Kinda productive night!

1. Eat buffalo burgers for dinner with husband
2. Watch Lars and the Real Girl, get kinda teary
3. Heat up the kiln and put in my Battlestar Galactica Soundtrack
4. Finally finish two of these guys with an antique patina!

Pro-Gress

Here's tonight's progress. These are coming along pretty well, but still have a few layers to go. Especially dude all the way to the right... that border that looks maroonish is soon to be green. But, all in all, not a bad evenin's work.








Listening to: A Perfect Circle, Faun

Champleve Progress

So, I didn't post last night because I went to see Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. It was every bit of teen angst and magic-ey goodness that I needed to fuel my creativity for the rest of the week.

As another side note, I'm currently reading Alan Moore's Swamp Thing. Awesome comic, it's a great retelling of a classic that only Moore can do, and rife with inspiration about human nature and natural things, and what exactly those are. So far, anyway, I'm only on book 3.

Anyway! Here's my progress on enameling the copper pieces I etched a few days ago. More info on Champleve, from Darty's enameling book: "The term Champleve comes from the two French words "champ," a field, and "leve," raised. In this technique raised fields, or areas of metal, are incorporated into the finished design and the enamel is inlayed into recessed compartments." She also details that the Celts were doing it as far back as 1BC, and the Romans, in their vast conquests, adapted it from them and were using it on armor, swords and shields in 5AD. If I had helmet in ancient Rome, it would totally have Champleve on it. Of a ram, or something hardcore.

That's not a beading board... THIS is a beading board

Yea, I'm still workin on it. YAY!

A million studio pictures

So, I took a bunch of pictures tonight for no particular reason. I was workin on various things, and got some pictures of those in progress, in addition to the magical wonderful place I call my studio.

In order of post: 1. All the pieces I'm working on right now 2. My new root branch series 3. Various test pieces I keep by the kiln to try out color combinations 4.The kiln, bakin at 1339F 5. Some pieces that have just had purple enamel dusted on them

Goin back in time with my playlist tonight: Rasputina (thanks for the ether) and VNV Nation (i'm not sure which album, actually)

Two days of works in progress

Here's some images of a pair of necklaces and earrings I'm currently working on. I put them next to their sketches for reference... I think they're coming along nicely.


The top one pictured here with the blue root squigglies is a rare picture of one of my pieces unfired. The blue squigglies are still in powder enamel form on top of the fired green enamel. The bottom piece is completely enameled, in contrast.

Cutting these bastards out took awhile today. But they're going to be really cute! Now i just have to cut out three more just like them to make the matching pair or earrings. You can see by the sketch what these guys are going to look like.

The weekend has been nice, but tomorrow is another work day! So much to do before my next craft show. To work with me!

More work in progress

A collection of things I'm working on right now...

The black one in the middle is upside down. oops! these will have beads dangling from the bottom, and chains on top. In progress shot, with this horrible yellow lighting I have in my studio. Ergle.

Rooty things

Remember that sketch I made about a week ago? This is it in the flesh. I really like the way this turned out, I want to make more in different color schemes.