life in quarantine

heat wave ...

Lots of completed pieces to share.  I love the porcelain spikes on two of the earring pairs - made by Petra Carpreau of the Etsy shop, Scorched Earth.  They are GORGEOUS!! And look like they were made to go with the bronze clay.

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:

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.

sing your own song

I do like the way that the amulets on a choker-style necklace hang over the throat, protective and yet empowering.  

It has been a struggle for me all my life to learn to speak my truth.  I suspect this is true of many women.  These amulet chokers I have been making are a reminder to sing your own song.

My oldest granddaughter started high school this week after going to a small, arts based charter school since kindergarten.  She was upset Monday night because no one seemed to be responding to her openness and natural friendliness.  In searching for words of grandmotherly advice, I found myself starting to tell her to be friendlier, make eye contact, smile more - and then before the words could leave my mouth, I caught them and swallowed them down and told her that she should just be her smart, funny, uniquely wonderful self and she will eventually find her tribe.  Or they will find her.

february

The picnic table where I usually take my jewelry photos has about a foot of snow on it.  The temperature hasn't gotten above freezing in ages and I've had to resort to using a set up near a north window.  We cope.  It's not ideal, but it'll have to do for now.

Shoulder duster earrings with bone flowers, wooden skull beads and beautiful amber colored horn beads.  I wish I didn't have such a short fat neck and I could wear them myself.

Leather, copper, abalone shell and a bronze Thai Buddhist amulet.  Great casual piece.

Milagros earrings.  Praying for true love.

Another variation on the abalone and leather theme - this time with a fossilized ammonite shell, a fancy copper wire bead and a recycled glass bead that makes me think of a root beer bottle.

And oh - this one. 

 This one I may have to keep.  I love the brown and the green together.  The fossilized ammonite shell with its slight iridescence, the carved horn spike.  Oh yeah. I may need to keep this.

 

in my mind I'm goin' to Carolina ...

It's almost time to pack up the old Volvo wagon and head South for a bit.  The baby is talking, the bigger kids growing ... well, bigger.  FaceTime is wonderful, but little Izzy thinks that Grandma Maggie lives in Mama's phone.  There's no place to set up all my wire and beads, so I'm trying to get everything finished, photographed and listed on Etsy before I go.

Can't wait for the AppleFest and the Dixie Classic Fair.  Apple dumplings!  Pig races!  Autumn in the Blue Ridge Mountains.  Maybe we can get in a visit to the alpaca farm.  Maybe I can start to look for my dream house ...

the evil eye amulet

    

The Evil Eye.  Malocchio.  Incantations against the evil or envious eye have been found in cuneiform writings from ancient Sumeria and probably go further back into prehistory.  Some of the most popular charms or amulets are intended to deflect the evil eye.  In China and India, mirrors are used to reflect any negative energies; using the same magical principle, the image of an eye has the same effect.  This is my first attempt at making an eye amulet from wire, and I already have ideas about how to improve on it.