Week 48 Oxidized ring

I have showed this on the forum this week. But I decided to show the finished result here too. I used Iza's Ethnic ring tutorial to make it. It's made with all fine silver wire and small Rhodolite Pink Garnet faceted rondelles. Than I oxidized it. I still need to learn more about the sanding and polishing after doing the LOS thing. But it is the first ever ring I made myself I actually like. I'm now waiting on my wire order to make me some more rings :).

Weak 47 Button earrings

I had so much fun making these earrings. And I'm actually happy with the result. I tried button or post earrings before but never really liked the way they turned out. While I was making them I got a lot of ideas on how to use this technique to make more earrings. These are going to stay with me :). Made with fine silver, silver beads, a tiny pearl and even smaller round garnet beads. I would love to oxidize these but I'm afraid the pearls will turn black as happened with my first try oxidizing a piece with pearls.
With big thanks to Magdalena for writing this tutorial.

Weak 46 More earrings

Simple earrings made with the Chalcedone that Robbie sent me.

Weak 45 Matching earrings

I'm catching up. These are a pair of earrings I made to match the bracelet I made for week 43. Not much to tell about them. Just simple earrings with a bit of coiling and faceted smokey quartz.

Week 44: Favorite Colors

I'm still not caught up. It's not that I'm not making any jewelry but I just don't have the time to make scans (and I'm not even talking about trying out my new camera :( ). My friend who owns a jewelry and bead shop where I also give my workshops is on a vacation to China (she is of Chinese origin) for three weeks and I'm looking after the shop all on my own. Haven't worked a full week in a long time so I'm pretty tired after the first week. And I just caught a bad cold. But I love the work. I sold my first necklace and earrings that where displayed in the shop :). And the big benefit is that I'm surrounded by beautiful beads and I can make jewelry when I have no customers.
Oh and I almost forgot to tell about the necklace. It's made with my favorite colors of the moment. Labradorite, Moonstone, Dark Pearls, Iolite, Blue Chalcedone, Quartz and Silver are all strung on a coated metal wire. I hadn't done any stringing in year but I really enjoyed picking out the beads and deciding where they would go on the necklace :).

Week 43: Smoking Bangle

I'm so behind with YOJ. This bracelet is part of the reason why. It took me double or maybe triple the hours this type of bracelet normally takes me. I did the wires around the beads to tight so coiling was so hard. I had to make room for the wire with a needle for almost every coil I did :(. But now it's finished and I like it a lot. It's made with all Smokey Quartz beads and silver beads. I didn't add to many small beads to the design because I really wanted to let the beads shine. If this one doesn't sell I will be happy to put it in my private collection :). Now I have one problem. I keep making this type of bangle to large. I thought I had the right length of beads but for small wrists it's still to large if I add a "normal" clasp. So now I'm trying to figure out how to make the end loops overlap with some kind of clasp so it will fit small wrists. Any suggestions are most welcome! The bangle looks kind of crocked but that is because I had to make a scan of it which is very hard when you make a bangle with memory wire LOL.
Of course I learned how to make this type of bangle from Eni's tutorial.

Week 42 Jims rings

I'm one of the people chosen to proofread the new book by Jim Mc Intosh. I decided to try out one of his designs. Here is the result. One all silver for me and one with an Onyx faceted bead for my daughter (she picked out the design she wanted herself).

Week 41 Hidden Treasure

Here is the piece I created for the 3D contest. We didn't have enough entries to let the contest go through but it did inspire me a lot and make me think beyond my comfort zone. This piece is a small treasure box. It can be displayed both ways up as a decorative item and it can be worn in two ways (to match your wardrobe LOL) as a locket. I figured out how to make a hinge for it so it can actually open. It took me a long time to make and I know have lots of scrap fine silver wire LOL. I picture it keeping a hidden treasure.... a favorite item, a lock of hair from your children, an amulet. Anything you want to keep close to your heart.
It's totally made in fine silver, lots of small silver beads, onyx, rose quarts, labradorite on one side and onyx and garnet ont the other side.. I'm still not sure if I'm going to treat it with LOS.

Week 40: Inspired pendant

This pendant was inspired by many talented jewelry makers. Robbie sent me the Pink Chalcedony for my birthday and her work always inspires me to test my limits. And I have to also mention the following artists: Eni, Iza and Magdalena. All of them make me dream of beautiful jewelry.
I used a lot of techniques that I learned from Magdalena Borjeko's Almond Layered Pendant tutorial.

Week 39 First ever piece treated with LOS

This is the first piece I treated with LOS and I'm not to happy with the result. There is the before picture. And than a pic after I sanded it down. And another one after I tried to buff it up with silver polish. I like what it did with the silver but I hate what it did to the pearls! They are a little better in the last pic but still not good. Maybe some time in a tumbler will help (hopefully after this weekend when it's my birthday I can buy myself one :) )? Has anyone had this happen to freshwater pearls? I think I put to much LOS in the water so maybe that is why this happened to the pearls?

