The Last of My Black and Silver Rut (I think)

I'm having so much trouble with blogger. It's so temperamental for me at the moment and I keep having the same problem on and off, the bold and underline icons become highlighted as soon as I start typing and then all the text is blue and underlined, plus there's a weird black line on the left side flashing on and off. Trying to get someone from blogger to help is nigh on impossible. Anyway that's a problem for me to try and solve, nothing you'd be terribly interested in unless you've experienced the same problem, if that's case email with a solution and I'll be forever in your debt and you can have my first born or a piece of jewelry.....take your pick. Just quietly I'd go for the jewelry.....even though first born is a sparky and can be quite useful around the house for installing electrical plugs and such like, he's got a large appetite, so be warned.

So this piece below was quite a challenge. Lots of cutting, glueing, setting eyelets, embossing and smudging, making figure 8 connectors, making sure it sits right, adjusting the chain quite a few times until I was happy. And happy I am.

Silver wallpaper and grungeboard.

Just a close up. And now one of my photos has disappeared. Ok it's up the top of the post now Grrrrr!
Hot water is back on, so now we can shower and use the dishwasher. It was a toss up which was worse, not having a shower or not being able to use the dishwasher. I'd forgotten what an odious task hand washing dishes is, almost up there with cooking!

This Is What Happens........

......if you use this, some sort of silver electrical tape that I rescued from my sons bedroom waste paper basket.............grungepaper is slightly thinner than grungeboard.......
....yay for Tim Holtz.....
.....die cut some shapes......
.....emboss said shapes......
....smudge some of this on them....
.....put it all together.....
......and you get this.
Worthy of my Artfire shop?
If you love gorgeous hand made pendants and would like the chance to win one head over to Tish's blog for your chance to win one. She's having a giveaway.

Easter Jewels

Easter Sunday, happy Easter all. Lovely cool day here in sunny Perth at long last. I was just about at the end of my tether (what is a tether anyway and have I spelled it correctly) with the heat.
So the cooler weather has inspired me and I've made stuff.
This one, copper chain, ceramic beads and shell discs that I stamped with black stazon.A little bit of wire work.
And some copper and sparkly charms.
Vintage glass beads that I picked up from a trash and treasure stall at the senior citz next to the nursing home my mum lives in. Web jasper beads and pink jasper large discs. The focal is brushed silver metal, I picked it up in a small antique store in a place called New Norfolk when we were in Tasmania over Christmas.
Gun metal grey oval chain.

I'm loving this one. Grungeboard covered with silver wallpaper and embossed and smudged with black rub n buff.
I might do a series of this style and use some of my artwork on the grungeboard. I like the design and the off centre large disc. Shame it doesn't photograph better because it's much brighter in real life. The silver wallpaper is really shiny and they actually look like real metal that has been textured with a hammer.
So I'm going to wear it today as we are not only celebrating Easter but also my mother in law's birthday. Dinner at the Burswood, I've got a new outfit to wear, new jewelry and lots of dark chocolate to eat, so all is right with the world.

Blog Post 101.......giveaway.

Edited to note, 12th August: Extending my giveaway until the weekend. I've been out and about shopping (I might have been in the bead store when you rang Carmen) and I'm exhausted. I'll give you the tip....bead shopping is a bit of head spin, so much variety, so much to choose from, so many beads! Working for the next two days (have to pay for the beads) so I'll draw the winner on Sunday. Till then, happy arting, crafting or beading my bloggy friends.

Are you sick of these yet? Sorry but I'm a bit addicted to these, don't worry it will eventually wear off. These are some memory frames I did in class on Wednesday night . Poured over a stamp and then smeared with a bit of rub n buff. Decided to try normal heat embossing on the backs of them so stamped an image with embossing ink, covered with normal embossing power and gently heat set with the gun being careful not to melt the whole thing in the process.

Now the one in the middle went a bit pecurliar. Someone, and I won't mention who Jenny, was very impatient and just couldn't wait for the black UTEE to melt so she stirred it up like it was a pan of scrambled eggs and consequently when I heat set it with the gun, a million tiny bubbles came up to the surface, so now it looks like a moon scape.

The Sheila's

The set of 3 ATC's and the memory frame pendant pictured at the very top of the post are giveaway's. I missed my 100th post by about one or two I think so if you would like to leave a comment you're in the draw. I'll pull a name out of the hat on Wednesday.

