Week 8-Peruvian Pendant

This week's theme was godesses, specifically Freya, who is a Norse godess. This pendant is more suitable for an Incan godess though. It consists of a large citrine colored hydro quartz brio wrapped in a sterling silver Peruvian inspired frame. The dangling beads are iolite. I'm not feeling the color combination though. Maybe it's because I graduated from Michigan State and these are U of M colors. LOL Maybe I would like it better with amethyst. Or maybe I should oxidize it. Opinions?

I'm Loving Coral This Week

I never wear red and it's never been one of my favorite colors. But a couple of folks on the forums I belong to were destashing some red coral beads and they all of a sudden appealed to me. So I played with these beads all last weekend. With the exception of the first pair of earrings, these are all done with copper wire. I would love to pair some with silver in a necklace but I find myself being stingy with my silver wire lately. I'll have to get over that-it's not going down.

Week 7-Eni Oken Style Bracelet with Pearls

The last week has been so busy I haven’t been able to get any new pieces made. Between metalsmithing class, Euchre club, a retiree's dinner, going to Ann Arbor to see my favorite band, and the death of my best friend's mom, I couldn't get much done. One thing I did do was sort through old work and inventory. Some things got recycled for scrap, some taken apart for the components, and a few things got donated to a charity. This bracelet is a rework. I made the centerpiece of this bracelet years ago early in my wire adventures from a tutorial by Eni Oken. I orginally made the bracelet with some purple jasper beads. But I never liked the way it laid so about a year ago I took it apart and replaced them with these large pearls. Then I didn’t like the closure on it plus it was too big. So this time I made a new hook and eye closure for it. It’s a pretty huge bracelet, measuring about 2 1/8″ wide so it needs to be a little snug to keep it from flopping around. I probably could have made a fancier closure but I just wanted to be able to finally wear it after all these years. So what do you all do with your older inventory?

Week 6-Amethyst Stalactite Necklace

Here's the stalactite that I got stuck on last week. The stalactite is set in a Margo Farrin O'connor style. I had started this at metalsmithing class trying to solder all of the wires together. But I wasn't happy with my solder joints so I ended up wiring them together with half round wire. Quicker, easier and just as strong. The necklace is somewhat inspired by Emily Gray. I used amethyst and labradorite rondelles above the stalactite, and the larger rondelles holding the chain are paraiba quartz. I ended up cutting off a couple of the rice pearls after I took the pics. I'm not sure about the pearl drops on this. It's one of those things I have to look at for a while before I decide if I like it that way. The pearl drops are actually a natural lavender color although they look a little peachy in some of the pictures.

Week 5-Solar Quartz and Copper Necklace

This isn't the project that I was working on for this week. I had prong set a beautiful stalactite slice and had a vague vision of what I wanted to hang it from. So I got out the copper wire to play around and instead found myself channelling Gosia Domanska and Mary Tucker and bending little leaves in the wire. It wasn't what I had in mind for my stalactite slice so I added some green tourmaline and vessuvianite beads, and hung a cool solar quartz pear briolette from it. I'm not sure about the addition of the keishi pearls but I felt like it needed something to echo the white.

Week 4-Ayudhia Bangle

The tutorial for this bracelet is by Achmad Irfan, Borneo Pahlevi on Jewelrylessons.com. I bought this tutorial because I thought it was one of the most beautiful bracelets I'd ever seen. My plan was to make it in silver with a silver druzy center. But since there is almost an ounce of metal in this, I thought I'd better try it out in copper first and I'm so glad I did. First because my weaving needed some practice. It got better as I went along and you can tell by comparing the two sides. Secondly, the tutorial as written turned out too big for me so now I'll know to shorten it when I make it again. This one probably took me at least ten hours to make but, hopefully, it will go quicker the next time.

Assorted Earrings

I've been busy this week trying to get stuff listed in my Artfire shop and also trying to come up with some new earrings in the under $30.00 price range. The first pair are little ribbons of copper sheet that I textured, drilled and folded before adding a dangling pyrite briolette. I was happy with how they turned out.

The second pair are gorgeous seafoam green hydro quartz briolettes that I coiled and wrapped in fine silver.

Last are some impression jasper beads that I've had for ages in a simple wrap of fine silver with balled ends.