Goal Accomplished (kinda)

I had made a resolution at the start of last year to write something in my blog at least once a week.  To facilitate that goal, I joined the Flickr Group "52 Earrings in one Year" started by Anke Humpert of Anart Island Studios.  While did not  accomplish the goal of posting every week ... I sorta did it in clumps.... I feel good that I finished all 52 pairs by December 31st.
   I just realized it has been a whole month since my last post ... whoa, really ... what the heck was I doing all that time"  No new beads to speak of ... my shoulders are the latest part of my body to start to go.  Cranking the pasta machine is right out for now, at least till my physical therapy starts to show better results. I did get a change to dig around in my stash and find some beads I made earlier this year that I worked up in the last few weeks
  So, tonight I posted my last earring pairs to the group.  I had a lot of fun doing it and got a ton of inspiration from the others who posted to this Flickr group.  I discovered new artists  (not just polymer)  and blogs to follow.  Started pinning a lot at Pinterest.  I can (and have) spend hours there just jumping from one board to another - talk about inspiration!.
    Here are the last 4 earrings from the Challenge.
    The first pair of beads I made up were made from the Texture Tut I got from Lydia at Diva Designs.  They are named after Bette Davis ... the bumps remind me of her famous line  "Fasten your seat belts, it's going to be a bumpy ride".

Bette Dee 

 These beads were made by coloring a base white bead with Pan Pastel Chalks. I made a whole set of these to make into a necklace, but haven't got around to that yet.

JW Patches

 Several of the blogs that I visited off the Flickr earring group do asymmetrical challenges. It is hard for my scientific mind to let go and not strive for absolute symmetry.  This is my attempt at it. It really bothers me that they are not the same length.  This is something that I hope to overcome.  I am currently working on an asymmetrical necklace to help this process along.

1 Pod ... 2 Peas

 My last pair for this challenge were made with a short band of scrap clay left over from another project. It was too colorful to wad up and use as bead guts .. there is no such thing as wasted clay

The Golden Band

Next post will hopefully be my further trials with asymmetry.

A Rocky Path

I finally broke down and bought something off of Etsy.  I have been purposely avoiding it for years.  Not because I don't like it ... heaven forbid.  It is the fear that I will go CRAZY and buy every thing in sight once I discover how easy it is.
    It is taking  lot of restraint to be good ... there are so many interesting items to be had just with a quick click of the mouse.
    I have been able to limit myself so far to a pair of earrings and beads from Lynda at Diva Designs.  I have been following her work for years now.  She was the first follower on my blog when I started it almost two years ago now.  I have purchased several of her very well written tuts in the past, but used a check rather than signing into Esty.  Now that she is a full time designer, it turned out to be better for her monetarily if I went through Esty, so now I have an account. .. so many shiny things.... opps... getting off topic
   This leads me to another Esty purchase I made last week.  One of my flickr contacts is River Valley Designs, and one of the techniques she uses and has written a tut on, is called Rocky Path. I have long admired pieces that she and others have made using Rocky Path and tried to figure it out on my own, with limited success.  So I finally broke down and purchased it. I am in love ... it is a playful technique and I love the serendipity of it - you can't predict exactly what is going to happen.  I love surprises.
   I have made two earring sets so far and would make more today, but I must get ready for the Artisan Show this weekend.

Using Yellows and Orange Inks

Pinks and Yellows

 

Where does all the time go?

We are almost to the half year mark on the 52 earring project.  I can't believe that the year is almost half over.  We are fast approaching the solstice, one of my favorite days of the year.  I suffer from SAD (as do a lot of people in the Pacific Northwest), so sunshine is a great boost to my emotional well being.  Seems this year, tho', we are not getting enough of it.  I heard on the news that we have had only 3 sunny days so far this month ....
   Opps, got distracted.  My topic is the 52 earring project, not the weather.
   Anyway, the theme for this week's 52 earrings is "half".

 
  I don't cane much and when I do it is not a complex cane at all. I made a skinner blend using a light yellow and the new Premo Magenta Pearl.  Rolled it into a bullseye cane, and added a thin layer of white clay.  Then the cane was reduced and stacked.  Easy for me to do.  Veneered a scrape clay bead gut, rolled it around in my hands a bit to smooth, cut in half. Then topped with the Magenta.  The hardest part was cutting the Magenta with the exacto-knife to fit on the top of each half.  Thanks to Julia Sober for this technique that she showed us a few years back at a NWPCG demo.

If I only had a Heart

Wait a minute ..... I DO have a heart.
I saw these hearts at Michael's (or Joanne's - sorry can't remember for sure where) and thought they just cried out to be altered.

Out came the Vintaj Patina and a while later they were transformed into earrings I have aptly named "Tin Woodman's Desire".

I hear a beat ..... how sweet!

a la Julie Picarello

For this weeks earrings, I tried my hand at the Pendulum earring design from Julie Picarello's "Patterns in Polymer".

This was my first successful attempt at coloring washers. The secret is to paint the washer first (I used a paint dapper by Ranger), using a light color and then apply the ink.  What I thought was strange, even though I used the same two colors of ink, when they dried they looked like two different colors of violet. I was a bit worried that the under painting and ink would not survive in the oven during the finally curing, but as you can see, it held up fine.

