FSOJ - Week 18 - Oriental Express

The theme this week was Oriental Express. This necklace is large white freshwater pearls and black barrel-shaped cloisonne beads. Simple, but dramatic... I think so, anyway! All comments welcome.

Shy Violet

FSOJ - Week 17 - Leaves

It's a bit late, but better than never. Here's my take on the Leaves theme. The pendant is Thai hilltribe silver, accented by freshwater pearls dyed green and gold. It also has matching earrings, not pictured because the bust/neck seems to not work with French hooks. The holes for the earrings are photoshopped out because I thought it looked silly for there to be holes with no earrings in them! All comments welcome, as usual.

Shy Violet

FSOJ - Week 16 - Spring Maiden

And I'm finally caught up! This is Spring Maiden in the Seasons Collection, sold over Christmas break while visiting family. It is an 18 gauge sterling wire frame coiled with 28 gauge fine silver - accent swirls are 22 gauge sterling with 28 gauge fine silver coiled over it. Beads are pink Peruvian opal, rhodolite garnet rounds, white opal chips, and sterling 2mm rounds. It's pretty substantial, about 2 inches from top to bottom. There's also some criss-crossing fine silver wire on the back to stabilize the Peruvian opals a bit more (they're held in through holes, but they just seemed a bit loose). It's quite stable now, even though it looks very lacy. I'm very pleased with how this turned out.

Shy Violet

FSOJ - Week 15 - Shadow

The theme this week was Art Nouveau. This obviously is not Art Nouveau - It's a pretty simple strung necklace: sardonyx, black onyx, and sterling accent beads. It has matching earrings that are not pictured because the neck/bust doesn't seem to like french wires very well at all.

Shy Violet

FSOJ - Week 14 - Saisons

The theme this week was Hint of Winter - This necklace is actually the original piece in my Seasons Collection, so it's a little bit of every season! Freshwater pearls (potato and rice), garnets (faceted rondelles and diamonds), citrine (buttons and chips), and peridot (chips). It doesn't look quite as lopsided in real life as it does in the picture - the color changes are asymmetrical, but the pearl section doesn't really look so thin in comparison to the peridot section.

Shy Violet

FSOJ - Week 13 - Willow

The theme this time was Second Thoughts - The pendant is an 18 gauge sterling wire frame coiled with 28 gauge fine silver and sterling beads. Then I made the necklace to go with it - african jade and golden jade (both probably really serpentine - those are trade names, but I don't know what they really are, serpentine is a guess). Now I'm not sure if the pendant and the necklace even look okay together at all!

Shy Violet

FSOJ - Week 12 - Regal

The theme was Simple Yet Elegant - This lariat is faceted rhodolite garnets, faceted onyx, faceted sterling silver beads, and a handmade sterling drop accented with two little rhodolite garnet cabs. The closeup shows the faceting much better.

FSOJ - Week 11 - Rio

The theme was Native Spirit - Peruvian ceramic beads (painted round, red and blue tubes), turquoise, onyx, sterling silver wire and accent beads. The ceramic beads are from a local bead store, and although their other prices are decent (not great, but decent), the ceramic bead prices are a steal - I'll definitely be back! All comments welcome, as usual.

FSOJ - Week 10 - Sun Dew

The theme this week was "critters." Well, there are no critters in this, but it is part of the Garden Collection, so maybe there might be some critters in the garden? This one is called Sun Dew, and it's citrine nuggets and buttons, peridot rounds and chips, bali silver, crystal quartz rondelles, and 28 gauge fine silver wire coiled over an 18 guage sterling wire frame.

Shy Violet

FSOJ - Week 9 - Glade

It's late, but here it is. It's called Glade, and it's part of my Moonlight Collection. It's an 18 gauge sterling silver wire frame coiled with 28 gauge fine silver, bali silver beads, faceted and round fancy jasper, and round and oval moss agate.

FSOJ - Week 8 - Moss

I'm back! The semester is over, I can finally breathe/eat/sleep/make jewelry/photograph jewelry/etc.! This has been done for a while and is actually already sold, but here it is anyway.

This is Thai Hilltribe silver, bali silver, sterling silver wire, moss opalite, sea green serpentine, and black onyx.

Shy Violet

FSOJ - Week 7 - Upstream

Once again not on theme. :-) The fish is Thai Hilltribe silver, the rest is liquid silver and lapis. The necklace is exactly how I envisioned it. However....

I actually completed this necklace a while ago (I am in grad school, and with school-craziness, I can't take pictures every week. I make something every week, but it might be a while before you see it.). In the meantime, the necklace has gotten tarnished, mostly the liquid silver bits. How can it be cleaned? I have tried the baking soda / aluminum foil thing, and it did nothing. I used silver cleaner (which you are specifically not supposed to use on lapis, I know, I know... but I had nothing else, and with lapis I didn't know of any other options). The silver cleaner worked GREAT, and showed no immediate ill effects. I put it in a bag and sealed it up, hoping to prevent future tarnishing. Now (less than a month later) the silver is all blue and purple. It doesn't appear corroded, but heavily tarnished and distinctly blue/purple. Any ideas on what to do? The silver cleaner would work again, but I don't want to sell it if I can't tell the person how to clean it (and have it stay clean for at least some length of time).

