran into problems on how to attach 3 to 6 strands of pearls to the pin that looked good... so I would put it away again.

I dug it out last week to work on again.. and this time I really wanted to get it finished. Once again, another rhinestone had fallen out, but this time I couldn't find it. I couldn't find a close enough match to the pin in my stash of rhinestones. So I'm stuck now. I cannot sell something missing a rhinestone! Also at this point I've re glued half of the darn things... so I'm afraid if I sell it another will fall out on my customer... not good. And I never did quite figure out how to get the strands draped evenly in the back... so lots of problems on this one.

Most importantly, I no longer have any desire to make this huge, drapy regency period thingie, though that might be a side effect to the problems I've had with this piece. sign.

I recently bought some resin to play with, typing this makes me wonder what the pin would look like if I glazed the whole damn thing so nothing else can fall out ( assuming I can find a match to the missing rhinestone) if it would look ok... hmmmmmm..... maybe it's time to dig through the rhinestone stash again, maybe I missed something........

copper and sterling .. together again!

Though in my mind they are rarely apart! Here is a recent copper/sterling bracelet I made with matching earrings. I think I need to use a thicker gauge of copper next time, I used 20 so it would fit into the holes of the beads... I like it but it's more delicate than I would wish. Like how the earrings turned out though! what do you think??

More Pendants........

A few more pendants to show.... the lime is Mother Of Pearl, the other 2 are agates.

Black and White Challenge for June

Just going through my pictures and realized I'd not shared my Bead Society's challenge for June... This year my local society ( check out http://iowabeadsociety.blogspot.com/ if you are in the Des Moines Area) is featuring a color or color combination each month. For June it was Black and white. I made this bracelet with vintage glass, fresh water pearls, sterling silver ( I made the headpins in fact) and crystals.

July's colors are Red, White and Blue. I'm having a hard time getting excited about that, as the 4th is already past.......

More Pendants.......

I like making pendants, and since they are selling very well this season, I've been making them like crazy!! All three of these use agates... but all are different. I really like the 3rd one, it's Mexican lace, and it's shaped like Africa, so that's what I named it. I don't always name my pieces, but some of them just call out for a name. What would you name the other two? send me your suggestions!

All three are wrapped in sterling silver wire.