Happy New Year! 2008 is looking to be a fantastic year. I'm excited to be working more, and get ahead with my production pieces. I may or may not be going for my master's this year, but whichever way the road takes me, it will be the right direction.

Since I am not really one for partying on New Year's, tonight is being spent at home with my love. Dave is sick, so I made a wonderful chicken noodle soup, and now we are celebrating with champagne :)

Tonight was one of those nights where I started dropping everything, got tired of yelling "Damnit!" every five minutes, and decided to stop metalsmithing for the night and just play online (I have learned when it's best to stop while you're ahead rather than ruining a piece). So, off to Etsy I went where I have been perusing the favorites of my favorites. Through Megan Auman, I re-discovered Arthur Hash. I had seen his work before, every time I would go to the bathroom at OCAC, it was there on the wall:


But somehow, it is different to re-discover him in this "realm" of the www's. I love his work, and his conceptualization of creating art that is affordable. I love the use of alternative materials and marvel at the graphics and ideas he comes up with. Brooches from shoes, graphic brooches, funky plastic bag bracelets, etc. It sounds redundant, but I LOVE IT. Here are some links:

Arthur Hash Website
Arthur Hash Etsy
The Art Escape Plan (blog)

Here are some favorites of mine:


Plastic Ring


Coffee Stain Brooch

10


Cinder Block Brooch

Tea Drop Necklace (polyurethane and loose tea)

Working in the high-end jewelry retail business, it's hard not to get swept away by the beauty of things I simply cannot afford. The other day, I decided to re-make my "family" ring--a wide silver band with peridot, yellow sapphire, and white sapphire in white gold bezels--into three small stacking rings, because I want something a little more fun and feminine. So, I hopped online and started looking around for inspiration and techniques, and came across L. Frank on Twist's website. Her own website doesn't show much of her work, but has more information. Below are some pieces I fell in love with, and I actually went down to the store yesterday to try them on--they are GORGEOUS!




The ring above is the one I tried on at the store. It's gorgeous, but I think a tri-stack ring is much more suited to my taste. I love how these rings are connected at the back, but still move freely with each other.


I'm a sucker for odd-shaped diamonds (as well as variations in color) and these pear shapes, with the rose cut, are gorgeous! My heart just swoons at these pieces.

I was just flipping through Indesign magazine (we get it at work), and came across a great quote by jeweler Scott Kay:

"Don't try to sell the whole world. Don't keep jumping all over the place. Find something that is your vibe, your language, so that other people can see what inspires you and what drives you. I guarantee you, people will relate to that."

I love this quote because in the past, I have battled with trying to make pieces that "will sell" or that are "trendy" and I end up hating them because they're not "me". My style is bold and strong, with some femininity. It is evolving as well, as I incorporate more texture and explore different techniques. I love my style and must embrace all aspects of it in order to make a great selling point to customers and galleries alike.

I had a wonderful, wonderful Christmas this year. After the initial stress of the morning, that is. First, I got my Christmas Wish of SNOW!!! Yay! It started snowing in Portland (unfortunately I didn't get pictures), decreased to rain as we drove through the gorge, and back to snow as we arrived in Hood River and Lyle! It was wonderful. We had a very busy day of driving but spent good quality time with family.


I got some very wonderful gifts, and a few indie ones as well. Being me, I totally forgot about the drama with the earrings from gemmafactrix that I ordered, and thus was very surprised with them as a present (my mom was a dear and wrapped them).


Dave and I also received these beautiful ornaments from my mom who ordered them from Made in Washington (she saw my handmade pledge), from Glass Eye Studio (click the photo for a link). We each got one of the #1 ornaments. They're beautiful and I think we'll hang them regardless of the season...just have to figure out where so the cats don't decide they look like nice toys :)

Dave's sister also gave me a huge 4x4' peg board which I'm dying to put up in the office. And now, our house is COMPLETELY messy, but we had a wonderful holiday and that's what counts.

Below is a picture of us...left to right, my niece Jaylene, sister Daneille, me, Cassie the mohawk dog, and Dave.

Christmas is almost here, and I have to say, I am amazed at how much it just does NOT feel like Christmas. Not only is the weather absurdly mild and wet, but hardly a soul has said "Happy Holidays" or "Merry Christmas" this year! Something just feels "off". Like it's not as festive, people aren't as kind, and it's not as much a celebration anymore, which makes me sad. I, myself, have become swamped with work, family obligations, taking care of loved ones, and creating work, which in turn has rendered my memory to that of a goldfish.

