Recycled junk mail!!!!

So, you know that annoying junk mail you get every Tuesday? Yeah, I hate that... Most of it I dump directly from my mailbox into the recycle bin.  But every once in a while a piece makes it into the house.  oops...

Anyways, I opened one of these annoying pieces the other day, cuz I thought, "hey, why not?"  It was a visa offer (like I need another credit card...) but you know how you can get those pretty cards now? Yeah, it was one of those.  The pictures were all Zodiac signs... very cool. So I put the insert in my craft-stash to ponder later.  That was two days ago...

Three days ago I made a few poly-clay pendants, thinking that I would Mod Podge some pics of my niece and nephews onto them, for gifts, if they turned out okay. Unfortunately, none of the pics I have printed would work at all well for that, and I've run out of ink (boo...). Then yesterday, I remembered the pics from that Visa offer.

So I started pondering, and made this:

[caption id="attachment_76" align="aligncenter" width="225" caption="Zodiacs"][/caption]

Here's the back:

[caption id="attachment_75" align="aligncenter" width="225" caption="Swirlies!"][/caption]

So here's what I did: After pondering the 12 designs offered up in the mailing, I decided on the Leo, Pisces, and Cancer (right, that's the crab?) images as the best for this project. And I cut some backgroundy bits from the other pieces to fill in the gaps a bit.   Instead of painting the Mod Podge on each individual piece, like I normally would, I just painted a thinnish layer on the front of the pendant, so that I would have a base to arrange and stick the pieces to. It seemed to work best for this project.  After I had them arranged (actually, I arranged on the dry piece first, then did the Podgey process...) and stuck down to my satisfaction, I painted some Podge overtop.  After that layer dried, I painted another layer, and made sure to seal the edges and back of the pendant as well, so that it's all nicely shiny... Shiny is good....

This project holds a number of firsts for me.  It's my first mosaic piece, it's the first time I've mixed polyclay and ANYTHING else, and it's the first time I've used Mod Podge start to finish.  I can honestly say, I was very pleasantly surprised at the workability of the Mod Podge.  See, I usually use Elmers to stick stuff down, and until the tea-tray, I'd not used Mod Podge EVER.  I think I'm in love...

So, what am I going to do with this pendant? No idea.  It doesn't really match any of the jewelry types I wear, but I'm kinda loving it.  But I'm not sure about the ethics of selling it, either, since I have no idea who the original artist is so I can't give them credit (and here is the dilemma of being an English teacher and a jewelry designer.  I worry about plagiarism in art... kind of annoying actually!)

Ah, well.  In the meantime, I'm just going to enjoy my craftiness...

R.Wilson

Earrings!

I love making earrings, and I love wearing earrings, so it's handy that I enjoy making them, huh?  Yeah, circular reasoning if ever I saw it, but it works for me... lol!

So I made earrings today.  Two pairs; I tried for a third, but the inspiration just wasn't there... although, it might be now... I'll be right back...

....

......

.....

Yup--just got another idea!

And just made the other idea!  LOL!  So anyways, I made three pairs of earrings today...

Turquoise and Copper

Falling Leaves

So, the first pair of the day was the Turquoise and Copper.  I just thought they looked like a lot of fun. And the most recent pair is Falling Leaves. Also, just a lot of fun.

But I also made a pair I'm calling Beautiful Death, and those were my baby today:

Beautiful Death

I'm not sure of the name yet, but I thought I could try it out here for the time being. I bought the skull beads ages ago from a seller on Etsy, and they're actually the first beads I used in anything I sold.  I have a great earring and necklace set that I made for myself, ostensibly for Halloween, but I wear them year round (it's subtle, and until someone really looks, they don't actually know I'm wearing skulls.) My goal with Beautiful Death was to go over-the-top (ish) joining the death icon (the skull) with flowers and soft colors.  There's even a little blue butterfly, if you look closely. I really like the way they turned out.  So much so, I may not sell them (the danger in making things you like....)

Enjoy, and thanks for reading!

R.Wilson

I'm stumped...

