week 29 - Routine

Focus on life... week 29

This is very much a warm summer day routine.. I wish I could do this year round!

But first things first  FEED THE CAT!...(. & the fish and wind the cuckoo clock)

This is Emmett We have 3 cats but he is the only one that jumps on the bed and licks your face to point out that his food Bowl is EMPTY!  ...

Next make the coffee

Coffee pot and grinder in their temp home  note the can of pliers behind them.... Now the fun part sitting outside and drinking it.. My favorite part about this house in summer!

(the coffee cup says "I thought normal was a dryer setting")

Coffees gone... time to quit reading and put out the gallery flags... have to do this in the rain too....

Now my day starts...  If it's not raining I'll probably water plants, then maybe work on a piece of jewellery

I finished this up this morning...

The major differences in my days are totally controlled by weather!

To see what rituals other people follow check out Sally's blog!

Bead Table Wednesday

New listing on etsy Raspberry enamelled toggle with copper bar and jump rings treated with LOS

This isn't currently on etsy but should make it there shortly .. description as above except it's aqua and has a couple of millifiori flowers

Bead Table Wednesday (BTW)

These are inspired by Jo Tinley's (Daisy Chain Designs) tutorial on the Art Jewelry Elements blog

The silver wire was recycled silver that I melted and reformed into wire a couple of years ago, the links need a lot of filing!  Everything except the copper and solder was recycled!

 

I love  Bougainvillea... SO I decided to try and make one this week.  Since they come in almost every colour of the rainbow, I made mine fairly light since pinks are expensive enamels and I wasn't sure it woud work!  Would love to live somewhere I could grow them!

The Challenge of Travel Blog Hop

The premise of this blog hop was to travel places we've never been through jewellery.  I chose New Zealand since it's a country I've never been too... when I think of New Zealand I think of  bright greens and blues surrounding Mountains  and of course Kiwi birds.... Well my kiwi bird bead has a lovely background but the little brown blob did nothing for me so it is no residing in Fred Fishes aquarium.  (One of these days he's going to run out of aquarium to swim in!)

As I was strolling through photos of New Zealand I kept running into sets for the Tolkien books... I've always loved the intro to The Hobbit... so my necklace is a tribute to Bilbo  and all the hours of pleasure people have had reading about him....  I've even include the  door into his hobbit hole as a bead in  my necklace ....

Using the flag as a jumping off point was suggested... well it's red white and blue with Stars and a union Jack... Those colours are not New Zealand in my mind! I see New  Zealand as blues, greens purples and more blues....






New Zealand's aboriginal population are the Maori's... traditionally they had elaborate tattoos... The tattoos remind me a bit of the intricately filigreed steel beads that I've been  enamelling for the last 18 months... so my trip through New Zealand is colour. 

 The necklace has a lampworked tree bead as a focal and then grades up through blue water, green trees, purple mountains and then back into blue sky;  my version of a New Zealand landscape.

I've finished the necklace with one of my enameled toggles!  All components of this necklace are made by me except for the chain which was purchased as chain.











In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit. Not a nasty, dirty, wet hole, filled with the ends of worms and an oozy smell, nor yet a dry, bare, sandy hole with nothing in it to sit down on or to eat: it was a hobbit-hole and that means comfort.
It had a perfectly round door like a porthole, painted green, with a shiny yellow brass knob in the exact middle. The door opened on to a tube-shaped hall like a tunnel; a very comfortable tunnel without smoke, with panelled walls, and floors tiled and carpeted, provided with polished chairs, and lots and lots of pegs for hats and coats - the hobbit was fond of visitors.  (From 'the Hobit' JR Tolkein)
 
And speaking of visiting I would love you to visit me on this blog hop! Don't forget to visit the other participants!  A list can be found here! http://treasures-found.blogspot.ca/

 

Almost wordless Wednesday

Have been trying to find tiny clay vases for my enamelled poppies, finally gave up and decided to try them in glass instead.  The poppies are about 3.5 inches tall.   I actually think the vase would be better a bit shorter... But by the time I decided that I had way too much white glass wound on the mandrel!

