My Discoveries in 2009

During this year, I have discovered many things that have truly changed my life forever. Those of you who follow my blog know what an impact Lexi Erickson has had on my life both personally and artistically.

I follow a lot of blogs and have had an opportunity to get to know some of my fellow artists and bloggers through their works, their words, and even their Facebook pages. I want you to know that I value the friendships that we have established. I have learned so much from your generosity; sharing your artistic journeys, your growth, your trials and tribulations. I thank all of you for helping me to grow as a person and an artist. Those of you, who have left comments about my work and my artistic journey, I want you to know that you have helped me more than you may realize. Thank you.

As 2009 comes to a close, I thought I would share one of my discoveries. Another blogger, Christine Kane, has what I feel are tremendous insights. Her writing speaks to me and I hope it will speak to you too. She has such a positive way at looking at life's challenges. In 2007, she wrote about the Resolutions Revolution. She described a different approach to making positive changes in your life in the coming year. I would encourage you to visit her post on Resolutions Revolution and I hope that you will find her take on the subject of New Year's Resolutions beneficial. I have.

After you read Christine's post on New Year's Resolutions, this will make more sense, however I want to share that my touchstone word for 2010 is Aspire. I've already started to use it and I can tell you it works!

May 2010 hold wonderful opportunities and successes for all of you.

Until next time, aspire to be more as an artist and a person. I am.

She loved it!

In my post on Monday of this week, I published a picture of Lexi's Dream, which is one of my fused bowls that Lexi described to me from a recent dream she had.

Last night, I presented the bowl to Lexi. She loved it! She said that it was even prettier than the one in her dream. It had more depth. The only thing it didn't have was real gold, which I truly don't know how to incorporate gold into glass...I can do silver or copper inclusions. And given the price of gold, that would be cost prohibitive. She saw how I worked at replicating the gold color she described with this lovely, almost lemon yellow transparent glass I used. I found it to be be awesome glass....as with most of my work, the Bullseye Glass palette works so well for me.

I also showed her Fallen Leaves, which she liked too. However, her favorite was the vision come to life, Lexi's Dream. As with all my work, I am truly happy when a piece finds its rightful home.

All that being said, I could tell how thrilled she was with this and how much she loved the colors of this bowl. It is my gift to her. It pales in comparison to all she has given to me as a mentor, friend, teacher, and sister.

Aspiring to be more as an artist and person. Happy creating all!

Fallen Leaves

Fallen Leaves
photo by Daniel Krucoff

I'm still amazed at times how ideas come to me for something. Do you ever find this happening with your creative process? I was working on Lexi's Dream mentioned in an earlier post. And as I was cutting the strips of glass that went into the construction of that bowl, I saw all these pointed pieces of glass that were discarded from the strips I used to make Lexi's Dream. They sort of called out to me and the more I looked at all those glass shards, I thought, a cluster of them would create a wonderful autumnal effect.

So this is the result of thought process on my part. Very abstract, but they remind me of fallen leaves along a hiking trail. The myriad of colors. All those sharp little pieces of glass fused so wonderfully and melded together to create this piece.

I'm going to share this one with Lexi too and see what she thinks of my 'detour' of sorts from her original dream.

I think Dan did such a great job capturing the beauty of this one with the light shining through it.

Aspiring to be more as an artist and person.....

Lexi's Dream

Lexi's Dream

Recently I hit "The Wall", you know, that period of creative block. My friend and mentor, Lexi Erickson, helped me to work through this block. One of the things that Lexi told me was that I needed to let go of some things in order to grow in other areas of my work. She felt one of the things I may need to let go of was some of my work as it relates to glass.

Now I truly love working with glass. Yet I knew deep down she was right and I have let go of some of my glass work. However, I feel that I will continue to create my fused glass bowls and the occasional stained glass window.

Here's the funny part....several nights after our discussion about needing to let go so I could grow in other areas of my work, Lexi had a dream. In this dream, I handed her a bowl I had made. She said it was glowing. And she said this bowl needed to be comprised of transparent glass instead of the mixture of transparent and opalescent glasses that I normally use. She was concerned that I would be upset about this dream after she had told me I needed to let go of some of my glass work. Quite the contrary, it just made me smile.

She described how the bowl looked to her in her dream. She said I needed to make this bowl. And I have. It's pictured above and I'm calling it Lexi's Dream. Now we shall see how closely it actually resembles the one she envisioned in her dream. I will be giving this to her later this week and I'll give you an update on her thoughts about it.