So, I've found I enjoy entering beading contests.  I like that someone else chooses the beads and other materials, and I have to figure out what to do with that kit.  I've entered 3 so far, the Use the Muse IV contest back in the spring, and both Art with Heart contests.  Use the Muse and Art with Heart Cycle 1 are both complete, and I had a lot of fun working on those pieces. Here they are:

[gallery columns="2"]

So now I'm working on Art with Heart 2.  And I'm clueless...It's a beautiful kit, but... yeah...  I got nothin'... Here's a link to the project kit. Pretty, yes?  The focal bead is gorgeous, that blue teardrop. So I can't decide if I should do links for a necklace, or if I should do some bead weaving or what.

I'll figure something out.  After all, I have until August 18th to get it all done!

R.Wilson

Inspiration

So for the first time, I have an inspiration other than the beads in my stash. My parents recently bought a 2nd home in North Carolina, and during the purchase process, the original owner sent some pics of the flowers in bloom.  They were all beautiful, but the pics of the azalea with the rhododendron in the background is absolutely gorgeous. Here's the pic:

So, like I said, I finally have inspiration outside of my beads (don't get me wrong, I have some awesome beads, and they've led me to some wonderful ideas), but I so so SO want to make something (maybe a set!) based on the colors in this pic.  I mean, look at it!  The orangy-pink, and the pale blue-purple, with the green?  Gorgeous!! I'm just so taken with this image!  I think I have the beads to do this, but I'm not sure yet how I want to work it.  Links, weaving, stringing, a combo of all of the above? I just don't know.... But I'll figure it out!  I'll post pics when I do!

R.Wilson

New Stuffs...

Happy 4th of July!!

Well, it took a good minute, what with all the, you know, real work and stuff, but I finally got a few new pieces up on my Artfire page.  You can see them here. I'm in the middle of a rather major revision of my artfire page, and I'm aiming to spend the rest of my summer learning some new techniques, posting some new work, and trying to make a real go of my jewelry business.  Which, if I really want this to be my life's primary work, I really need to get to work on!

So, the latest work... well, I have several more pairs of earrings, since earrings are something of a staple for me (I'm looking into making clip-on earrings, too, since I have several family members without pierced ears, so let me know if you'd be interested.) But I also posted a bracelet I'm quite proud of. The stitch is called the African Helix stitch, and I found a  video tutorial for it on YouTube. With this stitch, it's relatively easy to master the basics, (you work with five beads at a time, so there's not too much room for damage) but I'm discovering new and different problems every time I make another piece. For example, this stitch is worked on a wooden dowel or pencil. I thought it would be a good idea to score the pencil with inch marks, so I'd know how long the bracelet was. Great idea, yeah?  Yeah, I thought so, too... until I had to destroy the pencil to get the bracelet base off...  oops!  So far I've made 2 bracelets, and I have an idea for earrings.

[caption id="attachment_19" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="This is the African Helix Stitch bracelet, done in a base of matte black, with transparent lilac accent beads."][/caption]

I've also made an awesome little bracelet for a good friend of mine who's moving back to Arizona next week.  She's had a rough few months, but is getting back on her feet, and she collects bracelets, so I figured it'd be perfect (it was! She loves it!)  My goal was to make her a "Beach Bracelet."  She's lived here in Florida for 5 or 6 years, and doesn't really want to move back to Arizona, but at the moment, there's really no other option. So I wanted her to take a wee piece of Florida with her.   Here it is:

[caption id="attachment_18" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="Deb's Beach Bracelet"][/caption]

I found some wonderful shell beads at Michaels, so that was obviously going to be the focal, since this is a "Beach" bracelet, and Florida definitely has shell-y beaches (unfortunately, we also have other icky stuff on our beaches now, too... boo....) And, of course, any "beach" bracelet must have it's water and sand!  I used a spiral rope stitch (probably my true favorite, and the first I ever learned) that I modified a bit to include a bit more framing around the turquoise beads. This is just such a fun and bright little bracelet!

So that's my new news!  More fun and changes to come!

R.Wilson