Art Elements Theme Challenge, October - Eyes

This month our October theme - eyes, was chosen by the wonderful Laney Mead and I have had such a roller coaster of emotions making my piece!

I had these elements blue tacked on my wall for so long, but I never got around to making the piece as I was, well ....scared! This has been the most complicated, the largest and the most expensive piece I have made to date and I was rather worried I would mess it up.

I never normally draw designs but I thought this might help keep me calm! I was hoping for a magical talisman kind of look?!?!

 After two solid days of sawing soldering and hoping, it worked!!!

I still need to make some kind of chain and I may well add more LOS and some more texture as I want it looking older and well loved!

But I'm really happy with how it turned out. It has 14mm amethyst, wolf eyes by Laura Mears, a Tiffany stone, some petrified wood by Designer Cabochons and some touches of gold, plus there is a 14mm moonstone on the back....

With a hand sawn wolf and a cast silver Crinoid star.

Thank you Laney with out your challenge I never would have got around to making this piece!!!

AE Team

Susan  

Marsha  

Claire  

Cathy 

Jenny  

Niky  

Jennifer

Laney

Guests

Dawn  

Hope  

Beth & Evie  

Kathy  

Michelle 

Tammy    

Cat  

Elaine

August AE COM

The Art Element component of the month for August has been provided by the amazingly talented Caroline of BlueBerri Beads, and this time I remembered to photo them before I started.... 

Arn't they stunning!

As soon as I saw these beads I started singing "fly me to the moon and let me play among the stars...."  and I just could not get the song out of my head and then I started playing with my stash and out came this beautiful Raven cab by our very lovely Jenny Davies-Reazor and then this....

I made a part bezel part prong setting for the lovely Raven and then hung the beautiful star bead on some really thick silver wire with a couple of melted silver bead caps.

I intend to hang this off a really thick silver snake chain, there is even a little surprise on the back....

A cute little hare gazing longingly up at the stars!

Thank you so much Caroline I have throughly enjoyed emerging myself in making this little treasure! I hope everyone will join me hopping around the rest of the participants 

Guests

Cheryl Zink

Kelly Rodgers

Art Elements Team

Diana Ptazynski

Cathy Spivey Mendola

Niky Sayers

Laney Mead

Susan Kennedy

Claire Fabian

Lesley Watt

Caroline Dewison

April Year of jewelry project

Week 14 (Apr 4) - Birthstone of the Month: Sparkly like a Diamond, well they do sparkle but not a diamond in sight! This pair of earrings were made for a tutorial on Art Jewelry Elements blog.

Week 15 (Apr 11) - The Story of Me, of course coins! This pair of earrings is currently giveaway on the Artisan Designers Jewelry Buy and Sell Facebook group.

Week 16 (Apr 18) - Made of Thick Wire well made of wire but not that thick! This necklace was made for the Art Jewelry Elements component of the month.

Week 17 (Apr 25) - Embrace Nature, wooden bead! And of course this pendent was made for the Bead Peeps blog hop.

Happy making lovely people and have a great day! x

January Year of jewelry project

Please click Here if you have come via the Grow Your Blog Party x

I joined up with the facebook The Year of Jewelry Project again this year and although I think I have shown most of these I thought it would be nice to have them all in a post together with the weekly themes (which I am trying hard to stick to), so here goes....

Week one - A Personal Talisman for my Year

These hidden treasure locket have by far been my most popular design ever, also six pence's are supposed to be lucky in the UK!

Week two - Birthstone of the Month: Garnet

This piece was a special commission for the daughter of a very lovely lady. It's extra special as the coins are from the recipients year of birth (I hope she likes it)!

Week three - Try a Tutorial!

This piece is from the AMAZING book by Lisa Barth, Timeless Wire Weaving and I love it!

Week four - Hammer It!

The start of my modern princess collection, Cinderella Earrings. Disc's coin hammered.

Week five - Squares

This week I was rather busy with a last minute commission, so I made super sweet and simple prong set moonstone studs!

Have a wonderful day lovely people x

Facebook giveaway

This piece was an practice piece, I had an old cracked opal doublet laying around and thought I would try and set it, any who I liked the result so much I can't bring myself to throw it, so to celebrate 100 sales in my etsy shop I thought I would have a giveaway on bits of niknats facebook page.

Here is what you could win....

So why not head on over and enter for your chance to get your hands on these! You could also use the code to get 10% off one of these little lovelies....

I finally managed to get some coin lockets in the shop, Amethyst....

Kyanite and....

Opal!

And how cute is this little heart!

Have a wonderful Sunday lovely people x

Ancient Jewellery, The British Museum, third and final part

So I saved the best till last (well in my opinion)! The third and final photo's of The British Museum are all about the Jewellery (again please excuse the poor quality photos once again I have broken my camera again and am having to use my iphone).

Starting with one of the most beautiful pieces of gold work ever, I can not even imagine the work that went into this one!

I have already shown this pic but I really do love it! 

'Gold ring with the name Thutmose III'

Selection of beautiful gold rings with seals on them (owning a beautiful old seal one day is on my to do list) Oh and you can even see my phone in this one (you would not belive how many photo I ruine with my own reflection!

Lion heads, More amazing gold.

I love the design of these rings! 

Stunning supper fine gold chain, I love the beautiful clasp  on this piece!

Such beautiful gold and gem necklaces

Such a fancy clasp on this one....

Lovely links on this green one....

