Cold Connections and Butterflies!

I love butterflies and I think everyone does, so I thought I would do a bracelet with an assortment of them! cheers!

Pouncing Rain

Pouncing Rain is in Bellingham, Washington and is a Jewelry School and Lab. I went there last weekend for a 3 day course doing things I have not yet done and made this very large broach, suitable for keeping a shawl wrapped around you! The new techniqes were cutting metal out from within a piece of metal with a jeweler's saw, soldering with acetylane torches and the other new thing was soldering a bezel around a stone. I was a great class and intensive. We also made a bracelet, a narrow copper with embilishments soldered on. I really enjoyed it as I could read how to do things forever but seeing and doing makes all the difference. Thanks Judi Gauthier, you are a great teacher!

A Bracelet for the last necklace

One of the beads is the same as those in the last necklace that I made so this could be considered a match! I am not a fan of perfectly matching accessories so one bead the same works for me. The big centre silver bead is a Karen Hill Tribe bead (Thailand) and the others are Ginny Schmidt's handmade lampwork beads. I love the look of the silver jumprings that I have twisted, looks Southwestern to me! Cheers!

I decided today to do this blog!

So I took a bunch of pics, which as you will see I was not happy with, took me a long time to figure out that the black background that I put the jewelry on was the problem...... Oh well!!

I hope that you enjoy these entries. I have only done a fraction of what I have made and for some reason pretty much left out earings! Another post, another day!

I have tried to give information as I go on the sources of my beads and how the metal working is done, if you have any questions just email me!

I hope that I keep this up and do not have to do a whole lot of batches at once ever again!

Thanks for looking, cheers,
Judy

Sterling with Turquoise and Orange!

I have used a Lampwork Focal of Michou Pascale Anderson from Hamberg, Germany

http://michoudesign.blogspot.com/ , she is a designer of extremely exceptional beads and is reknowned for her work.

I also used some turquoise stones and smaller Lampwork Beads of Ginny Schmidt from Texas http://www.ginnovations.com/LampworkBeadSets.html, who is another of my favorite lampwork artist. She does beautiful work!

Sterling Silver and Kazuri Beads

So this photo is one of the best so far, up to now I had been using a black background and that I think was what was making the camera turn the silver white or to lose the colour of the beads, yahoo.... from now on the pics will improve I think!!

Summer Necklace, Sterling and Lampwork Beads

Some Thai Karen Tribe Sterling nautical pieces (they use very pure silver it is greater than the .925 that sterling is) , Lampwork Beads in turquoise and yellow, great with a long white shirt!

Sterling Silver Focal with Kazuri and Lampwork Beads

So in the first pic I am wearing it and the colour is true! the second is my that problem of picking silver detail or colour and not getting either one right!!

Anyway this is a rubber choker, I am still not certain if I am going to leave it on that or make some sterling links to finish it instead.

You can see all the coiling, done with my handy Home Depot drill and custom made mandrels for this purpose. Fun to create, there is no plan just add, twist and quit when it looks done!

Sterling Focal with a Lampwork Starfish

I wish that I could have got a good pic of this one, it is stunning. The starfish is wrapped up with a lot of Swarovski Crystal, a Thai Karen Tribe silver starfish and glass beads, the nautical theme continues on the necklace with a Karen Tribe turtle and Kazuri beads. I wish that the silver did not look just white but I have yet to figure out how to get better shots, I have been outdoors, indoors, macro, no flash and still!!!

Cold Connections, Mixed Metals, my new love!

This was my first one, made in a workshop with Eugenia.
Using metal shears and copper sheet, sterlingwire, brass charms, texturing hammers, found pieces, rivets, tiny screws, it is really a lot of fun to make Cold Connection pieces. I have bought a saw but have not yet used it, but I will be taking a class in metalsmithing using it this coming weekend!

copper and silver rivetted earings

And another one, they are all joined by Sterling Silver jumprings. These jumprings are made by coiling the sterling wire on a mandrel with my electric drill, then cutting them indivually from that coil, workhardening them and Bob's your uncle. Who would have thought I would have had the patience for this!

I have a disc punch now to punch out circles and one of these links has a silver link out of a sterling bracelet that I had bought some time ago in Mexico of silver and red links, it worked out great and I still have many more to do something with..... earings???

I just finished this one. this time I used rivets for the jumprings

All pieces of copper or sterling jewelry are patina'd or antiqued. They are first dipped in Liver of Sulphur which turns them black. then using 0000 steelwool to polish off most of the black but leaving the crevices black! next the piece goes in the tumbler for polishing.

Thai Karen Silver Heart Necklace

Thai beads, 3 strands of leather and wire wrapped on the ends to form a clasp. This is such a versatile piece and just goes on when in doubt about what to wear!

Bracelets!! The thing that got me started!

This is copper and I made it at one of my first workshops with Eugenia Chan and it is a fun bracelet to wear!

This one I just made this month, copper and Lampwork beads. Lampwork beads are handmade by artists using a flame and a mandrel, the beads are works of art in themselves and buying them is addictive!!

OK, now I am in Sterling, love it!! This is a lot of twisting and wrapping and again is made with Lampwork Beads from one of my favorite artists, http://www.pendragonfyre.com/home.html in New Brunswick, Darlene, and her blog is here http://pendragonfyretales.blogspot.com/ Sterling is seriously expensive right now and is going up!! Darn!! Lampwork Beads are also expensive as they are made one at a time by an artist.

I made this a while back, it is a LOT of beads made into charms on an antiqued copper chain, heavy but does get attention!

Lampwork beads and silver, very pretty in coral red and turquoise with floating silver rings!

another of my faves, polka dotted Lampwork beads and silver, I love hearts!

Sterling silver, Thai Karen Tribe Silver larg bead, smaller beads and Dragonfly clasp, love that clasp and the silver from Thailand. This is actually a pretty pink but I had to darken that colour in order to get rid of the white of the silver and give the silver some detail! Lampwork Beads again!

Discovered Kazuri Beads!

This piece is copper with a lampwork focal bead and Kazuri beads. The colours are sage green, hard to tell that I know!

Kazuri Beads are a great story of giving women in Nairobi independance through fair income, read about it at http://www.kazuri.com/


Copper again, another lampwork focal and again Kazuri, in purples, really pretty and a long piece that is rather dramatic!

Using up some of that silver plate I twisted it and coiled it and made this bracelet, Kazuri turquoise beads and a Tibet bead in red

Finally used up the silverplate, that is so hard to work with, it is so unwilling to bend!! But these are beautiful Kazuri beads in Black and Black and Silver in this piece and it is really pretty on, I wear this a lot! There is a matching bracelet and earings but I did not take their pic for whatever reason!!

Some of my first pieces from spring

This is made from copper and some Green Turquoise, some lampwork beads as well. It is a focal piece that looks great with jeans!

This was my first focal, made at a workshop with a wire master, I have taken a lot of instruction from her and am fortunate that she lives in the lower mainland, her name is Eugenia Chan

This is silverplate not sterling, I made all the links that have gone into this one at a Links workshop with Eugenia. I put together the necklace after I came home with a large bag of links! I am definitely in love with turquoise and keep choosing gems and lampwork beads in that colour! There is a pearl in this necklace and a large crystal but I think my camera makes them hard to make out! As sterling is very pricey and at another all time high, I chose silverplate to learn with, it does not need polishing if that is an advantage but the disadvantage is it does not bend and twist easily and requires a lot of hand strength to work with!

This is again a copper and lampwork piece, the focal is very green and turquoise but looks near white and pale in the photo, darn!!