Arrowhead Trio

Due to home circumstances of either me or my husband's unhealthful state (mainly blaming my broken leg!) I have not been able to go back to Quartzsite to Gem World since before the holidays in 2010. When calling them last Friday I learned that they would be closing the following week...for the summer! So, we did a spontaneous trip to QTZ and Gem World so I could feed my inventory of good stuff before the summer. Tom noticed a basket of jasper arrowheads that I had missed seeing and I am so glad he did. I bought ten of these, now I wish I had bought the whole basket! They are rough-hewn  and lovely pieces of jasper. I am going to try for a very minimalist wrap for most of these since I want them to speak for themselves and have only enough of a frame to be securely wrapped.

Now, to see if there will be time to sneak back down there again before next Saturday. I can always use a few more goodies..yikes!

Newest Neck Rings

 At my recent jewelry sales, I am becoming convinced that my "bread and butter" pieces will always be my copper earrings and my neck rings with simple pendants, such as these. After my last weekend's sale, my inventory of both pendant neck rings and copper earrings is sorely lacking so I am dreaming up new designs and looking for more stones.

I think many ladies like to wear pieces that are of natural stone, but dislike the heaviness of a complete necklace made of the focal pendant piece and stone beads. Also, these are interesting and make wearing jeans look like you are being somewhat elegant, but casual. I am hooked on them myself! Casual but cool.

These last two are made from turquoise stones and embellished just a bit more on the neck ring. The earrings with this one were just hooked onto the ring for the photo, they are not placed there when wearing!

As I said, elegant but casual, too.

SOLD

Gettin' Ready for a Show

I am adding to my inventory of jewelry for an upcoming show at the Sun City Grand Art Faire this coming weekend. I am going crazy over these neck rings,  I just think they go with everything, from casual to dressy.

I have had this glass focal bead for awhile and found that I had a strand of smaller beads that just matched it perfectly, so voila!

These are from a piece of copper I torched to bring out colors, and unexpectedly got such an amazing array of reds and silver tones. torching copper is like Forrest Gump's box of chocolates...you never know what you are gonna git!

I had made a beaded-on-beading wire necklace out of these stone beads which were admired by quite a few customers, but when they tried it on they all felt it was a bit too heavy for their comfort. So, after considering what to do, I decided to take it apart and repurpose the beads into this neck wire ensemble. I like the lighter look now, too.

This set will not be available for sale, it will go into a private collection.










The necklace below was another one of the torched copper pieces that, as it was turning interesting colors, I finally said stop! I just loved the dark blues, violets, greens and reds that happened when torching this one. I don't think the true colors show up as well in this photo as in real life, but truly it is gorgeous. As Forrest said above, ya just never know!
                                                                            SOLD

Finally, new jewelry

 I know I promised to start posting more of my jewelry projects as I create them, but I foolishly fell down four weeks ago and broke my leg! I have not felt very creative as I have been starting to heal. Anyway, here are a few of what I have been working on.

The copper triangle earring on the right is convertible in that the gold tone portions of the earring are on a post which can be removed from the copper triangle and worn as a dangle by itself or with the copper piece behind the dangle.

You should try using a sawhorse in the master bedroom to pound copper while your leg is propped up and you are sitting in a wheelchair! Interesting visual, huh?

 My twin sister has requested that I make her a necklace and earring set with red beads, not warm color red beads but cool color red beads. I had coral beads that matched this request so used them, although in the photo they show up as being a bit orange; which they are not in real life.

These are some earrings requested by my sister to match a shell necklace she bought from me earlier. It is great to have a twin who likes what I make and requests specific pieces be made! Yes, I am giving her a family discount.....

Three New Pieces

 As promised (at least to myself) I have photographed three newer pieces that I had finished but not posted. I need to improve my posting of jewelry pieces to this blog! I am preparing for an artwalk at Toscana at Desert Ridge in a few weeks and wanted to have some new special pieces for my display.

This is another of my copper calla lily pendants. This one has silvertone accents. The others like this I have made have had turquoise beads for accents and I wanterd to do something different.

SOLD

 This pendant is a stone I have had for awhile but didn't have what I wanted to use to make a necklace from. I did find some howlite stone beads and used those, linked together in sections, to make this necklace.

