You can see from the photo that the bulk of these are hearts which were requested by one of the stores. I also made something in copper that’s supposed to resemble calla lilies and there’s another unknown shape in sterling silver at the bottom left. I thought the latter shape was a trisket, but it seems I’m wrong and must have invented that name since I’m not finding it on the internet. Do any of you know what this is called?

The above picture shows earrings that look better on that laying flat. I thought I’d call them “dancing feet”, but I’ve yet to figure out how to explain the pair on the right. I guess those have two left feet!

I often feel that I either have two left hands when I’m working or that I don’t have enough hands to hold everything I need. Some days I wish for a real human who would willingly lend a skilled hand and work in tandem beside me at the bench. Alas, I’d probably talk to the person too much and neither of us would get anything done. I guess I’ll have to stick with my own two hands and do the best I can.

Lately, I’ve seemed to be in need of some of the Division’s spontaneity. At this point in December, I’m feeling a bit spent and my productivity has waned. It’s obvious to me that creativity and productivity are inextricably linked for me. If I’m not producing, I’m not problem solving and therefore am not being creative.

Yesterday, I got a little help with this problem from a friend . . . my mother. When I arrived at the nursing home to visit her, she informed me that it was about time I got there. She had on one earring and was trying to get the other stud on. I couldn’t help but wonder how long she had been at it. We laughed when she was finally “fixed”.

Then I asked her what she wanted for Christmas. Without missing a beat she said, “my TWO FRONT TEETH” and flashed me a big toothless grin. Indeed, her two front teeth are missing and she does need a couple! Again, we laughed and laughed. I think it was her spontaneity as well as her answer that got me. We went shopping together and then grabbed some lunch, but I just kept thinking about her Christmas wish.

This little episode reminded me of last year when we asked her where she was when she and my father got married. Again, without missing a beat, she said, “Out of My MIND!” The woman, who will be 91 in January, is quite clever.

When I got home yesterday, I continued to chuckle and decided to try a bit or jewelry work. That’s when things began to flow nicely and the ideas became present again. Was it just time to design or did the laughter really help. I vote that it was the latter.

I mainly worked with cabochons yesterday, but was pleased with a couple of the new wrappings and the bezel I created.  The first stone is a boulder opal and all the rest are turquoise (yes, even the brown one). See what you think.

I’m hoping to hang on to this productive thinking and continue to get some good work completed. I’m a believer that for me, at least, laughter leads to productivity and creative thinking.

I guess that the moral of this entry is . . . find something to laugh about and if you can’t find anything, go visit my mother!

I’ve had a couple of neat challenges this week from people who saw my work at a local San Marcos, TX gift store, Paper Bear. One person requested some earrings similar to a pendant in my display at the store. These were a challenge, but I enjoyed trying to make her idea come to life.

It’s hard to get a sense of them from the photo, but they are copper ovals that have copper stars soldered to them. I set small denim lapis stones in a premade bezel in the middle of the star. There are small silver balls at the side of each star. The challenge, as always, was trying to get the earrings to match. I hope the person likes these.

Another person asked me to wrap some rocks from her family vacation. I thought that was a really neat gift idea and hope her family members will appreciate her idea. I’m not showing those since I don’t want to spoil any surprises.

I think it is interesting to brainstorm with customers regarding what they want made. Often, they can’t quite put into words what they want, but a wave of the hand and a few drawings often brings their ideas to light. The fun part is seeing the pleasure when their own ideas comes to fruition. I’m sure they will have a story to tell when the gift is presented.

Gifting . . . isn’t it fun?

Frequent and long time readers may recall that fold forming was the new technique I chose to develop last December and January during the winter lull between completion of the Fall products and the development of the Spring designs. Unfortunately, I may have moved too quickly from fold forming last year and back into rapid production for my customers. Also, I “closed” on the technique partly because I couldn’t figure out new things to do with it. I chose not to face the somewhat discouraging struggle that forces one into creative generation. I currently have renewed interest in fold forming due to a couple of happenings. Two of my lucky friends took a recent workshop with Kim St. Jean at the Texas Beadfest and their discussion of the class helped add to my refinement of the technique. Also, I gave a demonstration on the technique at a recent gathering of wire workers. Therefore, I had to practice.

The trick for me with fold forming has been trying to make something besides a leaf that would comfortably work as a piece of jewelry. First, I practiced some different ways to hammer on a few leaves and learned how to better ruffle the edges. Then I created a couple of copper cuff bracelets. I like using a long diagonal fold to start the bracelet design and following this with appropriate texture. I quickly learned that it’s important to begin with a longer and wider piece of metal than the size of the anticipated product. I folded the metal first and then cut the final bracelet shape. When I annealed the metal bracelets with a torch during the fold forming process, beautiful colors appeared on the pieces.

I’ve also been experimenting with a star shape shown in Newton-Brain’s book. First I made several pairs of earrings and then I created a larger star and used it as a pendant on a strand of coral. I gave the pendant a liver of suphur bath, tumbled it and then used the torch on it again. It adopted a very rich color.

