For the love of bugs....Riveting, Reconstructing, Animating

I had the opportunity to take a quick trip to Chicago to take a class with Gail Crosman Moore at CREATE. Her workshop left my head spinning with ideas. We deconstructed raw brass stampings and created pieces with movement and dimension. I thought I would share my creation.

Gail shared some of her favorite coloring techniques. They ranged from alcohol inks to fingernail polish to rub and buff and gilders paste.  I loved the idea of fingernail polish. I used this wonderful lime green on by bugs body, his head is actually orange in color and his wings are purple. His short wings are what give movement to my creation. I'm still working what I'm going to hang him from.

Long time no see.. Sorry, I have been off the grid so long. In late January I took a few steps back with my shoulder surgery. I had been doing so good and then developed a bad case of bursitis. Which laid me up for 7 weeks, serious bummer. I also lost my creative mojo and its taken me a bit to get it back. I seriously haven't even looked at my blog for 4 months. Soo bad of me. I had a posting that should have happened on Jan. 31st.. I prescheduled it and as I see it didn't happen. I will figure out what is up with that and play catch me up.. Enough of that.  Time to move forward. Here's what I have been up too.

This last weekend I had the privilege to take some workshops with Jen Crossley of A Mark In Time over at SmittenDust Studio in Diamondale, Michigan.

The first being this bird house pendant. My main focus of this workshop was soldering. For some reason I have not been comfortable soldering... so says the girl that torch fires like a mad woman. I don't know what was up with that. I learned so much and this class was so much fun. We had a great group that day.

I had another one that night and I still have to tweek it a bit so will be sharing that in the near future. I took saturday off and spent the morning and early afternoon off with my husband doing some estate sale and flea market shopping... so glad he enjoys this.

Yesterday we created these wonderful little bag pendants. "I CAN"T BELIEVE THAT WE MADE THESE LITTLE CLUTCHES!!!!!!" Jen walked us through the construction of our little bag. We tackled some wire wrapping skills and patina rusting. In our creative supplies were some fabulous tin type photos, vintage brass bobbles and beads. On mine I used a little vintage brass stencil I had. I am saving my tin type for the future. I used the stencil in place only because my other creation (too be shared at a later date) has a portrait tin type.

Happy creating everyone.. more to come.

Another CREATE day

The inspiration and fun was contagious in Chicago. I could hardly wait for another day to come. Now I am working hard at holding back and showing you my creations one day at a time. I just want to post them up for you to see. In this workshop Uncle Charley has Left the Room Pendant, we cut copper and created a soldered bezel with a cold connection, added brass embellishments and made a wonder cloth necklace to hold our pendant. Our instructor Jean Van Brederode was so full of energy, she shared a wealth of information. The garage door clasp was fantastic. Each one of us left wearing our totally unique pendants.