As a result of this work, I had an alternative idea for another bowl of transparents in the same color family as this bowl. It's currently in the kiln for its final firing and I will be posting a picture of it sometime this week.

Isn't interesting how ideas and life co-mingle at times, creating such fun twists and turns in our growth?

Until next time, aspire to be more as an artist and a person.

Teaching My First Class

Last month, Lexi and Pat asked me to teach a class at Coyote Creek. They love my wire wrapping and wanted to offer an advanced wire wrapping class to those students who had taken the beginning wire wrapping class that Pat teaches. I agreed and this past weekend I had 5 students at the studio in Coyote Creek located in Fairplay, Colorado.

This was the first time I've ever taught a class and I wanted to provide some tips and tricks that you generally receive when you attend a class. For me, that is one of the real benefits of a class when the teacher shares things that you can't find in books or online. I believe I was able to accomplish that for this class. Some of what I shared were those lessons we learn when we make mistakes...hoping to help them avoid those!

The drive from Colorado Springs to Fairplay is a pretty one and one of my favorite parts was the crossing over Wilkerson Pass. The panorama of the mountains covered with snow as you come over that pass is stunning. It just takes my breath away. At one point there was a hot air balloon taking off and that made for a lovely scene. I only had my little digital camera with me and I just couldn't do justice to what I was seeing, so no pictures to post here.

We completed one pendant and there were a number of "Ah Ha" moments throughout the class. It ran longer than I anticipated and I feel bad about that. I underestimated a few things and if/when I teach another class, I know what I can do to prevent some of the "time eating" exercises. I guess that's somewhat normal, you learn what to do for class preparation and planning from each class you teach. The setting is dynamic and with this being my first time to teach, I didn't anticipate some of the situations that arose.

I put together my first step by step tutorial for them to follow as we completed the lesson. Dan took pictures of me putting together a piece and I wanted them to have something to refer back to after the class. Each pendant had the spin of the person completing it and they were a fun group.

While my focus isn't on wire wrapping as much any more, I am more than happy to share with others who want to learn. As I was leaving, one of them asked me to teach another class and I've heard some rumblings that others are interested too. We shall see. Given the approach of winter, I think a safer bet will be a class later in the spring months.

I learned something from them too and it was a worth while experience for me.

Until next time, aspire to be more as an artist and a person.

Soul Searching Series

River to Ones' Soul

This is my first piece since my "Chocolate Gelatos and Mountain Sunsets" post. It is part of my new series, Soul Searching, that was inspired by my heart to heart with Lexi. I call this River to Ones' Soul. The stone is a Cobra Jasper that I purchased from Gary B. Wilson. I find this stone very striking in its markings and the color patterns. And I see a river running through this, so that is how I arrived at the title.

The stone is set in Sterling Silver with copper accents. There are a few firsts with this piece too.

• My first rivets, thanks to a step by step posted in Lapidary Journal's Flashcard by Helen Driggs.


• The two separate sections, connected with jump rings is another first. For that, I followed another step by step The Fossil Fern Pendant, only this was written by my mentor, Lexi Erickson, in the August 2009 issue of Lapidary Journal.


• I carried the gentle curve from the bottom of the stone to to top piece of this pendant too.

I hope you can tell how inspired I've become by that heart to heart Lexi and I shared on September 28th....that was my mother's birthday too. Hmmm, there were a lot of things working to help me that evening and now. I'm certain of it.

Photo credit goes to my dear husband, Dan. Doesn't he do an awesome job? :)

Thank you for sharing this journey with me. I would love to know what you think about this first piece in my Soul Searching series.

Until next time, aspire to be more as an artist and a person. I know I am.

Chocolate Gelato and Mountain Sunsets

I’m posting this on my glass and metalworking blogs because I feel strongly about sharing this with all of you creative spirits.

The Creative Block. It happens to all of us, right? The dreaded, proverbial block to our creativity process and energy. I call it “Hitting the WALL”. When it happens, we go through whatever we hope will unblock us and release that creative energy that we all have.

Sometimes it doesn’t last very long, other times it lasts longer than we would care to admit. What causes it? How do we work through it? Many folks smarter than I have written about it, discussed it, theorized about it, and proposed solutions.