Now the struggle is to try to develop some ideas of my own for fold formed shapes. Hopefully, I’ll have the time this year to stick with fold forming until I’ve either developed some new ideas or convinced myself that I CAN’T come up with anything new. Wish me luck.

At other times, it wasn’t so quiet with either Daisy Mae, the Blue Tick Beagle, baying at something outdoors or my grandson working on his high pitched scream. Thankfully, it was a happy scream, albeit shrill.

Then, by ten o’clock Saturday morning, it was suddenly quiet again. Today, things are back to normal with the only loud sounds coming from my hammer on the bench block. I’ve completed a good deal of whacking and am hurrying as I prepare for a show tomorrow evening. Here some new earrings that just hatched. These are made from small squares of copper sheet that I annealed and thin rolled, starting at one corner. I used a hole punch on the bottom and now they remind me of faralitoes. These little lanterns are the focus of one of my favorite children’s books, The Farolitoes of Christmas, by Anaya. You might visualize these as little tin lights wherein a candle can shine through the holes.

I made a similar pair a couple of weeks ago and they left home before I took a picture. That pair didn’t have the holes, but were wrapped in half round sterling wire.

I was hoping to show you the texture on this second pair of earrings, but it’s difficult to see in the photo below. My friend gave me a new little hammer which I happily used to tap dents all over these discs which I then domed.

Today, I finished the cascade of beads and mixed metals shown below. I’ve made this necklace before and have always said I wouldn’t make another one. Alas . . . I gave in. It’s quite time consuming with all hand made chain and jump rings. Then, as you can see, each bead is attached with an individual head pin and wrapped loop. I thought I was finished with this twice, but then kept going back and adding more beads. Today, I’ve promised myself that I WILL NOT add any more beads! It’s going in the traveling display case right now! I hope this blog entry finds you relaxed after a quiet (or noisy) Thanksgiving weekend and that when the real world calls you back Monday morning, you’ll be ready for it.

I hope the season is remaining pleasant for you as it is for me. This year, instead of being cross, I chose to make a cross. One cross led to another and I am beginning to think I should just start a cross store. See what you think. Below are just a very few of those I’ve made.

The plain wire crosses are the easiest to make being composed of two pieces of 14 gauge wire soldered and then wire wrapped in the middle. These are then patinated and textured to provide the look of wood.

The flower-like wire crosses are a little more challenging. I eyeball the shape and occasionally create one that’s not as symmetrical as I would like. Yes, I know that I could use a jig and make them perfect, but that wouldn’t be me. Although you can’t see it very well in this photo the fold formed leaf at the top shares a jump ring with one of this style crosses.

The embellished cross required some problem solving before hatching. I saw a pendant in a magazine that was made by attaching beads to a filigree with wire. I tried this and liked the look except for the back shown below.

This was one big mess! As I pondered how to cover the mess, I, of course, thought about making it into a cross. First I soldered a wire cross onto a sheet metal disc.

Rather than overlapping the wires for the cross, I cut the side pieces and placed them beside the vertical wire. This made the cross a bit flatter. Finally, I wired the decorative filigree to the wire of the cross and finished the piece.

I made a smaller cross, not pictured, by whittling down the filigree piece. This removed the lovely outer curves and I didn’t like it as well.

Finally, I created a scroll type cross using double wires rather than single.

Customers at my last show seemed to enjoy selecting a cross and then choosing either chain or leather to go with it. They also had a choice of selecting a sterling silver cross. I’ve made these in various sizes.

Now it seems that every time I contemplate a new design, I can see the product made as a cross. Yet, I guess this is better than being CROSS! (I think I just heard a loud “Amen” from the other room.)

I’m preparing for a few art/craft shows in the Fall and thought I would get a jump on making some small, inexpensive items that could be stocking stuffers. Last year, I made a healthy number of wire bookmarks. There were wire cats. dogs and rabbits. This year I had visions of other wire animals hanging from the shepherd’s hook bookmarks. I was happily working on these when I happened to glance across and see my husband who was reading. Then it hit me. Someone moved my cheese!

If you are not familiar with this phrase, it is derived from the title of the 1998 book by Kenneth Blanchard  Who Moved My Cheese? (http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=Who+moved+my+cheese) Companies and educational groups bought this book by the dozens and used it to make employees cognizant of the fact that times are changing and we need to be prepared to learn new skills and to problem solve. Many of us who were “encouraged” to read the book felt we could have gotten the idea with a simple memo, but hopefully it made a difference to others. The full-day workshops on the topic were a bit much.

My “cheese” realization” came when I noted that my husband was engrossed in a book on his IPAD II and no longer needed a bookmark. With the onslaught of electronic readers, I had to rethink the number of bookmarks I might need this year. Many of my friends and customers who are readers no longer need bookmarks.

It was fortuitous that I realized I might not need so many bookmarks this year before I made a hoard of them. I garnered my bookmark energy and set out to find something else small that I could offer at the art shows. I’m currently working on a few very small pendants/charms that could go on a chain, bracelet or a BOOKMARK.  (Surely, that cheese didn’t all move away.) Unfortunately, these little things take a bit longer to make, but I’m sure I will get faster as I make more and more.