I added a couple of rhinestones for a little bling.

I really like the way they look, but when I tried them on, they just didn't hand right.  One was fine, the other sticks out at a weird angle... can't figure it out as they look identical when I put them side by side.... hummm, maybe my ears are lopsided?????

Pretty in Pink

Be my Valentine Earrings Week 6

With Valentines day falling in week 6 of the 52 earring project, it was not hard at all to come up with the theme.

I started out the week working with translucent clay, so made a few translucent hearts. I tried adding a red glitter to the clay, and red ink to the clay.  The red washed out.  Not too bad, but didn't ring my chimes.

I then thought I might try for a faux ceramic heart look.  My thought was to make a kinda banner across the heart.  My first try, the banner is too thick for my liking. Back to the pasta machine... this one I like better. With the first heart I used Watermelon ink to color the LPC.  The color was not red enough without putting on several layers.  It lost it's ceramic look.  So the next time, I used Pepper Red ink thinking it would be darker. Surprising, it was lighter than the watermelon. I only used one layer of colored LPC to keep it more ceramic.

Used a waterproof pen to highlight the stamped letters.

These I liked enough to make into earrings. But I was on a roll and did not stop here.  I was not happy being unable to get a good red color using ink, so I thought I would try using the PanPastel Chalk red - it is really vibrant.







I made a basic heart shape and used a needle tool to outline the stamped letters to make the banner. I then colored the bead with chalks and baked.  After baking, I used LPC colored with black ink to antique.  With the first pair, I did not realize that I was making marks that would look like a strawberry when colored in.  Opps... so the second pair, when they come out of the oven, looked a bit like wood. To keep this theme, I antiqued with dark paint and used a satin sealer.

Shortcake anyone?

 I added a little bling to spark these up.

I am really enjoying this challenge. Coming up with a new idea every week AND blogging about it. Keeps my creative juices flowing.

Earrings - Week #5

Several years ago, Seattle put in light rail between downtown and the Seatac airport.  I have driven past it a lot and wondered how well it would work for those clayers flying in for the Clayditaron cruise to Alaska this summer.  So on my day off this week, Lord Opuson and I caught it at the airport and road it downtown to the Westlake Center.

I was pleasantly surprised.  It was clean and not very crowded - not much more $ than the bus, but much faster.  There is not, however, much room for luggage. There are folded up seats for those with special needs, the area of which could work provided they did not need to be used by  people who might require them. The staging area for the Link is a ways from the airport terminal (to the north) so if you come in from the south end of the terminal, it would be quite a hike.  It would also be a bit of a walk from the Westlake Plaza to the hotel.  I suppose one could catch a cab at Westlake.  Not sure if it is the best idea, but if there is not a hotel shuttle available, it would be much cheaper than a cab and we all want to save a few $ for clay goodies on the cruise, don't we.

While at Westlake, of course I had to visit the great stores.  In one I found a great product that I wish I had thought of.  A metal necklace with interchangeable magnetic inserts!  It is made by a local company called Magnabilities.

They make them square like the one I bought or round, and a lot of inserts so you can always match what you are wearing.  Of course, I am wondering if I can figure out how to make my own inserts.

Just had to have this dragonfly.  I love the color, which is weird as I don't normally wear a lot of pink. When I got home, I thought I would make my week 5 earrings to match, but had no pink polymer beads. OK, I could have made pink beads, but I was heading into a weekend where I had to work at my J.O.B., soooo I decided to check my stash and see if I could  come up with a match.





These are what I put together.  They are actually a bit more orange than I would like, but they are shiney and I got several comments, including a day shift co-worker who wants to know if I sell earrings.  I thought everyone at work knew about my jewelry work ... looks like I have to work more to get the message out.

I did not feel like setting up the light box so took these on my window stile - scratches in the wood curtesy of the  Underfoot Clan

The Lady or the Beast?

Ok, so a cow doesn't *exactly* fall into the Beast category. Maybe the Minotaur..... but I suppose that is stretching it a bit.

Mokume - you never know what will show up with the next slice of the blade.  I didn't even see these patterns until I was sanding.  Now I have to decide which way to wear it.  I might be able to put a hole in it if very careful....

I used to have Fingernails on my Right Hand

I hate to sand.... really, I HATE it.  So when I discovered that Julie Picarello sands all her lovely creations, I was dismayed.  I was fortunate enough to take her Mokume class several years ago, and really loved the look I got, but sanding was just not something that I was willing to do.

 Then her book came out and I, being the collector of as many polymer related tomes as possible, just had to have it. This time though, the book did not linger on the shelf for long.  I cranked up the old PM last Sunday and created a bunch of veneers. Took me all week, a bit at a time, to finish them.  And last night after work, I sat down with a pan of water, my sand papers in varying grits, and actually sanded!!!! I know, took me by surprise too.  I must say though, that I really like the smooth texture that it imparts to the clay. 

I can't really say that I like sanding anymore now than I did before, but .... well, it is not as bad as I once thought, considering the outcome.

Here are a few pieces that have not yet decided what they will be when they grow up. I call them Pretty in Pink (I warned you all to bear with me while I get this naming process underway)