Pretty Things

I make a lot of pretty things to share on Etsy, but I have a very non-pretty secret. My house is cluttered and messy. Between a busy 4 year old, and 2 adults who admit to be packrats, we had a major problem on our hands. I started dealing with this over the summer, with the addition of my work desk, and then I cleaned out our downstairs storage closet. This week, I started on our family room, dining room, and kitchen. Yesterday was dedicated to the prevention of paper piles.

I saw this idea on Pinterest a few weeks ago (are you on Pinterest? I LOVE that website!!), and decided it was just what we needed. So for a couple of dollars, I got some thick cardstock, and covered a cereal box. I glued a bunch of magnets on the back, and this is where the mail will go. Every Day.

Ahhh, see my nice clean fridge? I took everything off of it, except for magnets that actually work, and important information that we want to keep at our fingertips. After the mail comes out of that box, it goes in a place either for bills to be paid, in to the shredder, in to a file, or in to the trash. No MORE PILES!!

I also cleaned and sorted things in our family room, and I'm starting work on the desk in the kitchen as well. I plan to do one level of the house each week, so I should be done in a few weeks. I feel a lot better about life in general after having even a small part of the house organized.

After all of that, I thought I'd show you something else I made (and please ignore the cords. They aren't pretty, but they are functional for our surround sound, LOL!).

You may recognize that little spider from my Etsy shop. He has yet to be adopted, so he's keeping my candy corn company. I got the instructions for the candy corn here. I had thought they might be a fun fine motor activity for my son, but he lost interest after about 3 wraps. Oh well.

I do have several new pieces made for my Etsy shop, and I'll do a separate post with those later so you can see them. I'm pretty excited about all of them!!

In to the Woods

Woodland items are really trendy right now, and they are fun, too! That in mind, I made these beads last week! This photo was taken before I did some paint texturing on them... owls, squirrels, acorns, and birds.


So I took some of those beads and made this bracelet!
I paired the beads with 2 huge agate nuggets, silvery cathedral beads, peacock pearls, and sterling silver discs. In spite of my best attempt to make an asymmetrical bracelet, I do still see a little bit of a pattern in this... *sigh* Oh well! I'll keep working on that, I guess!

A great find!

My son had the day off of school today (something about a professional day), and we decided to trek over to one of the large chain craft stores this afternoon. He likes going to this particular one, because there is SOOOO much to look at! I was on the hunt for some bird-themed stamps for my clay, and I decided to pass through the jewelry section as well, to see if there was anything interesting...

This is what I found!

Vintaj Natural Brass products and jewelry findings. I've been wanting to try some brass stuff out for a while, but I never wanted to order enough to make it worth my while. I had no idea it could be found in retail stores! And judging by the display, this is a new development, and it looks like they will be getting more stuff! Everything in the photo is earmarked for a couple of specific projects so far... A crafty friend mentioned rings with brass wire, so I think that will be my first project, because the other one I have in mind is a little more involved, and I have a few other things that need to be finished first.

Happy Crafting, everyone!

A little house cleaning

I've had some clay work that has been needing to be done, but every time I opened up one of my clay boxes, I kept seeing this, and it was so frustrating to me, and I never wanted to dig in to find what I needed.

So I decided a little clean up was in order, and this is what I ended up with! I feel so much better.

And yes, that IS my Mango Margarita that I was drinking while I worked. I'm sure it helped, somehow.

And now, I feel like I can really get something accomplished! In fact today (I did this last night), I made a Striped Gecko for my Aunt, 2 charms in copper bezels, and a pink sparkle pendant. And now I'm going to get back to it! I have a snowman ornament to work on, and I think I see a Santa head ornament in the near future as well.

New necklace

I'd been working on this pendant for a few days, off and on, and when it was done, I was stumped as to how I should use it. I had a pretty sterling silver pinch bail all picked out for it, but it just wasn't... right. So I was doing a little flickr browsing, which I do sometimes when I get stuck with a design, and was inspired to use my Irish Waxed Linen cord for hanging the pendant. I think adding in the swarovski crystals gave it a little extra texture, too!

I created the pendant using the Sutton Slice technique, where you fill in the grooves of a texture sheet or stamp with clay, and then carefully transfer it on to a flat sheet. It looks smooth because I also used large amounts of resin (I'm still learning, and it takes multiple applications for me to not "miss" any spots sometimes), but I think that makes it even more interesting! It also gives the necklace some weight, so it hangs nicely.

This is currently listed in my Etsy shop, and would make a unique addition to anyone's jewelry collection!

I plan on doing another pendant using this technique soon, so I'll take some photos during the process to show you all. It's a really interesting technique!

Wrap it up!

If you've walked through any department store lately, or paged through a weekly ad, you've most likely seen any number of styles of "wrap bracelets." In my own personal style, I don't tend to keep up with the trends very well, but I do happen to have a few wrap bracelets in the shop. You can find them here.

This was the first one I made, actually, and as my first attempt, it took so long that I almost didn't make another in this style. I eventually ended up making 2 more with different stones.
This is my newest style of wrap bracelet - it's a little more delicate than the first, but just as easy to wear. And orange is HOT this season!!

I know I said that I don't generally follow the trends in my own personal style, but I really LIKE these wrap bracelets, so I have 3 that I made for myself! I think they look pretty cute layered, but I think the 3 in this picture might be a bit much. Two is probably better...

These represent all 3 styles of wrap bracelets that I currently have listed in my Etsy shop. The top is Braided Irish Waxed Linen with Moukaite beads. The second is crystal chain wrapped on to leather, and the bottom one is Fancy Jasper on Leather.

So, there you have it - my nod to trends. If you really love the wrap bracelets, please check out my shop! If you don't see something you like, let me know and I'll try to make one just for you.

My new direction

Part of my new direction is to go in a more casual direction with a lot of my newer items. This seems to be the way jewelry is trending lately - casual, shabby chic, or BIG statement pieces. I have a few of these crystal wrap bracelets in the shop. They are super sparkly, but the wrapping and leather allow it to be casual still. I have one I wear pretty frequently myself!

This turquoise one is finished with a handmade polymer clay button. It's a double-wrap style.

This bracelet was strung on waxed linen cord, instead of my standard beading wire. I really like the color combination, and the knots between the beads add a little extra texture.

These are just a few of the things I've been making lately. I will continue to make more classically styled jewelry, much like I have been, but I'm enjoying branching out and challenging myself.