2010

Happy New Year's!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I hope everyone has a better year!

MERRY MERRY

MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL MY LOVELY FRIENDS!!!

HAVE A GREAT ONE TODAY!

Holiday Stardust

I am in the middle of making a slew of Christmas presents! I have a bunch left. My mom just added 32 more to my list of "to do". However, I got this one for my aunt done today. I love it! I want one for myself! I even bought beads to make one for me! Isn't that BAD!? I am going to make a free tut for this one.

Metallic H20 tutorial ready for sale!

I've uploaded the Metallic H20 tutorial. It is now available for sale at http://www.jewelrylessons.com/tutorial/metallic-h20-cwire-cuff
You can also find it on my Etssy store. http://jamilola. etsy.com

Meetallic H20 Series tutorial in the works

I love making cuffs. I had several requests to make a tutorial for my metallic H20 series. Here is the piece I just finished in order to do the step by step tutorial!

I will post the link when uploaded and ready for sale.

A Christmas Sister & a new free tut

Saturday I spent time away from my all day writing frenzy on Black Friday (10,000 words challenge - write them all in one day!). So Saturday I needed a serious break! I made a variation of my Dainty Sister Pendant tutorial- Christmas Sister.


Later in I was checking out youtube and found this wonderful tut for a mandala! So I have posted it here for all to enjoy!!!

Industrial Chic

This is my second attempt at the Riding the Waves cuff tut. I made several construction modifications for ease and speed.

Copper Waves- Thanks Linda Rosa for the tut

I just finished this piece this morning around 2:30 AM. I need to make a clasp because I have a big fat wrist and the cuff barely comes past my wrist bones. I love the design. I already have ideas for alterations.
You can find the tutorial from Linda Rosa here.

Free tutorials

I am an internet junky! I will search and search for anything that I am really interested in learning. A lot of people out there would like to learn how to make various types of jewelry. However, in these hard economic times (and in my personal case when I know I can find it on line for free- I know it sounds cheap, but it's actually practical. Why pay $8-$25 dollars for a common technique when a little bit of internet time will suffice?). So I've decided to write down here in this post a few links to tutorials that are free! Try some of them for Christmas gifts, etc. Feel free to leave comments!
EDITED POSTING: Ok, I made three pendants yesterday. I made several alterations to the video tut. I changed thread counts and used needles to hide thread ends. HEre are the three results.
Today's pick: thread art pendants. I saw this on youtube after a quick search. I plan on doing one this afternoon :)

Tree of life pendant: The same artist has a tree of life video as well. I learned my from another site but videos are more interactive. This one is a little more involved. You can be more freeform with them.



A gemstone tree. Again it's from the same artist. Very cool!

Ocean's Madonna

This is my adaptation of the spiek tutorial. I liked constructing it, so I made another composition. Originally is was going to be a pair of earrings. Then I didn't cut the units in two. I started forming them around faces and stones just to play. This is the one that stuck.

First attempt at Spike Seahorse tut

I am starting to feel better. The nose isn't as stuffed or runny and I am not coughing as badly. My head is relatively clear as long as I don't eat too quickly or bend over for any length of time. In my better feeling self, I decided to take a stab at making this seahorse tut I purchased a couple days ago! I love it! Even wrote a review for it on the site!

I've been featured- Thank you Mary

I'm so excited! I've been featured on Mary Anne Gruen's Vaudville Rose blog! Mary was kind enough to do a wonderful write up of my jewelry and writing work over on her blog. She is a doll! She, herself, does wonderful writing pieces and takes gorgeous pictures of her rose gardens,etc. You must stop by her Starlight Blog to check it out. Mary also has several pieces posted on Scribd.com Be sure to visit her there as well!

Once again, thank you for the honor, Mary! HUGS!

October Jewelry

This piece started out as a wire cuff. I was about to run out of wire however. I ended up stretching the piece out of shape. It morphed into Darla's Pride. I like it!

Tomorrow is the show. I hope it goes well. If would be wonderful if I could sale everything I have! YES!!!

New pieces

I was playing with some wire and bits of glass from the craft store. Here are the results.

Oval Unit Tutorial posted

I finally finished making pieces to photo graph for the variations section of my oval pendent tutorial. It is the second one I've written and posted. Actually it is the FIRST one I wrote but I needed these extra pics. I'm hoping it sales well! It is beginner level but looks cool (in my opinion anyway!).


Also found out my sweety should be able to come very soon!!!!

Bali Moon

Last night I had the polyclay for months, a wire wrapped unit for an earring, and a grey angle waiting for a match. I'm sitting at my table around 9PM and randomly start pulling them together (all three originally made for 3 separate projects months ago). My new piece Bali Moon is the result! Finished it at 2AM!


Materials:
silver toned wire, silver plated beads & dangle, pearlized grey glass bead, silver toned bead cap, polyclay face
approximately 3 inches long

This weekend's Jewelry making

Here are the pieces I made in the last 3 days.

Beaded Beads

I've been wanting to try beaded beads for several months. I hadn't gotten around to doing so. Yesterday afternoon I decided to give it a whirl! SO excited how they turned out!
I used (roughly 4x5mm) blue/dark aqua rice pearls and 11/0 olive green silver lined seed beads. In the center a grey/metallic disc ball bead sits.

Shell Days!

I think I am obsessed with drilling shells! I went and purchased several other large shells. I have them soaking in water to make the drilling process somewhat easier. I love creating pieces from them and the polyclay faces! Pippi has a seahorse tutorial in the works and I can not wait until she has it done so I can incorporate them with the shell designs!

I'm also thrilled because I have been accepted into the Oktoberfest on Oct. 4, 2009! Excellent! Now I have to get in gear and make more pieces!

Calypso's Flowering

Once I make a piece a typically have a bunch of ideas to use some of the same materials and techniques. In this case, obsession with sea shells! So after Posidon's Daughter, I've made Calypso's Flowering.

Materials:
Poly clay, copper,pressed Czech glass leaves, seed beads, faceted Czech fire polished beads, teardrop stone (not sure what the stone is. If anyone can identify that would be great!). And of course a sea shell as the base.
It measures approximately 4 inches from bail to end of the drop.

Posidon's Daughter

I felt inspired to do a piece while sitting in the bead shop with my beading friends on Friday. After looking through my vacation pictures I wanted to do something in regards to the beach and sand and romance. I was originally going for a pendent. It turned into a much LARGER neck plate instead! I like it though. Just need to add a few jump rings and a chain.
Materials:
copper, shells, more shell, cat's eye, seed beads, peach aventerine chips, red agate chips, arrogonite chips