'The little space within the heart is as great as the vast universe. The heavens and the earth are there, and the sun and the moon and the stars. Fire and lightning and winds are there, and all that now is and all that is not.' -The Upanishads.

Monday, June 27, 2016

follow up





A few of the pieces didn't work out. They crumbled to a brown dust. I was very disappointed, to say the least. The rest were also rough and brown, but when I tried polishing them, the results were much closer to what I had hoped for. Not sure what I did wrong, but I ordered a couple of different types of bronze clay and I'll try them out and see what gives the best results. I'm reminding myself that I've had the same disappointments with pottery and fabric dyes, so I just have to learn from it and move forward. Sometimes I can be such a grown-up!

A few new Etsy listings:




Sunday, June 19, 2016

summer solstice

I am the Queen of Procrastination.  Two - ok, maybe more like three - years ago, I decided that I needed to expand my repertoire and branch out into making my own components.   I thought about lampworking, but I am not a big fan of open flames.  This is also why soldering seemed like a poor choice for me.  I ordered a packet of silver clay and a creme brulee torch, but the expense involved was daunting, as was trying to find a place in my small house to do torch work of any kind.  The silver felt too precious to allow me to make mistakes with it.  I need to make LOTS of mistakes.  It's how I grow and how my work grows too.

Sooooo, I decided to go for broke and ordered this baby:

opening the box
 
A Paragon metal clay kiln, metal clay in copper, bronze, and - - - something else I can't quite remember right now.  The clay is not exactly cheap, but not so precious that I wasn't able to get into fooling around with it and making enough thingies for a firing.  I will post some photos when they are done.  I am sooo excited!




And here are some pieces I haven't blogged before:




A Tibetan turquoise earring, deer antler tip, copper spiral, red jasper for strength and courage, vintage inlaid bone beads from a Buddhist prayer mala.




Lucky Ancestor flower earrings.  Horseshoes, skulls, blue evil eyes - and hearts.




This piece features three large, hand faceted rutilated quartz beads, a raku scarab, mother-of-pearl bar, glass beads from Indonesia and the Czech Republic. A couple of really old African trade beads framing the scarab and some smokey quartz too, I believe. I haven't listed this one on Etsy yet - can't seem to figure out what to say about it.




And another large ceremonial piece because people kept asking if I was ever going to make another one and I just happened to have bought two of the (alleged) Song Dynasty bronze coins and had one just hanging around.



Saturday, February 13, 2016

i can't for the life of me think of a title


Only a couple of weeks into the new year, we lost one of our sweet dogs, Tonka, to cancer.  He was my shadow, my nap buddy and a constant ( and sometimes annoying ) presence next to my worktable. When I sit down to try to start a new piece, I can almost feel his big chocolate eyes watching me.  For now at least, it's been impossible to be very creative.  At least one of the blessings of have lived as long as I have is that I know that all things have their cycles.  Spring will come.