Four Seasons of Jewelry

Melissa Meman Designs - Carnelian Swirl

This was one of my first attempts at this basket weave bail and I used a piece of scrap wire - I am not happy with the bail - it is pretty messy looking, and the spacing of the tiny faceted carnelian is not great either.  I am happy that I got the loops for the dangling briolettes somewhat proportional - so overall, not a bad piece.  I really love orangey carnelian - very sunny and cheery for a cold February!

Jurassic New Art

It seems that animals were a great favourite of the Art Nouveau period.  Butterflies, snails, dragonflies, peacocks, snakes, etc. were often represented on various pieces of jewellery of that time.

I have chosen to make a crocheted brooch of a silver snail for this week's project.   I had a lovely ammonite waiting in my goodies box for something just like this.  It was found in Madagascar, and it is about 165 million years-old, from the jurassic period.

Ammonites are not expensive because they are fairly common, but they are soooo pretty!  This brooch measures about 2¼ inch long by 1½ inch tall, so I guess that it will take someone not too shy to pin an old fossile on her sweater!

-- Johanne

Art Nouveau - Jan Atherton

Hammered sterling pendant , this pendant was based on a stencilled "cabbage rose design" by Charles Rennie MacIntosh, the original design can be found on the walls of the dining room of MacIntosh's own home, recreated at The Hunterian Art Gallery in Glasgow. Eventaully I want this to go on a neckwire, that will have to wait until next month.

Week 15 - ShyViolet/ShyVioletCC/Cecilia

Not Art Nouveau - This is a pretty simple strung necklace: sardonyx, black onyx, and sterling accent beads. It has matching earrings that are not pictured because the neck/bust doesn't seem to like french wires very well at all.

Week 15 - daisy chain

This charm bracelet is made using oval jump rings and twisted closed rings from Bali as a base. I made up the flowers using rice/oval beads and crystals or fireplolished for the centres and to add a bit of sparkle. The flowers are secured on to the oval jump rings by wrapping the excess wire from making the flower around either side.

I love the look of this bracelet and was thrilled with the way it looked but it has turned out to be a little uncomfortable to wear sadly and tends to catch on everything. Maybe I'll have to elongate it and make it inot a choker instead!

week 15 - weirdlywired

Nothing fancy here - just sterling silver and magnetic Hematite beads.  This was inspired by all of the other Hematite pieces I did around Christmas.  I sold this (and made earrings to match) last weekend while at a bar.  I took a 4' table and set some stuff out while a friends band played.  It was interesting, and I'll probably do it again.  I was hoping for a few more impulse buyers...I did realize how little stuff I have after the holidays.  Gotta get BUSY!
I actually have gotten my diary updated thru week 12... :o)

Thanks for looking!
Have a great day!

Angie S
http://www.allthingsangie.com

Week 15- Art Noveau- Ninde'

I meant to follow the theme for this week but somehow I made this instead.  I started with the gold fill in 24 or 26 ga. and the fresh water pearls.  I thought I would put some sort of art noveau piece on the bottom but I saw this bead and for some reason HAD to put it on this necklace.  It is part of a set and now I don't know what to do with the rest of the set.  I'm sure I find something but it is an indication how strong the pull was to use this bead.  I just loved the golden sparkle of the inclusions in the bead against the pearls and gold fill.  Also I like the idea of the "wild animal" along with the "culture" of the pearls.  Like many of my lampwork focals, it is by Charlie Warner.

I made the chain with pearls for dangles to give the bead more impact  in the necklace.  It was too plain with just the bead.  The necklace is a pinch longer than the photos show.  I had to tuck it up in back to make a better photograph.

Mary Klun

Ninde’ Designs

My site: www.nindedesigns.com

My blog: http://360.yahoo.com/ninde_designs

Week 15 - Remy

This week sees the arrival of my sister's two oldest children from Darwin for a 10 day visit with us. They are the same ages as my two oldest which make it 5 children 13yrs and under.  So a full week of activities this week and next week will be the same.   I spent the entire week just playing with the kids (as well as feeding and cleaning up after them,lol and after a week of late nights to 1-2am, I'm exhausted let me just say) and one activity I've been doing with them quite a bit during quiet moments(quiet?? yeah right), is learning new weaves myself and teaching the kids some weaving firstly with this plastic stuff,.. then teaching them how to make simple macrame bracelets with beads.  I put together the fruits of my plastic weaving labour, hee hee, for you to see.   My macrame bracelets were claimed and are probably still in bed or amongst kid clutter on a bedroom floor.  While I never got a moment spare to get to my workbench and this week's FSOJ entry is not exactly made with wire,.. it soon became clear that learning new weaves was very fun and an eye opening and potentially useful experience.  These weaves might eventually turn up in my jewelry some day.

Remy

Week 15 - Dragon

This isn't exactly on-theme nor does it use much wire, but I just got Christi Friesen's Dragon book and had to try it out.  This is the first time I've really worked with polymer clay, so I was a bit timid about starting what looked to be a rather complicated project.  But Christi's directions are wonderful and so easy to follow. 

I haven't come up with a name for this little guy, but of course, as my first, he just HAD to be purple (my favortie color).  He's accented with touches of green to hint at my peridot birthstone, and then decorated with lots of gorgeous freshwater pearls [you can't see it, but this is where the wire comes in -- it's anchoring the pearls into the clay).  A touch of gold mica powder gives him sparkle too.  He was soooo much fun to make!!!  I haven't decided whether to use him as a pendant or a pin, but either way, he's all mine! <grin>

Comments welcome, as always.

--Tina

Jean Power- Week 15- St Petersburg Lariats

More beading this week- These lariats use delicas in three different colours and are beaded using St Petersburg Chain - two strips of which are joined as you go along.
It takes a lot of experimentation to get colours that work together and I don't normally use pastel shapes so the second of these wasn't in my comfort zone!
Jean Power