ALmost wordless wednesday

I really liked the way the toggle on the bracelet in the previous post worked out... but I didn't think that the tiny holes that the jump rings went through looked finished so I inserted the world's tinniest eyelets into the holes to finish them... (nasty little things kept trying to run off!)

Anyone have a source for those tiny eyelets in black (1/16 by 3/32 long) I have rivets that size in black but not eylets! I don't mind the copper but would like black or sterling?

Playing around....

Saw someone elses version of the link bracelet on The Jewelery Artisans Comunity forum and discovered that it was in the July Lapidary Journal magazine which I just happen to have..The second bracelet is from the same magazine only it's done in brass there.... so made them both .... My donut is a piece of 3/4 inch plumbing pipe I didn't like the closure on the link one in the magazine so made an enamelled toggle

My rings are made from stripped 12 gauge electrical wire... my stock doesn't include wire that heavy!

More enamels....

I decided that I needed to make pinwheels that spin not just ones that are stuck as static components in a piece of jewellery....... 

I got a set of water colour enamels last week with my enamel order...   It's not really like painting with normal water colours as you fire between layers....  the 'painting' is suppose to be of my husbands boat out in the cove .  Guess I need to PPP!

My new enameled rose.....

ALmost Wordless Wednesday & Bead Table Wednesday

Spent Sunday playing around with copper anticlastic bracelets... guess I should put some on etsy but they don'tseem to stick around long enough













My new perennials... Don't figure that I can kill these!....

Almost Wordless Wednesday & Bead Table Wednesday

 

My first 'succesful' cored big holed bead...  The tubing is actually aluminium not sterling... The hardest part is actually getting the holes centered on the bead caps!  If someone out there knows the trick to this... 

PLEEZE SHARE!

The closure on the silk cord is based on this free tutorial on Jennifer Camron's blog 'Glass Addictions'

Gord launched Money Pit last Monday... and since then the trees between our house and the water have come into bloom... and for once we actually had 'blue' sky... Today the rain is coming down in buckets!

ABS March Challenge... 'Street Scene in Montmartre'

 Van Gough's Street Scene in Montmarte is this months inspiration for the ABS Challenge... Some months I look at the picture and nothing happens... other months I can see the focal but it never gets into the kiln....  This month I took one look at that painting and thought this will be FUN!

First off... Make a focal ....  Usually my version of the focal is a miniature of some element of the painting...

I wasn't sure about adding the french flag to the bead then thought nope... I can make an enameled French flag...  Lucky it was a French flag... most other flags would have been beyond by enamel talents!... & I couldn't resist trying to do a pinwheel to represent the windmills... I made the mistake of punching all 5 holes before I started... think it would have been much easier to bend the copper into shape &  then punch the hole... Then I had all my new headpins that I had to show off somehow... I'm really pleased with the way this necklace worked out!  With the exception of one tiny commercial copper bead wired onto the focal and the bases of the enameled beads.... this is 100'% hand made from glass rods, enamels, copper wire and copper sheet...

As I was looking for the link to add my name to the list for the blog tour I discovered that I am thisweeks designer of the week for the ABS Challenge...  Here's what Heather Powers has to say about my piece!
& If you want to do the blog tour

Almost Wordless Wednesday & Bead Table Wednesday (BTW)

 My new enameled Poppy Headpins...  they might be on etsy they might not...  These ones are sold and I haven't listed a new set YET....

And this is for anyone who missed Eli-Mae's cute tummy on my face book... Gord says that the tiny black heart in the middle of the white one is the true indication of her personality!

Today is the 5th beadsoup blog hop...

 I'm hopping but have no soup on my burner....

So instead of Soup I have a work in progress.... Playing with some of my new enameled headpins!  This did not start out as a bird....  I'm still tossing around ideas on how to fill in the wing....  The piece has loops on both ends so will become part of a neckpiece....