This is something really funky I decided to try. I downloaded a free tutorial by Judy Freyer-Thompson from the ArtJewelry online website. It involves patination of metals using a process that in different steps involves the use of Kosher salt, white vinegar and ammonia. I really love the free-form designs on these discs, which I will use for some earrings. I am not sure how I will design them, but I do know I don't want to cover up this patination with anything fancy, it should stand on its own! I am thinking ahead now to pendants using this method, how cool is this?!

SOLD

Jewelry Give-Away

I am always interested to see the generous nature of those who give paintings or jewelry away on their blogs. Right now, Tish McDermott is giving away a lovely pair of earrings to the lucky one chosen from the comments section of her blog. Just click on over to her blog and enter...her pieces are lovely and so imaginative.

I promise to start photographing the pieces I am working on and begin posting them here again. I have neglected to do that for far too long!

Aubrey and Grandma Time!

We had the pleasure of a few days' visit from our youngest son and his family. This included my Ms. Aubrey! After raising only sons, it is such a pleasure to have a girly-girl to play with and have her participate in our activity planning! She came with her plans of what she and Grandma could do together. This included painting, bracelet-making and I surprised her with a chocolate chip cookie baking session. We had to have the energy to do all of these activities together!

She is developing a sense of design, whether it be painting or jewelry. She wanted a bracelet that matched the poorple in her pretty new dress. Of course Grandma had just the perfect beads in her growing stash. We both had a great time and created more wonderful memories together.

Vintage Treasures!

This past weekend, the ArtChix had an art and artisan jewelry sale. During some of the down time, one of the ArtChix brought out two huge bags of vintage beads and jewelry to sort through. What fun! She is a member of the DAR and they are involved in a service project, working with the schools, and selling this donated jewelry/beads is part of their fundraiser for this project. So, for a donation, I had the extreme pleasure of sorting through both bags and choosing lots of treasures to turn into modern jewelry with vintage charm. We sat for two hours remarking things like "look at this...I can make three pairs of earrings from this one bracelet", etc.

I am always torn, when receiving vintage jewelry, between leaving them as they are or tearing them apart to modernize them to be worn today. I usually lean towards making them wearable today since I think these treasures deserve to be worn instead of stored in boxes in a closet. Add to that the fact that I (and I think many others) cannot bear the discomfort of wearing screw-back earrings with my pierced ears so something has to be done about that! The workmanship, even in the costume jewelry, is amazing by today's standards and I just marvel at that.

Here are the first few I have been working on, I just could not wait one day past the weekend! I might also add that I don't think these will be available on my sale tables since I like them so well I want them for myself. I will have to be less greedy than this as I work through these treasure bags and make more jewelry from them since I do want to sell (I mean share!) them with others who enjoy the vintage looks as much as I do.

 This is a lovely old brooch, all metal settings, done in black metal of some sort. One of the larger stones was out of the setting, but it was found in the bag of mixed beads and jewels (phew!) and I repaired it, cleaned up the brooch, removed the brooch pin, made a bail for it and hung it from a black neck wire ring. Cool, huh?

These were my fav's before I even got them home! Look at that filigree on the long drop earrings! Do you see why I am keeping these?! The rhinestone earrings were taken from a choker necklace where these were some of the focal pieces. Thankfully, I was able to snap them from the rest of the stones cleanly and add the posts to them without incident. These are now all on posts. Lovely filigree silver in these.


Stay tuned as I continue to work my way through these bags and make these treasures from the past into Fav's for Today!

Got the Book!

I want to show you all that the book I won on Lisa Crone's blog arrived and I am now perusing it. I want to try some of the projects she provides as they look like such fun pieces of jewelry. She is a very inspiring person!

Some Days You Lose, and -

- some days you WIN!!!!! A few weeks ago, I entered a blog give-away offered by a blogger I follow every day...Lisa Crone of A Bead a Day. I love her daily blogging because it always contains the latest news of beads and things that everyone is trying now. She was giving away one of her new books on beading and jewelry making, so I entered a comment on that day. As Fate would allow, I was the winner! So, I am now excitedly awaiting the shipment of my great new book. I'll post a review of this when I get it and read it. It is so exciting to have your name drawn above all the others who entered!