I don’t know that I have a solution per se, but I do know that I hit “the WALL” a little over a week ago. The trip to Estes was beneficial, but even when I got home I was stymied. I couldn’t believe it. Here I had all those beautiful stones that I had just purchased at the Denver Gem & Mineral Show and every design I tried looked blah. They all started to look the same. Here’s the stone, here’s the stone shape…maybe a texture, an overlay, or nothing. BORING! At least it was boring to me. I wanted to showcase these stones and do justice to them, not detract from them.

Most of you know that Lexi Erickson is my friend, teacher, and mentor. Lexi has a wonderful ability to tune into others and get a sense of what may be happening with them. I am convinced she has an extra sense. After I got back from Estes, she asked me to come to her home for another lesson. I quickly agreed and told her I was having trouble with designs all of a sudden. She assured me we would work through it.

On Monday evening, off to Denver I went to spend some quality time with Lexi. My design journal and recently purchased stones in tow. As is our custom, we sit and catch up for a bit. She asked to see my designs and could tell my frustration. She commented that she knew I had been frustrated for a while even though I hadn’t vocalized it until that evening. As we looked at my designs, she shared my thoughts about how some of them were just plain boring. She kindly pointed out that there was nothing wrong with them, but I was growing as an artist and what was a perfectly good design was just too plain and boring for where I wanted to go next. She picked one design that centered on my favorite stone; a heart shaped Chinese Writing Stone. Effortlessly, she drew several beautiful designs for this stone to show me examples of how to create Emphasis in a design. Those were signature Lexi designs, just as individual as her handwriting. The key is they were the beginning of what would help me to break out of the constraints of “the WALL”.

I’m a very visual learner and just to see some examples of where designs could go was exhilarating. I didn’t understand why I hadn’t come up with that on my own, but I know that’s just part of the learning process too.

The mentor and her padawan learner; we went over the basics of design.

Principles:

• Line
• Color
• Shape
• Value
• Texture

Elements:

• Pattern
• Repetition
• Emphasis

Lexi was kind enough to write these in my journal and I am referring to them! She said it's not uncommon to experience being blocked after getting the sensory overload from the Gem and Mineral Show. I'm certain that had a lot to do with it. All these beautiful stones and I am so committed to doing justice to each and every one of them.

And then she turned to me and said, “How about going out for a gelato?”. It kind of took me aback, because to me, it was "what does that have to do with jewelry design?"... oh little did I know what was happening to break through my artist's block. Well, I had never had a gelato and wasn’t really certain what they were, but no matter, we got in her truck and headed out after a little more discussion and review of the stones I had purchased and the stones she had purchased at the Gem and Mineral Show.

On the way, she said that she didn’t think I needed a lesson so much as an evening to relax, talk about goals, art, and life, enjoy a gelato and watch the sunset on the mountains.

I thank those of you who have hung in there to this point, because I finally got to the part about gelato and mountain sunsets!

We enjoyed our respective variations on chocolate gelatos and conversed. A true heart to heart. Sharing our thoughts about our own unique life experiences. Let me tell you, those moments in life are precious and meant to be cherished. I do.

When we finished our gelatos, we headed to one of her favorite mountain viewing areas to watch the sun set. She pointed out that as the sun sets, the light on the mountains shows the variations that you don’t see during normal daylight. It reminded her of metalwork with all the depths and contours. She was right. I never looked at the mountains that way before. We took in all those wonderful colors in the sky as the sun sets too. Inspirational!

She asked why I was ‘blocked’ and the answer that came to me was fear. I was afraid of making a mistake. Gee, that’s how we learn! And believe me, I recognize fear is the worst emotion that can attempt to govern our lives and our decision making process. I KNOW THIS and yet it was holding me back. Calmly, Lexi said, “It’s only metal”. Yes, that’s true and I don’t work in anything expensive like gold or platinum yet. I’m still concerned about the cost of Sterling Silver, but on an individual item basis, it’s only metal and can be recycled into something else when you do make those inevitable mistakes as you are learning or working. It’s ok….you are going to make mistakes. Geez, duh, I know this…time to confront my fear and eliminate it.

Lexi reminded me that her series “Conversations with Harold” came out of a very similar situation; she was enjoying an evening of discussing life, art, and more with her friend and mentor Harold O’Connor. Wow. My response was maybe I’ll have a “Conversations with Lexi” series!!!