Would love to see some creative  comments

Size just over 4 inches/ 10 cm loop to loop.

Beadtable Wednesday , & Giveaway!

Yesterdays enameled poppy's... This were inspired by Joanna of DaisyChain Jewellery tutorial in Beads & Beyond

Only problem is at the moment they are in pieces on my 'bead table'  and I have  no clue how to put them together... yes I have ideas... so here's the deal Anyone who posts a comment on this post giving me a suggestion on how to put them together will get  a chance to win a 3 piece  set  (large flower, small flower and head pin)... your choice of colour... draw will be Feb 29, 2012  I would like to see what you do with them!

Middle flower is too close in size ... so is unnecessary....

Last nights full moon from the deck!  Unfortunately it was low tide so no reflection!

Almost Wordless Wednesday & Bead Table Wednesday (BTW)

 First off.. BTW...  My first attempt at resin... actually there are two pieces.. the other one had a solid back which was soldered on... no gaps in the solder... but there was a gap where the loop joins and yes the resin all drained out... Anyone know what where or what the above  image is?

And BTW the original meaning for BTW (By The Way) I am not in love with Resin at all...  Not being able to touch something that I can see for 6 hours... and then having to leave it a further 3 days...  Yea yea.. I'm a lampworker I stick my beads in a kiln for 12 or 15 hours... however I can't see them... I don't have a great deal of desire to play with something I can't see!

My token flower picture... Wish they were mine but they aren't, they belong to the Gardens at Roosevelt's cottage on Campobello!

Bead Table Wednesday (BTW)

OK I'm a day late.....  This is what I'm doing for fun today...  Making myself a prototype anitclastic bangle... Don't artists always get the prototypes?

No it's not finished and the hammer still needs more shaping.. but my knuckles need a chance to recover from the hammer shaping!

Rasp 3 Knuckles 0

Even now it's a really comfortable bracelet  The directions are in 'The Workbench Guide to Jewelry Techniques' By Anastasia Young... I made my strip 8 inches not 8.25 but I also made it a bit wider

Almost Wordless Wednesday & Bead Table Wednesday (BTW)

New Beads this week... not sure what I'm doing with them....

Spent Monday beating up on some copper wire and sheet....

OK .. I give up... there is a picture of a necklace made with those rings that I dipped in liver of sulpher becuase I was tired of tumbling it everytime I wore it... But it will not show up on this blog!!!!

ABS March challenge.. Finches and Bamboo

Finches and Bamboo, Northern Song dynasty (960–1127)

Emperor Huizong (1082–1135, r. 1101–1125) Chinese

Handscroll; ink and color on silk; 11 x 18 in. (27.9 x 45.7 cm)

The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

John M. Crawford, Jr. Collection, Purchase, Douglas Dillon Gift, 1981

My original though when I saw this piece was that it looked like it was painted onto Dichroic glass so that's what I used!   I made one large focal and a number of smaller beads in assorted shades of topaz and dichro with 'bamboo' leaves painted onto the bead with a stringer...  With the exception of a couple of copper plated clay Mykanos beads everything in the necklace was made by me!

To see other entries in this challenge check out the Art Bead Scene April Challenge post


April Fools Sale in my Etsy Store & Mothers Day promotion on Starving Artist Forum

Check out my Etsy store... I'm having an April Fools Sale...  The sale will be in effect the entire month of April, 20% off store wide  Just in time for Mother's day!

Ths is my newest electroformed tree bead... It's headed towards etsy.. but I haven't found my caliphers and my camera in the same place yet.... I really like how this turned out!  (and yes the little wonky stand will be included!)

As for the Starving Artists Mothers Day Promotion... you get 'ballots' for doing Social Media things.... Here's a link to the Starving Artists Blog of all the ways you can get ballots to win one of three gift certificates from the  starving jewelry artists shops that are listed in that blog post!  You can spend the 'money' in any participating shops... Buying something from me doesn't get you any extra ballots but it will make me happy... and I make much nicer beads when I'm happy then when I'm sad!