Copper Piecrust Pendant with Chain

I decided to turn this pendant into a larger piece by using turquoise beads with chain and some silver pieces. I like this and hope that someone who loves large jewelry will like it also!

SOLD

Copper and Silver Two-Tone

I just got back some of my jewelry from Chama and will start photographing it. I want to be prepared for the Oktoberfest sale at Sun City Grand on October 9 and wanted some of my inventory from there. It is like seeing old friends to go through my stash of finished jewelry now.

Copper and Turquoise Links

I made this pendant a few weeks ago and have been mulling how to suspend it until yesterday when I found I had some matching turquoise beads to pair with it. I like to separate the stone beads with hand-made links since it cuts down on the considerable weight of these natural stone beads when wearing. Plus, that makes for more copper to show!

SOLD

Copper and Sodalite Pendant

I cut and hammered this pendant base yesterday and added the beads this morning. I like the pairing of the copper with its complementary color of blue beads.

I am mulling taking off that bale component and trying something a bit different for that part of the piece. I have some more ideas, anyway.

Copper Calla Lily

I felt compelled to get out my torch the other day and start bending copper to make this cone which I paired with turquoise beads. Lots of bending of metal and wire went into this one! I like it and hope that others will, too.

SOLD

Copper and Turquoise Pendants

Once again, I feel compelled to make pendants, reaching for my favs of turquoise and copper components to make some. I have quite a collection of copper components and turquoise beads so they sort of speak to me when I start putting them together. I like the simplicity and lighter weight of using the natural stones to make pendants rather than heavy beaded necklaces.

Glass and Copper

I have had these glass beads for awhile and hadn't decided what to do with them. Today, when I looked at them I decided to make a chunky bracelet with them and it feels good on the wrist. Love those colors, each bead is a bit different.

Pie Crust Cabachon

I spent the morning trying to figure out how to make a free form cabachon wrap with sheet copper. I saw some examples of "pie crust wrapping" and decided to make it work for myself. This is a very free form piece and I love the organic nature of it. This could also be termed as "crude", but I like the fact that it is a unique piece. I also love how torching the copper brings out so many colors!

Finally, Jewelry!

I must apologize for ignoring this blog for over a month. We were on a planned monthlong vacation, during which I made lots of jewelry in the motorhome but neglected to photograph it. Plus, I was taking it up to the RV park office for their display case to sell it and that was my main concern, greedy person that I am. At the end of the summer, if there is anything left I will photo it and show it here then. My jewelry items do seem to be selling.





These are among my fav earrings I have made. I started with a sheet of copper that I flamed to bring out the colors, cut the blanks out, punched the holes in with my metal punch and then textured and domed the discs. I then beaded them with brass beads and hung brass dinosaur bones from them. I just love them and may have to keep these for myself. The other earrings here were made with brass and copper blanks I cut and then put them together in this fashion with the suspended dino bones. I hung the tiny copper blanks on both sides since these earrings have so much movement that they need to be reversible. SOLD



These are just some fun earrings I made from some of the strand of red glass heart beads I bought some time ago just because I thought they looked like such fun beads. I still do!

Art/Jewelry Sale Yesterday

I participated in an art sale yesterday to raise funds for the Arizona Artists Guild new building fund for operating expenses, maintenance, etc. I "bought" my table and was allowed to keep any proceeds I made. I had mainly artisan jewelry for sale, but also a few racks of unframed, but matted prints and original paintings. It was an okay day; not the worst jewelry sale nor the largest jewelry sale I have done, so that is okay with me. AAG seemed to be doing very well with table sales and donated items sales, so that was good. I do wish the traffic could have been more, but this was our inaugural event so we will have to see how this evolves in the future. But, at any rate, this is my table(s), my buddy, Carol, had bought a table and then was too sick (respiratory virus, yuk!) on that day to participate so I inherited her table as well. I was situated in front of the wall containing a few nudes in Conte, etc. That was either a boon for my table or not, I don't know. I do know that those who did not even bring a cloth to cover their tables, nor organize their wares well remarked that my table was the best in the room. Jewelry displays necessitate their own display formats! So, here it is, warts and all....