Photos!

Finally! I am able to upload some photos! I tried shutting down my Firewall and now it seems to work. Although until now, I never needed to shut down the firewall for uploading photos.
Anyway, here is a picture of polymer clay pendant pieces I made. I got the idea from a photo in a book on decorative finishes for metal jewelry. I thought, "I could do something like that in polymer clay!" I want to try this again and fine tune it, they did not turn out exactly as I was imagining, and I know what I did wrong, but I think these are pretty cool anyway.
















Also, I have been working more with metal lately. I purchased some decorative punches, a 'raw silk' texturizing hammer and a dapping block.

Here's my dapping/doming block:














And here's my fancy texture hammer:






I have also been working on metal jewelry, using my new tools. With my dapping block I have been able to take flat sterling silver discs and dome them. You place them in one of the round depressions on the doming block, choose a dapping tool-the metal tools with the round ends shown in the photo, and when you place that on the silver and tap with a hammer, you get a nice domed piece of silver. Also, with various hammers you can pound away on the silver and leave really cool textures and impressions. Here's pictures of some earrings I have made using my cool tools:

Faux Dichroic Glass Pendant

I spent much of the day working on this. It is a technique for a faux dichroic glass effect on polymer clay. To learn how to do this check out Donna Kato's site for a detailed tutorial.
Good luck and have fun!

I'm In An Etsy Treasury

I am so surprised and excited. I am in Etsy's Treasury West. A wonderful etsian, RhodesAnnalsDesigns made up the Treasury and chose my Cutting Edge necklace. It is in the 2nd row, 2nd column. Check it out before it's gone! When I can jump in at a time when there is Treasury space available, I have my choices lined up from Etsy, I will hopefully be able to put one together and I'll post it.

For any who do not know, on Etsy, they have what are called Treasuries, where other Etsy people can choose 12 or 16 items from other shops on Etsy, to promote others and show their appreciation for other's work. I can't wait to get to do one.

Now to work on some more pieces.

My Work Table

Well I have really digressed on my blog lately, but now I am ready to start posting about Polymer Clay, Jewelry making and Etsy.
I do not currently have a work room, work shop or studio. I have a Work Table, with most of my supplies packed into my bedroom with some of it on the table and under the table. I live in a 2 bedroom apartment and I keep trying to get my son to shape up so he can afford to move out so I can take over his bedroom-sort of kidding but not really. He's 19 1/2 and I didn't move out of my parent's home until I was almost 23, but I already had a full time job with decent pay when I was his age. I mean, I don't want him to be a bum, and he certainly isn't a momma's boy, but he needs to get his act together soon, but he knows he has it pretty good here.

Here's a picture of him from about a year ago, with Gizmo and Savannah.

So, until he can go out on his own, or move in with his dad (Yesss! Please!!!) I have to make do with a work table. My work space is my dining room table which is actually rather large, covered with a vinyl table cloth. It works pretty well for me, except for those rare times when I need to eat. But at least I have everything where I need it and I don't have to keep putting things away when I am done. I can just sit down and get right to work.

Here's some pendants I recently finished.

A Pendant in the works.






More pendants waiting to be finished.

My tools!

Coiling gizmo. Very inexpensive and makes great coils out of wire.

Pasta Machine. Very useful with polymer clay. I will write about it later.

Beads and things. One of many containers.

Polymer clay, for my beads and pendants.




Tools for Polymer Clay. I will save the explanation of these and the pasta machine and other tools for Polymer Clay in another post.

Well, I need to get started on dinner. I am cooking for once, do not do much of that in this apartment's tiny kitchen, but I've been wanting to make spaghetti for a while now, so I better stop. Next time, hopefully, more about polymer clay.

New Stuff

This past week has been about a lot of new stuff and keeping busy. I have been spending a bit of money on jewelry findings and tools lately. But that's okay. I am determined to make my jewelry business work, and it makes me happy and keeps me busy when I am not at my part-time day job. With my pending divorce, this one-time hobby, now exciting business venture, and my strong faith in God is what really helps me get through the tough times, and I am sure there are more ahead.

Well, about the new stuff. I have registered for my first craft show. It is this coming November 22nd at my Parish church. I have been told that this may not be the best venue, but this is my first one, and as far as I am concerned, a perfect opportunity to start and get my feet wet. Even though I have been doing some research on what to do and not do with shows, I am sure I will screw up somewhere, but it will be a learning experience; and that is what I need, experience. I will take any advice and tips that anyone might want to give though.

I also have some new items in my Etsy store, link above and on the side. I am also posting photos on Flickr, still have more to go on that one.

I have purchased some cool new tools. One is this great wire cutter . It is a double flush cutter with a guage. It has these small holes that correspond with different wire guages and when you put your wire in that you want to cut, the cut is so smooth, you do not need to do any filing! I have tried it a few times so far and it works great. I still need to figure out all that I can do with it. It is rather large and a bit heavy compared to my other tools, but to me it is worth it.

I also decided to purchase a light tent, or table top photo studio. I know this one is probably cheap, but again, I am a beginner, and I have done my research on the internet. For where I'm at right now, this is perfect for me. I took a bunch of photos of my jewelry that I listed this weekend, and I can really tell a difference between the photo studio and just taking pictures with natural lighting. The only problem was that it did not come with any instructions, so I had to figure the set up on my own. But, with some common sense and patience, I actually got it up and running in about 15 minutes! And when you're done, it all folds up flat and has a separate little case for the tripod.

Gizmo, my chihuahua, is begging for my attention so that's it for now. I promise I will get into the basics of polymer clay for those who are interested, but really have no idea what it is.

First Day-First Post

Well, here goes...my first blog, my first post.
The purpose of this blog is to talk about creativity. That of my own and of others' creativity. And, to avoid cleaning my house.
From my blog title you can figure out that I like polymer clay. I have been working and playing with this versatile medium on and off for 10 years and more. After making all sorts of home decor items and wall rosaries, larger rosaries that you hang on your wall, I have finally settled on jewelry.

I recently began selling my jewelry on Etsy.com. It wasn't long before I was invited to join the eSMArts Team, which is a team on Etsy to help other etsians, as we are called, market themselves, their product and their websites. Realizing that pretty much everyone else on the team had their own blog, and seeing the marketing potential, not just for myself, but my team members and others, I decided to bite the bullet and give blogging a try.

So here it is. I spent all morning trying to figure this out, went to work in the afternoon, and came home to get this done. Needless to say, my house is still a wreck.