I'm back with some input.

So I decided to take up Deryn Mentock's summer jewelry making challenge.  Of course she's on Project 6 but I am just moving so slowly.  I've been wasting time on the computer, ordering supplies, reading blogs, bought a dress, visiting friends.  I did start though and because I never make only one of something, I made two!  This challenge is based on doing the projects in the book Wrap, Stitch, Fold & Rivet by Mary Hettmansperger.  

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I picked up this book because I have been a fan of hers for a few years.  I love the different colors of the metals she uses and had been saving pictures off the internet, of things I had seen that she has made.  Then when Deryn made the challenge I couldn't resist.

Here is my version of the first project, the "Spinner Necklace".

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This one has shaped and hammered copper treated with a torch so it becomes really colorful.  A long piece of etched sterling silver, a piece of red brass (it's really yellow but it's called red), a disc of patterned PMC, a small bali spacer and it is strung and wrapped with 18 gauge sterling twist wire.  It hangs on brass ball chain.

Now I know you want to see the other one too!

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This one has a piece of shaped and hammered etched brass as the first layer, then a piece of etched sterling silver, a piece of heat treated copper that was put through a rolling mill with some mesh, a small piece of hammered and heat treated brass, a textured ring of PMC and in the very center a tiny ring of fused 18K gold.  I love all the colors!  

Speaking of patterns,  because I was... the last necklace I photographed on my pattern journal and I wanted to show you some pages because this is where I like to draw patterns that I will later use as inspiration, or if I need to think of something and my mind is blank.  

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and here is a carved clay stamp I made from the last picture:

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and the mug I made with it.  As I am always looking for patterns I keep my trusty camera in my purse all the time.  Here are some of the latest things I caught in my wandering around, actually I was at my friend Leslie's house and it is a treasure trove of inspiration.  LOOK what I found!

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Some violets I saw on her table.  Aren't they glorious?  Then I was all inspired and I made this for my friend Lynn.

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We traded art and she made a beautiful box teapot and sent me some incredible tea as well, not to mention the ribbon that I have never seen before and is gorgeous!  (I am crazy over ribbons and someday I might show you what I have.  I will post a picture of my loot from Lynn later since I have to take a picture first.

We are on the tail end of a whopping heat wave here and I have been hiding inside.  I'm thinking it's going to be pretty nice out tonight and I am planning on going out to dinner with Dori and Vicki, my Artfest buddies.  We are going to do "show and tell" about what we have been doing since April and just have a good old time. 

 

Talk to you later!