What was I thinking?

Well gee, I'm not sure.

As per usual my thoughts were most likely going in a hundred different directions. full of a mix of wildly sporadic and strange thoughts.

All zipping along at an alarming speed.

Probably something like this..............

Friday Favorites!

I am borrowing today's FF from a friend - Melissa of Melissa Meman Designs, but in a more general way.

My fave for today is 'blogs'

Blogging and blogpals and blognews and blog memes and blog themes and blog schemes.....oh, wait, sorry - got carried away.


But seriously. I love blogs.

I enjoy blogging to some degree, but moreover I just enjoy blogs in general. Love reading them, following them, linking to them, commenting on them. My only problem is there aren't enough hours in the day! I can't get to them all.


I think blogs are a great way to stay connected, a great way to meet people, to speak out, to share, to see, and be seen.

I have probably have about 40 blogs in my 'reader'. I don't actually visit them each day, but I skim every post in my reader, every day. I often click through though and comment - on a handful, and not the same ones each day. Just when I am particularly inspired or moved or feel I have something to add......... or when something surprises me or in some way catches my fancy, or just 'when'. A blog the other day asked about people's favorite colors - I'm a people, so I commented! :-) (seems a lot of people like red and purple)


As with sappy commercials, I can be moved to tears by a blog. Someone, you know who you are, has been intermittently writing about her experience with adoption. Been moved to tears more than once there.

I laugh out loud at blogs - Lisa of "It's a lovely life" often causes me to LOL. (thank you!)

There are blogs that make me hungry, (yum, and ohh yum)
blogs that inspire me,
or make me think,
or just entertain me
or some that do a lot of the above

and some that blow me out of the water - in more ways than one - check his employee award in the sidebar - Hans is one of a kind, truly. :)

there are blogs that I read faithfully that I've never commented on. Sometimes because they are written in another language (OK, it has subtitles, but I'm not sure it always did) and sometimes just "because".

So now you know.

I'm a blog-aholic.

And I don't want help. I am hopelessly addicted and really happy for my enablers - ya know, feeds, readers, "following". Its made it relatively easy to hide my addiction and carry on without anyone performing an intervention. And many of you are co-dependents. You visit here, you comment, you link to blogs in your blogs and on your websites. Its all a sick sick web we're weaving........but I'm planning on living in denial. How 'bout you?


:0

OK, enough about that. I mentioned rings the other day and someone asked for pics......

Recent rings...

"Crater" - sterling and swiss topaz.














"Sprouts" Sterling














and then this friggin' thing which I can't seem to get polished right and if I keep going over it with wheels and buffs and steel wool I'll have no gold left on it...















The part inbetween the gold balls looks bad - its got like umm, drag marks kind of, ya know? I LOS'd it to cover but then can't get the LOS off 'right'....what to do? Suggestions? My last resort may be to LOS it dark and then scratch finish it so it looks like graphite...the gold would still pop and I'd not have to worry about scratches or too much LOS or LOS in the wrong spots, etc.

Thoughts?

~Janice
Keep comin' back, it works if you work it! ;-)

Follow up - photos

As promised. :)

Anticlastic Cuff - Sterling

I'm having trouble with the sizing on this. Its hard to get on, and then it doesn't stay on - at least not when I shake my arm around like I'm in a blender. Maybe thats being too rough on it? It slowly turns and then could potentially come off....

I was trying to retake a few pictures so they show a bit better, this is the only one I uploaded last night.

This is the ring I made a couple weeks back - a pale jade stone in sterling. Size 6 3/4

and then a new ring - a little turquoise beauty.

Size 6 3/4 and will go on Etsy later today.

Going back to my 3 Rs - here is another redo:

BEFORE:

and after:

I miss the punch of orange, but it never would have seen the light of day with that nasty looking bezel, so I cut it off and folded the side down, so I could keep the 14k gold.

It doesn't have the same "pop" that the before had but its definitely presentable now.

I don't know what's going on with the photos either. I must have altered the lighting or something. I am now back to editing more and the background isn't the same green that I had when I first began using it. So I need to fiddle with that and take really good notes so I can reproduce consistent pictures.

Thanks for all the messages re: our little doggy and other things - I appreciate you all - but especially when you take the time out of your busy schedules to drop me a comment or email. ((hugs))

Janice

Progress....

Here are a few of the rings from the other day....I'm getting there!

yay!:)

Productive Weekend

For me, metalsmithing comes in waves. I don't always have the time I'd like to sit at the bench for a couple of hours to work on jewelry. And sometimes when I DO have the time, I'm beat! Since I work FT outside the home, and I have a son (age 7) at home, my evenings are a whirlwind.

BUT, I had the best Valentine's 'gift' - the house to myself on Saturday night - from about 6:30pm on....YAY! My son went to a sleep-over birthday party (his first ever sleep-over!) And I got to finish these, two of which are listed on etsy:








I actually had started the smoky quartz ring sometime last week, but didn't finish it until Saturday night. Then whipped out the other two pretty quick. Its unbelievable how having an totally empty house can really boost productivity! If only the rest of the weekend had been that quiet. :)

Saturday morning my son had a basketball game at 8 am. So we were up and out early. Then shopping for the b-day present on the way home. Then house cleaning and some laundry and then packing for the big sleep-over. Then off to the sleep-over, but not before I accidentally tripped the security alarm! So when I got home, the police were waiting for me. But then, after that, I had the house to myself!

Sunday morning I skipped church, something I so rarely do, to pick Sam up from the party. After that we went straight to the grocery, came home, put away groceries, cooked brunch....finished some laundry and hung out with Sam. Took photos of jewelry, made dinner, visited with my daughter and her friend who stopped by, then gave them a ride home - got home about 9pm and uploaded the pictures. Cropped, edited, posted online. And finally went to bed around 11:45 I think. Somehow the weekend seemed busier than that. All I know is it was over before I knew it!!!

Hope you all had a great weekend!

OK, here is a late addition picture - to give you an idea about the size difference:


The chrysanthemum stone ring is really big! The setting itself measures 1.5 inches at the long angle. :)

a few shots and the new ring

I am playing with my new tripod -- ohhhhhhhhh, did I mention I received a little teeny tiny tripod for Christmas!?? It is REALLY small - JUST what I wanted to use desktop for shooting jewelry. I am hoping it alleviates any tiny handshake I may get pressing the trigger or just holding it in my hand while I use the timer.

ok, here is the ring that I mentioned earlier, that sort of matches the bangle....similar, but not the same - it still needs a bit of clean up - but I wanted to show it since I said I would!

And with it on. I wore it today. I have no pride....I don't care if its dirty! I just can't wait to 'test drive' new pieces!! This is a bit big, but I managed to keep it on my middle finger today. I either need to resize it or try to sell it to someone with large hands. :) Or just keep it....

Here's another photo of a few recent pieces and one OLD ring - one that I wear just about every day - my little twist ring, all the way on the left.

Ring Roll

Been on a ring roll - I think I can blame it on the 1,000 Rings book.

If you don't have it - GET IT!


Info on the rings is as follows:


Turquoise and Sterling. All hand fabricated, well I didn't draw the wire. :) This is 4 ga halfround low dome wire with a built up bezel base, fine silver bezel, hand textured base and FS granules. Size- big.





Then there is the charoite and moonstone in sterling. Pretty simple setting, again with the LD HR wire for the shank. FS bezels and sterling wire embellisment.




I have another ring about 75% complete. Its sterling with a split shank and will be filled with resin inlay. :)