The charms with a religious theme might work well combined on a bracelet or simply as a single charm attached to a beaded bracelet. Surely something will hatch before long.

In the meantime, I’ll be making just a few new bookmarks and trying to pay close attention to any other cheese that has been moved since last season. Of course, it would certainly be exciting if I had a clue what customers want ahead of time. But where would be the fun in that??? I’ve just got to follow the cheese, but in the meantime it’s important just to realize that it moved.

Tonight I feel lucky that I had that chain since these three pieces needed to be completed and time was ticking away. I’m doing a little art show tomorrow and wanted these to be ready since I wanted to take a few pieces with me that weren’t composed mainly of wire armatures.

The bird’s nest necklace was so easy and fun to make. You just wrap wire round and round a ROUND object and then weave lighter gauge wire in and out of the rounds securing the eggs (beads) with the ends of this wire. I also made a couple of rings like this. Hmm, I wonder what bird would lay this color eggs.

The metal lotus is similar to something I’ve previously created, but I wanted to try a more open look. This one presented a challenge in getting it to solder in a way that wasn’t super messy on the back. Should I tell you that it took two tries?

The third piece probably took the longest to make. It was quite tricky to get the three middle pieces of wire to all ball together in the torch. While you cannot see this very well, I can assure you it doesn’t look very ball-like. Yet, I wasn’t going to do it again! I think the wire weaving took the longest and I really do appreciate those of you who whip out these weaves with the greatest of ease. I’m making myself keep practicing and trying to learn to do this technique without gritting my teeth.

Am I glad that I bought that chain? Yes, today I am because it helped in a crunch. Yet, I realized considerable added cost by making these purchases and that has to go into my pricing. You would think that this should work out about the same as if I had charged for the time it takes to make my own chain. Alas, it’s much easier for me to charge for something I purchased than something I made. I MUST get over that! Is there therapy for pricing anguish?

I’m making a real effort to focus on flora today and stay away from fauna. If you read the entry titled “Black and White” you know I encountered a skunk on a previous walk. Yesterday, it happened AGAIN! I was watching very closely as I went up the last hill and detected movement in the grass. Yep, there was black and white again. Yes, I did run down the hill AGAIN! 

Also, Bruno the dog just brought me the last of a snake that he or some other heeler consumed in the back yard. There was enough skin left to determine it was a coral. So, with raccoon footprints on my front wooden door, a skunk in my walking path and snakes in the back yard, I’m thinking about moving to town! You’d think I live in the boonies, but you can watch the video on the opening page of the website and see that is not the case (www.dreamcatcherranch.net) .

At any rate, all I can control “habitat wise” is the work in the studio and I hereby proclaim that it will be FLORA! (did I mention the ant and mouse traps I just set?) Flora doesn’t sneak up on you. Flora is graceful. I like flora! Yet, it has to have a little metal twist to it.

While I usually work until a piece is completed, this one spread over two days. Late yesterday, thinking I had all the soldering complete, I pulled this piece out of the pickle and a leaf fell off. With hungry fauna (dogs and spouse) waiting, I set this aside and started again this morning. It has now been resoldered, given a patina and run through the tumbler. I think it’s perfectly secure this time. Now I just need to figure out what type strand to hang this pendant from. Alas, the fun part is over. Yet, there’s more flora on the table . . .

I’m wishing you a good weekend free of black and white fauna and full of beautiful flora.

Wondering if that was some sort of sign (probably just bad luck), I chose to try an about face (well almost) on the jewelry designs and momentarily attempt to focus on something other than wire armatures. I’ve made so many lately that I’m beginning to have nightmares about them! I think I could make handmade chains in my sleep.

If it’s not wire, then the designs around here must be metal. I’ve had components of the pieces shown here laying around on the work bench for a couple of weeks, but with this new direction, they had to be used.

You’ll recognize those same old bottle caps. I have a love-hate relationship going on with them right now. This bottle cap is riveted to the back piece of copper that has been run through a ringer provided by a nice friend. It hangs from a leather chord. (yes, the back is supposed to hang slightly ajar)

The second piece is more complicated and I kept telling myself that simple is better as I added more and more components.  The telling didn’t work. I hope I didn’t overdo it. My home constructive critic wasn’t fond of it and had to be told to “pretend you like it” as I queried about the length of the piece.

The copper V was foldformed and hangs from jump rings on a hammered piece of wire. It’s really not crooked, but the picture is. I wire wrapped the hammered wire and made a loop in the center of each wrap for attaching the leather chord. You can see that it is asymmetrical with leather dangles on one side and black and copper beads on the other. This one hangs down pretty long.

Taking a slightly different direction isn’t too painful and is often needed to free the mind for whatever comes next. Sometimes making those wire armatures becomes too comfortable and I have to move out of that zone. Last night I purposely made a very intricate wire wrapped pendant that took about three hours to complete. It required a techniques that I’m not very good at. As I grumbled about it, my critic asked why I was doing it. I replied that I thought it was important to do something uncomfortable part of the time in preparation for whatever comes next.  What do you think?

By the way, if you are wondering about that black and white, my downward hill run was successful and I did not get sprayed. Whew!