Week 38 First Attempt at netted bezel

This is my first attempt at a netted bezel. And it failed completely. It doesn't show on the scan but net netting is very uneven. I did get better at it after the second row but my wire snapped ! After it snapped it attached a new wire and worked on only to have my wire snap again and this time the patch in the second row also snapped again :(. I have patched it up but it looks horrible. So I'm going to try again. If anybody has any suggestions on how to deal with work hardening on Fine Silver please lot me know. I tried annealing it with a lighter (don't have anything better) but that only seemed to make things worse.

Thanks Eni for a great new tutorial. I'm sure with some more practice I will improve my netting and I love the technique!

Update: I tried it again and this time it worked without breaking the wire. So I replaced the old photo with a new one of the pendant.

Week 37 Purple Necklace

This necklace I made as an example for my Beginners Workshop. The wrapped loop isn't well know here so that is where I decided to start with my Wire Workshops. I used freshwaterpearls, Amethyst and a Fluorite pendant.

Week 36: My first 14 K Gold pieces

My stephmom just turned 50 and this saterday she is giving a big party so I wanted to make something special for her. I know she likes gold so I made my first 14 K Gold earrings. Boy was I nervous when I had to cut that LOL. I kept them simple because I didn't have much wire to work with. So here they are: one pair with faceted Amethyst drops and one pair with faceted Opalite. Hey I might even be on theme with the Opalite once. They do remind me of White Hot and Sparks. Oh and took pictures with my new camera. At night with not much light so that needs improval. Not the best background but I was in a hurry (it was after midnight here).

Week 35 Jade and Carnelian bracelet

Since I have started giving workshops at a local beadstore I have had the oppertunity to work with some great beads. I love the carved Jade beads in this bracelet. I have combined them with lots of Jade and Carnelian. With thanks to Eni for her great coiled bangle tutorial.

Week 34 Onyx earrings

I made these earrings with Eni's netted cap tutorial. Just didn't do the netting LOL. I'm not satisfied with the wires going across. Could be much straighter. But I like the effect so I will try again and hopefully improve :).

Week 33 Smokey Earrings

I've been very busy this week with all the preparations for my first workshop on monday. So I haven't been playing with wire that much. I did manage to make a pair of earrings as a gift for my aunt. Made with Smokey Quarts and Freshwater pearls. Because it's a scan the small beads look kinda silly spreading around.

Week 32 For Robbie

This pendant was made using various techniques but I think the part that makes it special are the leaves I learned from Robbie's "Blooms in Wire" books. I was making the circle and was looking for a special bead to make it more interesting and than I remembered I had a mother of pearl flower. Flowers always remember me of my best friend Robbie. And than it came to me I should make it more interesting with some small leafs. So this is the result. The other beads are onyx and moonstone.

Week 31 Full Persian bracelet

This is my first chain maille project in years. Still had these ring so I figured I'd better use them. Don't mind the ugly clasp. Didn't have anything better.

Week 30 Pink Brooch

My mother has been asking me to make her a brooch. One of her favorite blouses has a stain on it and she wanted something to cover it :). I don't have any experiences with pins or brooches but this is what I came up with. A pink (my mothers favorite color) round brooch losely inspired on an old style of Dutch jewelry called a Zweeuwse Knop (knop means knot). I wanted it to look kinda classical. It is made with lots of wire, Freshwater Pearls, tiny faceted and round Rose Quarts and tiny silver beads. While I was making it it gave me lots more ideas how to use this technique for pendants and other jewelry so I'll be trying out more of it.

Week 29 Iza's pendant

Again not on theme this week. But Micky sent me a copy of Step By Step Wire Jewelry (thanks Micky!) and I really wanted to try Iza's tutorial. It was the hardest thing I ever did. I had to start over twice and it took me lots of hours but I'm really happy with the result. Iza thanks so much for that great tutorial! I'm sure I'm going to use this technique again.

Week 28 Waterfall

I don't know why but I got in my head that this weeks theme was Waterfall. I just found out it was 3 weeks ago LOL. I think it's because I saw the movie "Dragon"fly this week that has a waterfall in it and I thought about the theme and than started wondering how I would make a waterfall. Shows you how my mind works. Very strange why didn't it go with the dragon bit? :). So here's my waterfall. It's made with 30 gauge wire to represent the water. Tiny silver beads and faceted moonstone represent the foam you see at the botom of the fall. It is slightly curved which is hard to see on the scan.

First YOJ entry week 27 Sea Bracelet

Well here it is my first piece for the YOJ project. This is a practise bracelet made
with Eni's Coiled Bangle
tutorial. The wire and silver beads are all fake. But the stones are real. I used shells, moss agate, jade and some more. It took me about 10 hours to make this piece. Initially I wanted to cut it up and do over in real silver wire but my mother saw it and immidiately put it on her arm and I never got it back!