Beautiful set stones

This one looks like an amazing amount of work....

I totally love these....

 Beautiful Egyptian Faience melon beads.

I do wish I had time to get all of the information about the pieces, the where and when they were made and found but any visit we have to a museum with a two year old has to be a fast moving one, while he likes to look at the lovely shiny things he dose not like to linger!!!!

While in London we were lucky enough to fine the sweetest little Antiquity shop just across the road from the British Museum and we picked up these little beauties. I wanted to leave with at least half of the stuff in there but settled for just these (this time but we will go back)! I think I might prong set them with an open back so you can see both sides of the coin and use them in a bracelet or two!

Have a great day you lovely lot!

Haberdashery Blog Hop

Today I am joining in with Melissa Trudinger's fab Haberdashery Blog Hop, a lovely friend of mine saw this hop and thought I would enjoy it, and how right was she!

As a young child I spent alot of my time in Haberdashery shops as my mum and grandmother were avid embroiderers, when I was not in the shop looking and beautiful coloured silks and ribbons I was spending hours watching them embroider! Any who now to show you my treasures.....

You may well notice a bit of a theme with all my pieces, buttons, I do love buttons! 

This is a simple macrame wrap bracelet I made for my oldest daughter, using leather cord, string, seed beads, a cute butterfly charm and one of my painted farthing coin buttons. I liked it so much I had to make one up for myself....

This one is much more me, in my favourite colours! I used the same macrame technique but instead of seed beads I used 4mm serpentine heishi gemstone beads (they are so beautiful) with a really cute heart charm from Daisy Chain Extra and another of my painted farthing coin buttons.

These look really lovely on, and before I knew it I was making another macrame bracelet....

I have had these beads for so very long and although I love them could not for the life of me think how to use them, then this design just happened! The lovely lampwork drops are by the amazing Laura Sparling and this time I used a silver sixpence shank button. 

It has a really nice glassy cuff look to it, but alas is very hard to photograph with out a model and my model has gone away to the coast for a couple of days! 

My last make is made up from some of the many baby buttons I have cut off my children's clothes (after they have destroyed them as only children can)....

Baby buttons mounted in silver made into earrings (they are not as big as they look in this pic, I just have freakishly small hands), I really, really love these! I have used a thin 0.3mm silver wire to look like thread.

I have decided to use some more of my baby button stash to make charms for a bracelet with the children's initials on the back and maybe even with gold thread!!! Now I am bursting with ideas!!!! 

*Shameless plug* if you would like to see more of my coin buttons they can be found here in my Bits Of NikNats etsy shop!!!

Thank you so much Melissa for hosting such a fun blog hop. I am now off to make a nice hot coffee before I take a look to see what everyone else has made, If you wish to join me here is the list of participants.... 

Melissa Trudinger                                           http://beadrecipes.wordpress.com 

Ann Schroeder                                                 http://www.beadlove.wordpress.com

Tammy Adams                                                http://www.paisleylizard.com/blog.html

Amanda Wacasey                                           http://mandyinmystic.blogspot.com

Dolores Raml                                                   http://craftydscreations.wordpress.com

Divya N                                                             http://www.jewelsofsayuri.com

Michelle McCarthy                                         http://www.fireflydesignstudio.BlogSpot.com

DiYana Brooks                                                 http://agapecreationsjewelry.blogspot.com/

Robin Kae Reed                                               http://willowdragon.blogspot.com

Andrea Glick                                                    http://zenithjade.blogspot.com/

Karin Grosset Grange                                     http://ginkgoetcoquelicot.blogspot.fr

Mitzie Crider                                                    http://needfulluxuries.blogspot.com

Janine Lucas                                        http://www.esfera.me/travel/blog/travel-stories (Will be posting on Sunday)

Rosantia Petkova                                           http://bairozan.blogspot.com/

Susan Kennedy                                                http://www.suebeads.blogspot.com

Leithleach Alainn Seodra                http://alainnjewelry.wordpress.com/

Kathleen Breeding                                          http://99bobotw.blogspot.com/

Shiraz Biggie                                                    http://secretsongdesigns.blogspot.com

Chris Eisenberg                                               http://www.wanderware.blogspot.com

Heather Richter                                              http://desertjewelrydesigns.blogspot.com/

Lennis Carrier                                                  http://www.windbent.net/

Rebecca Anderson                                         http://www.songbeads.blogspot.com

Jenny Kyrlach                                                   http://anafiassa.blogspot.com

Rita Toltec Jewels                                 http://www.JewelSchoolFriends.com (Will be posting on Sunday)

Mischelle Fanucci                                           http://www.micheladasmusings.blogspot.com

Karen Mitchell                                                 http://overthemoon-design.com

Carol Briody                                                     http://Cbriody.blogspot.com

Karla Morgan                                                  http://TexasPepperJams.blogspot.com

Carolyn Lawson                                              http://Carolynscreationswa.blogspot.com

Lori Anderson                                                  http://www.prettythingsblog.com/

Jami Shipp                                               http://www.celebratinglifewithdamamashipp.blogspot.com

Lili Krist                                                             http://pcbylik.blogspot.com/

Evelyn Shelby                                                   http://raindropcreationsbyevelyn.blogspot.com/

Raissa de Guzman                                          http://www.abloro.com

Niky Sayers                                                      http://silverniknats.blogspot.co.uk

Keren Panthaki                                                http://vasdea.wordpress.com

Have a great day