If at first you don’t succeed…

Because of the workshops I’ve been teaching, I’ve been pretty focussed on needle felting lately. I think it’s time to start pondering jewellery for a while.

I created a pendant for the art show that was held at my work, and it wasn’t at all what I wanted it to be – partly due to running out of time, partly due to many of the beads I wanted to use crumbling when I tried to thread them on the wire. This is a sketch of what I was thinking of creating, and then what it turned out to be.

Rough necklace sketch

Rough necklace sketch

What is was

What is was

It is titled “Reef”, and I wanted to have coral beads for the chain part of the necklace. It did end up with coral beads, but not in the way I intended. When it came back from the show, I stripped the beads off of it, and this is what I’m left with.

What it is now

What it is now

I think I will try to go back to a version of the original intent, although I have a few things to figure out – whether to use only coral or to incorporate other beads, multi-strand the whole thing or just portions, make it short or long… the list could go on forever! Or maybe it will be something quite different… who knows!  I’ll keep you posted on the outcome.

I have realized that I have been very lax about documenting jewellery I have made for myself.  Must get on this!

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Roving, roving, everywhere roving…

Today was the first of two Christmas ornament workshops (still room in the second workshop on December 13th – see the Classes page for more details) – it was a lot of fun… a great bunch of students making some pretty fabulous ornaments!

Table decor

Table decor

The snowman likes chocolate...

The snowman likes chocolate…

Last night, after I had put together all the material for the class, I decided to make one last ornament.  Smudge decided she had been ignored and shooed away quite enough, so she decided to “help”.  Sigh…

Smudge "helping"

Smudge “helping”

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A Twisted Tree

‘Tis the season of craft sales… what fun!  I went to two this weekend – they were overwhelming, but I picked up several wee gifties and stocking stuffers.  I did find a little treat for myself as well… odd how that seems to happen!  This is my lovely new ornament/all year around piece of fabulousness… a twisty tree!

Tree of Life

Tree of Life

The artist is Sharen Johnston of Glass Quirks. I had seen her work before and loved it… I’m glad to have a piece of my own!  There is a tree on both sides of the disc, so when the light shines through, there is a real feeling of depth.  She had a selection of colours and sizes, but deep red… one of my favourites…  Yummy!

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Everything’s coming up sparkles!

Everything in my world is sparkly right now… the floor, the counter, me, the cat…  It’s a little bit crazy!  But I’ve had a lot of fun working on the tree.  The clay that I added cracked a bit while it dried, but instead of filling it in with more clay, I went the route of loading the tree up with paint, gloss and sparkles.  Then I sprinkled more sparkles on it.  Sensing a theme?  Some of the cracks still show, but that’s what twisty lighting is for.  Now I guess I need to make more ornaments for it…

Sparkle close-up

Sparkle close-up

Lit and sparkled tree

Lit and sparkled tree

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Air dry clay is fun… so far

One of the things I really like about teaching workshops is the preparation.  Handouts, little bags of supplies, table decor… such fun to put together!

When I found out I would be doing a Christmas ornament workshop, I immediately went to a second-hand store to look for a tree to hang the decorations on. Being that it was July at the time, I was surprised to actually find one.  It was a little sad-looking (and still is!) but I’m trying to make it fit in with what my brain is visualizing.

The tree is wire, and I want it dripping with sparkles. I tried slathering on sparkle paint and sparkle glue, but it wasn’t as textured as I wanted.  What to do, what to do…

Enter air dry clay.  I had worked with it a little bit for one of my costumes (the steam in the teacup), and thought it might be just what I needed.  When in college, working with clay was not something I excelled at.  I think my mom has the few items that weren’t “accidentally” broken… truly they are items only a mother could love!

But this was different… This was building on an existing form.  Unfortunately I didn’t take a picture of it before I started working on it, but here it is in progress:

Tree in progress

Tree in progress

Once it dries, I’ll try painting it with sparkles again… Hopefully it works out!  I will post a finished picture if successful.

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