Flower Obsession

My obsession with little glass flowers continues...

My Newest Obsession...

... little bitty glass flowers. Every-freaking-where.

What can I say? I guess I'm ready for spring.

Tiny Terrace Collection - Pocket Full of Pansies in Blue

Tiny Terrace Collection - Little Poppy Pendant in Copper and White

Tiny Terrace Collection - Little Poppy Pendant in Silver and White

I am the Vine... - Sterling Silver Necklace

I am the Vine... - Sterling Silver Earrings

Maybe I like them cause I can't kill them.

Oh wait. I guess that's not true. I did kill a few... apparently glass flowers do not like the 1400+ degree heat of a torch. They sort of explode. I don't recommend trying that.

I do recommend wearing them, however, as they are just darling. Dontcha think?

Mixed Metal Mania

I'm addicted, y'all.

Can't.Stop.With.The.Mixed.Metals.

They call out to me, begging me to make them all harmonize. The sterling tells me it can't stand to be alone, and the copper is all, "yo, I need a bright and shiny bud".

Seriously. My jewelry talks to me. Doesn't yours talk to you? No? Well, maybe you just aren't listening! (Or maybe you're just, you know, sane.)

I actually had a little creativity in the past few days. Not much, but a little. Mostly I've been bogged down with adoption stuff or filling orders for my handmade supplies shop for things that have long been designed (not that I'm complaining, mind you). I haven't gotten to actually design something in a few weeks.

I've been wanting to make a triple metal Jens Pind bracelet for a while. My Shaggy Loops bracelet was originally going to be a Jens Pind, but the aspect ratio was off just a touch, and Jens Pind is a very picky little weave. So picky, in fact, that it is apparently one of the hardest weaves to learn. But never fear, jewelry loving friends, for I have mastered it. I guess chain maille becomes me, because I actually found it fairly easy to learn. (Am I allowed to say that I'm dang proud of my mad chain maille skillz, yo? Cause I am. I have now mastered two of the so-called "hardest weaves". Go me! Woooo! I kick massive chain maille booty!)

(You do realize that I don't really say words like "mad skillz" and "yo" and "kick massive booty" and "fart in your general direction", right? It's all an online act. Sorry. It's true. In person I am quite eloquent and have mad speaking skillz, yo.)

(Stop laughing.)

(For real, Dustin. Stop laughing.)

My photo set up is packed away while my office is getting the new flooring, so these photos taken on my kitchen table (with a cool little wooden dish that came from Hawaii!) aren't the best.




Here is what I made today. Six gemstone pendants (from left to right, top row first: black water jasper, blue pearl, lapis lazuli, kiwi jasper, Russian charoite, and a wooden teardrop, all wrapped with sterling silver wire) and some mixed metal earrings. Copper flowers, hammered antiqued brass teardrops, and antiqued brass lotus flowers, all on sterling ear wires.




Oh, and just look at these little earrings! I did not make them. My parents brought them back from Maui (where they are handmade! Woo!) and gifted them to me (along with... *happy sigh*... handmade soap!! Do they love me or what?). These earrings are little sterling plumerias. I think they're just the most darling earrings ever, so I had to share.



What is your jewelry saying you to you these days? ;oP

Yay or nay?

Yes, yes. I know that the proper term is "yae or nay", but I'm wavering between "nay" and "YAY!" with this new pendant I've been working on.

I've found myself strangely obsessed with dandelions lately. Not in my yard, of course, but artsy representations of them. I've seen some cool dandelion jewelry and other art on Etsy (including this super fabulous wall art that I've been arguing with myself over whether or not I.NEED.IT. for the past couple of weeks), and even though I try to not be a bandwagon-jumper, I had to this time. I thought about doing something in metal, but that's already been done. Sooo, I thought I'd try it on some polymer clay.

This is a whimsy representation of a dandelion, so not what you might be expecting. I just can't figure out if I like it or not. I may try it again but with the colors reversed.

Soo what do you think? Is it a yay!? Or is it a nay?

The most perfect shade of purple

That's what I would think every time I made a trip to the big grocery store and saw the irises when I passed by the floral section. I always thought to myself, "I should buy some of those", but never did. It's kinda weird buying flowers for yourself, you see. Despite our recent big ticket spending, I really am quite frugal most of the time and, well, spending money on flowers for myself just seems like a waste.

However, I did enjoy looking at them and never failed to notice them when I passed by. Either my husband did not fail to notice me not failing to notice them, or he is psychic, because Thursday evening he came home with a bouquet of, you guessed, it, those most perfect purple irises.




Now you're probably thinking that purple irises are a strange Valentine's Day gift. Roses, Dustin, ROSES! But my man knows me. He knows I'm not a huge fan of the roses. He also knows that tulips are one of my most favorite flowers ever and those are the flowers I usually receive. But for some reason he decided to be different this week and he was so right on. He also brought along some more little buddies of his. Hello, bloggy friends, meet Mr. Lindt chocolate and Ms. Ferrero Rondnoir.




Flowers? Chocolate? Wait, that sounds like Valentine's Day and we don't really do Valentine's Day! So I was quite unprepared. He really took me by surprise. Thursday was actually the 8th anniversary of when we got engaged. If you don't know the story of how we met and how we became "an item", you can read it here on his blog, where he wrote a sappy sweet entry on Valentine's Day just for me. *swoon*

So he bought me the most perfect shade of purple, delicious dark chocolates, and a cute sweet little card with a nice hand written love note in it. And what did I give him?




Peanut butter cookies, his favorites, and fudge oatmeal cookies, MY favorites. And I keep eating them all. *giggle* I'm such a bad wife.