This is a blurry view of the back of the pendant. Or you could turn it into a key chain, it's 1" square with some beads and a small metal charm added to the bottom.

Stuff

Here's a couple of ATC's I made last week, just so you don't think I've completely abandoned my mixed media work for beading. The one above is a background technique I did in a Kelsey workshop but I can't remember what it is. Black texture paste around the edges and an image glued to some chipboard. Oriental letter stickers above and the image was glazed with Craft Smart Glaze Paste.

This one was made from scraps of magazine images and the wording was from an Ikea catalogue. I think I should keep it on my desk to remind me to keep my desk clear and tidy. It's conducive to being more creative when you have a clear space. Doesn't happen that often though.
Another memory frame filled with a mixture of clear, black and Mango opals.

And another bracelet with the same mixture. The black beads are embossed with a similar colour combination and glazed with Glossy Accents. Sorry about the glare, used the flash which I don't normally do, but they were very dark and it was hard to see the pattern. Should have scanned them I suppose.
Finding it hard to get motivated this morning, well harder than normal. I need to vacuum, should do a couple of loads of washing, think about what to cook for dinner tonight...blech.....go to Office Works to get some labels, fill the car with petrol before the 15cent per litre price hike tomorrow and a million other things. And here I still sit and it's already 10.40 am. I'm a time waster today.......I'll just have another cup of coffee then kick myself up the backside and tell myself to get moving and not be such a lazy cow.

No Housework Get's Done

Here's some Leandra beads I made yesterday, still pretty wonky but if you clump them together it's not quite so noticeable. I've attached them to various lengths of chain then attached that to a large jump ring which I attached to an even larger ring with a hole in it. Added another large jump ring that I threaded some small beads onto then put the whole thing on a chain. Fun to make but I'm suffering with RSI in my wrist and my shoulders are killing me from being hunched over the desk for a few hours. Who says you don't need to be fit to craft. Think I need to go to a gym and do some sort of muscle strengthening exercises.......me.....gym.....nah!
Another memory frame. Black gold and silver Opals and I laid some opal scraps over it when it was set then blasted them with the heat gun to attach them to the base.
This is the reverse side. After it was set I sprinkled on some silver and green Opals granules and heat seat them with the gun.
The small memory frames I made the other day have now become a bracelet with come small beads between the frames.
The reverse side.
In between all this jewellry making I have made some ATC's but I'll post them another day.
The pest control guy is here to do the annual termite inspection. Nice guy but I always dread his visit in case he finds some huge infestation and the roof is about to fall in. So far so good.

The Postman Only Rang Once.........

.......and I ran to answer the door and there was my package of Opals embossing powders and the book. The most luscious colours and when you open the jar it's very tempting to lick your finger and and scoop up the powder to taste it because they look just like Aeroplane Jelly jelly chrystals. But I wouldn't advise doing that.They have wonderful evocative names like Currawong (black), Daintree (lime green), Mango (orangey apricot) Wild Hibiscus (dark pink) and Zeehan (silver) all in 90g jars and I bought a 150g jar of clear. It's a shame the photos don't show the colours well, but trust me they are gorgeous.

I also bought a pack of Opalettes 5 x 9g jars of the Warm palette just to see what some of the other colours are like. Aurora, Mountain Berry, Valentine, Fool's Gold and Sunburst.Their book is very informative with lots of instructions and photos and many examples of the different ways you can use them. Now I just have to wait patiently for my melt pot to arrive at Scraptivate. I badgered them into carrying the opals in their shop seeing as how Mel is going to be doing some classes on melt art. So keep a look out for them if you are in Perth.

I found it very strange that none of the LSS stores in the metro area of Perth carry the Opals. It's an Australian product made in Tasmania so it's good to support local product. Here's a link to their site.

Just some more bracelets I made. Silver beads with dingly, dangly, baubley things hanging off them. Threaded the beads onto stretchy elastic, tied it off and added the baubles and gave them to Brighita and she's worn them everyday since.

Well I'm off to make Moroccan Meat Balls and Lime Impossible pie. It was Michael's girlfriend Erin's birthday yesterday and I foolishly said "Come for dinner" (and she foolishly accepted). You know how much I looooove cooking...not, and her mum is a fantastic cook. Erin always eats like a little bird when she comes over and I somehow suspect it has a lot to do with my cooking!