Above are some ornaments I have created as gifts this season, which I am really excited about. I used wire designs and my lovely hydraulic press to emboss copper discs, and Dave helped me yesterday and today with the spray painting. They're lovely!

Now, it's 4 more days....I hope you all have wonderful holidays, and I will post more soon. Oh yes, and my earrings that were lost in the mail are now recovered :)

So, after wondering for a couple of weeks where my beautiful earrings from gemmafactrix had gotten to in their shipping, I decided to check the email receipt and realised that although I had previously changed my address to my current one on Pay Pal, they had the wrong address as the shipping address, and therefore my new earrings are now someone else's possession. I will find some way to sort it out. Apparently they were "delivered" yesterday. I was looking so forward to having these! Without sounding like too much of a downer, this just adds to the insane amount of things that have gone wrong this winter. All my exuberance for Christmas has been completely diminished.

Every night for the past week, I have gone to sleep past midnight, and it is finally catching up with me. I'm exhausted and very forgetful, which makes things interesting. The good news is that I finished the necklace (see previous post), and now all I have to do is give it another tumble, and it'll be done. I was going to blacken the links to show off the little gold links, but I kind of like it silver with gold, for now at least. I'll post more pics of that soon.

Anyway, yesterday I bought a doll house for $40. It's the Whitney by Radmark, and I think it's from the 60's or 70's. It's a DIY kit, which is fun. I think tonight will be spent relaxing and putting this guy together, or at least trying to :) More stories about dollhouses later!

What was once a tree, is now ......leaves! I'm loving this piece. I love how chunky and weighty it is. The leaves are about 16g thick. Tomorrow comes the tumbling, gold, and blackening. Yay! Check out the posts below for how these guys began.

So I woke up this morning, and started the daily ritual of checking email and bloglines before heading out to run errands. To my surprise, I found myself featured on Roadside Scholar! Gigi, of Roadside Scholar, has a beautiful site, comprised of daily finds ranging from the personal, to the art world, and beyond! Her photography is beautiful, as well as her impeccable writing. Here are a few of my favorite items I've found on her blog:

Paula McCullough art


handmade benedict bear from Adelaide's Little Red Pear

Runnerbean paper creations

Art by John Zoller

Every day, Gigi features something new and fun on her site, and I am always surprised and pleased.

My baby love, Sammy, is sick today. Or so we think. The photo above was taken a while ago, but he's been sleeping pretty heavily today. His ears are cold, nose is dry, eyes dilated, and he's a little wobbly. We almost took him to the vet earlier, but he started to improve, so we're holding off. Anyone that knows me well knows that my cats are my children. I love them as such, and feel that connected with them, so I get fairly stressed out when they seem to be ill.

Consequently, today hasn't been quite as productive as I had hoped, since I've been taking frequent breaks to check on Sammy. Hopefully there will be no visit to the emergency room today!

Just a quick post, since I've been busy and have a lot of sawing and sanding to do. In my casting class, we were given the assignment to create multiples, using a mold. Fun! My first two molds didn't work, but my third one works like a charm! I created a very simple shape from 16g wire and built two trees. The first one (above) didn't cast all the way, which was a little discouraging and we almost didn't cast the second flask. But we did, and look at how beautiful they are! I'm actually not all that disappointed by the half-formed ones, as I think they provide a sort of "step by step" towards forming the whole shape. Now I must go finish sawing and sanding the sprues off...or at least tackle a lot more before tomorrow!

Got off to a bit of a late start from blogging when I got home from work :)

I don't know how I missed this....I've been tagged by Margaux Lange at Midge's Mind to share 5 weird things about myself. Okay, here goes....

1. My kitties are a. like my children and b. have very obvious names (Sammy - siamese, Amber - coloring)

2. I have Synesthesia, and see letters and numbers in colors (in my mind).

3. If I can't make jewelry or bang on metal for a long time, I start to go a little crazy (and get sad).

4. I lived in Australia for almost 4 years (and would go back at the drop of a hat).

5. One of my childhood dreams has always been to have a horses and live off the land.

I tag:

Juliet from The Broken Plate
Liz Mathews
Abigail Percy
Ceeb Wassermann
Simone Walsh

the rules:
1. Link to your tagger and post these rules on your blog.
2. Share 5 facts about yourself on your blog, some random, some weird.
3. Tag 5 people at the end of your post by leaving their names as well as links to their blogs.
4. Let them know they are tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.