organic

Big Daddy

The last few times at the torch I’ve been trying to work small, as you can see the smallest hollow bead is approx. 11x16mm. As customers keep asking if they could get smaller hollows, I thought it couldn’t be too hard to make them smaller…Yesterday, I couldn’t take it anymore and my hands decided to try and make the biggest hollow yet- it measures in at 37x49mm, which is nearly 2 inches across. And this made me think what else I could make bigger- smaller sculptural focals, perhaps? Who knows, the big daddy took me more than 30 minutes on my Minor torch and it was a decidely delicate dance keeping it warm enough. It’s always nice to feel my creativity start to percolate and see new possibilities.

Extreme Busy-ness

I’ve been absent due to extreme busy-ness, lol. I have around 70 hollows for the show in November and think I need to triple that amount. If they don’t sell, I’ll have plenty of stuff to put up in my Etsy shop. Speaking of Etsy, I just listed the trio set and finished a special order for a customer.

What I’m most excited about is my large hollow focal that I cored. The colors don’t show nearly as well here as they do in person. I’ve realized that I’m horrible at photographing jewelry, lol. The pendant is 1-1/8″ x 1-1/4″ or 28.5x32mm. The bead caps are Bronzclay and for me, the rustic/organic look is really jivin’ with me, but I’m not sure if my (potential) customers would feel the same.

Slip Painting Experiments

Tried to slip paint w/ Copprclay for the first time today, I think I still need to work on getting the consistency just right..The leaf had three layers and the rest around half a dozen layers of slip- thank goodness I have a handy-dandy mug warmer to dry my pieces lickety-split.

My hand developed a bad habit of shaking at inopportune moments while trying to do close work on my fern, hence the slightly odd placement on some fronds. Is frond the right word? anyhoo, it was fun and I still need to settle on a design for my BIG hollow forms.