Bracelet and an ATC

This is another tile bracelet with embossing. I managed to get some bails that are smaller and the loopy bit sits flush with the edge of the tile. I glazed the embossing with Glossy Accents, but when I looked at it a couple of days later the embossing had kind of a powdery look to it and it has very fine cracks over it.
The black embossing powder I used on the cream tile is Stamp-it, Super fine and the powder on the grey tile is Adirondack so I'm thinking the brand has a bearing on how well the glaze works on it. Well you live and learn and it's all about the journey blah, blah, blah. I just wish the journey wasn's so frustrating at times. This is an ATC I made paying homage to Simon and Garfunkel seeing as how they're in the country at the moment. It's a line from their song the Boxer, one of my faves. Love to sing along with it in the car and pretend I sound good. Car accoustics are excellent in my book. She's a bit of a saucy tart isn't she? Not that I think Arty and Paul are saucy or tarty. I mean anyone who can write and sing a song like Bridge over Troubled Waters couldn't possibly have the slightest bit of tarty sauce running through their veins. Really!!!

So now I'm experimenting with Sheer Heaven transfer paper and Purell hand sanitiser as a transfer medium. I've had a couple of successes and quite a few failures. It's all in the timing and the amount of purell used. Too much and it's just a big messy blob, wait too long before applying your image and the results aren't good.

I'll post some pix of my successes and failures in a few days. Gotta keep practicing.

Back to the Drawing Board

It's finished but I'm not happy with it. The bails I've used aren't quite right. Because the back of the bail was quite large I couldn't get the loop bit to sit flush with the edge of the tile and when the bracelet is on your wrist they stick up too much. So it was a trip to the bead store, well actually 3 bead stores, 2 of them have closed down. Casualties of the economy I expect.

So I got some smaller bails along with more beads and several other bits and bobs.......$70.00 later and I was back home embossing more tiles. I've done a different colour for the next one, so when it's finished I'll take photos (that's if this one doesn't require another trip back to the drawing board too).

Yesterday I got the best surprise. I won a prize on Broken Heart Art's blog. I'd left a comment for Susan's 200th post and I won. You must go and visit her, Susan is very talented, very funny and her blog layout is something to aspire to. She has been doing the most amazing background papers and her ATC's are to die for with sassy sayings and incredible stamping. Lucky me......I won!

A new project, will they ever end.......

......and will I ever finish anything. I don't know, I start something, which leads to something else, which lead to ever more things and before I know it I've started about 12 different projects. None of which are finished. This is my latest craze (or crazy) thing I'm doing.
You might remember in an earlier post I bought a necklace that was a small tile with a green design on it. Well this got me thinking about transforming some tiles into a bracelet, so after sourcing said tiles from Bunnings and sharing half with Carmen this is what I've come up with so far. Below is a plain off white glass tile about 2cm square.

On this one I've stamped and embossed with black embossing powder a small flower, then glazed it with dimensional magic stuff. Gee...macro lens really pick up everything, you can see all the stray powder which in real life isn't evident to the naked eye. Now I've glued some bails on either side of the tile and when they're dry, I'll join them all together with some jump rings, add some sort of closure gizmo and see how it all looks.

When it's all finished I'll give it to Brighita and get her to where it heaps and see if it stands up to normal wear and tear. Maybe she won't like it, maybe she'll think it's soooo not like her kind of thing and wouldn't been seen dead wearing it mum.....I'm getting ahead of myself a bit. Of course she'll like it and of course she'll wear it and be my test case, if she knows what's good for her and which side her bread is buttered on and who does her washing and who cooks her dinner and on the odd occasion who makes her bed (ok, maybe once in the last 15 years). She'll wear that bracelet or else!

Arty Girlz Challenge #67

Weird girl. I love this stamp.

The challange.........'anything but a card'. Watercolour crayon background, stamps and embossing, black and white gesso. Some silver fab foil added to her hair and just under her legs. It never shows up in the scans which is a pity. This will eventually go into a journal.

Here's a link so you can see all the other very creative people who have joined the challenge.

http://artygirlzchallengeblog.blogspot.com/