Thanks in advance. This is one of my favorite necklaces so far and I'd hate to just chalk it up to an impossible design.

Shy Violet

Meeting 41

I attend The Bush School of Government and Public Service at Texas A&M University. We had a special question and answer session with former President George Bush on Sunday. I sat in the second row and although I didn't get to ask a question, I did shake his hand afterwards. How cool is that?!

I believe he is generally in attendance at graduation, too, and he reads the school newsletter that I write for and help edit.

I'm finally going rockclimbing this weekend with some fellow Bushies and my hubby. The wall at the rec center is pretty good, too, so I'm excited about it.

Shy Violet

FSOJ - Week 6 - Forget Me Not

Forget Me Not is made of sterling silver, fine silver, and blue lace agate nuggets. This is one of the bracelets where the clasp worked out pretty well - sometimes they are more difficult than others.

Shy Violet

FSOJ - Week 5 - Off-Theme

The theme this week was Something Old is New. The topic didn't really inspire me this week, so I'm off-theme. However, the piece DOES fit into my Garden Collection. It is called Primrose, and also has matching earrings. It is made of pink Peruvian opal, freshwater pearls, and sterling silver.

Shy Violet

FSOJ - Week 4 - Autumn Colors

Moss I - Moss opalite, onyx, sea green serpentine, Thai Hilltribe butterfly and folded bead, and handmade sterling wire links and clasp. I love the variation of the colors in moss opalite - I got on an earthtone kick while making this bracelet! It's sort of Autumn colors... I like it anyway.

I made a second version of this bracelet, Moss II (oh-so-creatively named!) with a Hilltribe round hammered pillow replacing the butterfly and the order of the stones slightly different. That one sold from my website in just a few days! Yay!

Shy Violet

FSOJ - Week 3 - Eastern Spice

Well, it's not exactly spicy, but this necklace does have a vaguely Asian feel to me. The necklace is Burmese jade, smoky quartz, and sterling silver. The pendant is handmade Thai silver stamped with a vine motif. The clasp, which you can't see, is a sterling tab-style clasp with the Chinese symbol for "joy."

This is a really simple necklace, but I think it's one of my favorite simple necklace designs ever - the colors just really matched my mood when I made it.

On another note, I finally went back and added the pictures for my week 2 entry in the FSOJ blog, so if you're interested, I would love comments on it as well. Thanks!

ShyViolet

FSOJ - Week 2 - Complementary Colors

We finally replaced our stolen digital camera, but hubby and I both had tests and homework that prevented us from taking pictures in time for the due date, so the picture was several days late.

The theme this week was Complementary Colors. The bracelet is a link bracelet with carnelian nuggets (look familiar?) and apple green chrysoprase nuggets. The links and clasp of course are SS wire, and the beads are bali silver. Simple, and also complementary colors (if you use your imagination a little bit!). The bracelet is quite comfortable to wear - I really like making these link bracelets. I've been on a real bracelet kick lately, so you'll probably see a lot more of them.

Shy Violet

Back to Teaching!

Well, I'm teaching at karate in an hour and a half. The club is semi-traditional, at least in style if not in overall mood. I'm teaching practical self-defense, basically the stuff you could really use on the street to defend yourself. I'm a bit nervous, because I always am when I have to get in front of people. But I also know that I am qualified to teach, and I have a lot to say and show them, so that helps.

The piece for Week 2 of FSOJ was due last night, and mine was completed but not photographed. Hopefully I'll be able to actually post it tonight.

Four Seasons of Jewelry - Week 1

This is my first of the Four Seasons of Jewelry project, which is part of the Creative Wire Jewelry Forum. I'm excited about participating this year. My goals are:

- to improve my technique and design (color, overall design, structure, technical details, etc.)
- to learn 3 entirely new techniques, specifically chain mail, double viking knit, and possibly stamping and/or riveting
- to increase my website visibility, professionalism, and effectiveness/profitability
- to participate in at least one decent-sized juried show

Autumn
This is one of the pieces in my Seasons Collection. Obviously, I was very much inspired by Eni Oken (one of my jewelry-making heroes!), but I tried to make her technique my own as well. The nuggets are carnelian, the chips are Mexican fire opal, the accent beads are sterling, and the coiling is done with fine silver over a sterling wire frame. I have to confess, this bracelet has been done for a while - I can't take pictures of any newer stuff because my digital camera went missing in our recent move to Texas from South Carolina (for grad school).

Also, I didn't use Eni's tutorial for this or any of my bracelets so far - I was inspired by her work before she had the tutorial up, and I figured out my own way to do the bracelets. This one is obviously a bit different in structure, being composed of two main frame wires, each doubled. This was actually my solution to a technical difficulty, but it resulted in a really unique bracelet I think. I'm very pleased with the way it turned out.

The theme this week was "Counting My Blessings"- inspiring jewelry artists, the fix for the technical problem in this bracelet resulted in the little curlies that look like I designed it that way

Shy Violet