So much came out of that evening. We watched the sunset create new lines and outlines of those beautiful Rocky Mountains. I realized, as odd as it was, I needed her permission to venture forth and go beyond what I knew how to do metal work wise. She gave me her permission even though I shouldn’t need it. We’re both over achievers. We both got straight A’s. Neither of us can just do something simple and easy the first time, we have to try to do something more complicated and advanced. We laughed. We discussed our goals. What did success mean? Philosophical topics, dreams, hopes, aspirations, how fortunate both of us are with the wonderful husbands we have. Quite refreshing.

In order to grow in one area, sometimes you need to let go of other areas. I’ve been conflicted with my love of glass and this newfound love of working with metal. I’ve started to come to terms with this. I can’t stop creating things with glass; I enjoy the process too much. Yet, I’m just beginning to understand that art jewelry work is where I am even stronger as an artist….or maybe I should say, where I have my greatest potential. I truly have become consumed with the process. You will still see me posting my glass art as I cannot completely give that up.

She expressed concern that maybe this discussion wasn’t helping me, but I explained that I generally need time to process things like this. She understood because she does the same thing, that is, she needs time to process information about important subjects. I told her that knowing me, my subconscious was taking all of this in and I would probably have my break through in the middle of the night. Typical to wake up at 2 AM with an idea, solution for a problem I’ve been working on, well you get the picture.

We enjoyed the sunset and I headed home. I was drained.

At 4 AM, the flood gate opened and design ideas emerged. I had my break through AND it was faster than I even expected! I think three designs came to me while I was trying to go back to sleep until the alarm went off at 5 AM. The good news is I was able to capture all of those designs on paper. And I’ve been on a roll ever since. Oh what a feeling!

As I reflect on that evening, I think it was more about Soul Searching. You guessed it, my new art jewelry line will be called “Soul Searching”. I have at least 6 designs in that series and I’m running with it.

The next time you hit “the WALL”, remember chocolate gelatos and mountain sunsets. Gelatos are delicious and well, mountains are breathtaking. Find that friend and mentor who will listen and encourage you, while you take in the beauty that surrounds in nature. The point is take in something that is beautiful to you, enjoy something delicious, and just relax. Your internal creative energy will come to life! Trust me, it really will.

Thanks for taking the time to read this. I am sharing this in the hopes it will help you to unblock your creativity. I look forward to hearing your thoughts and experiences too.

Until next time, aspire to be more as an artist and a person! I know I am.

Thank you Lexi.

20th Annual Castle Rock Art Festival

Lexi Erickson's Archaeologica Art Jewelry

Just Announced.... Lexi won Best of Fine Craft for this Show!!!
She is automatically accepted into next year's show.
Congrats and Well Deserved my dear friend.

Yesterday, Dan and I went to the Castle Rock Art Festival. This is the first time we've attended the event, even though both of us have lived in this area for over 15 years! Our main motivation to go was to see Lexi's booth. She's changed the look and feel of it to better represent her line of art jewelry, called Archaeologica.

Beautiful bronze sculptures

The weather was overcast that morning and it was cool. Fall is coming to the Rockies. There was a nice crowd and we were happy to see more people were buying from the artists than we had seen at previous shows this year.

Paintings and metalwork

The caliber of the artists in this show is really outstanding. I think the jury is very selective and discriminating in their choices and it truly shows.


In the afternoon, the skies opened up and according to Lexi it just poured. That chased all the potential shoppers home and the artists closed shop early for the day because it was a driving rain, no customers, and I can only imagine how tired they were.


Today is the last day of the show and right now the weather is overcast and it is cold. The forecast indicates that it should get into the mid 70's today and that would be great for all.

Loved these large Aspen paintings!

It's a very nice show and Dan & I are considering applying for it next year with a 10' x 20' booth for Krucoff Studios. Dan can display his photographs and I can have a variety of my glass and metal works.

May all of you have a wonderful day and week of creativity! Aspire to be more as an artist and a person.

Salida Riverside Arts Festival

Yesterday Dan & I traveled to Salida, Colorado for the first Riverside Arts Festival. It was a nice day, even though a few rain showers visited. There were 100 artists admitted to this juried show. My friend, mentor, and teacher, Lexi Erickson was there. It's the first of three shows she will be doing in the next 6 weeks. The following is a picture of Lexi talking with a customer in her booth. She's wearing one of her pieces, of course!

I saw some beautiful work and had an opportunity to meet some of the artists. Pam Caidin was there. Her metalwork jewelry designs/creations are just phenomenal. She's featured in the current issue of Lapidary Journal. We had a chance to visit and I discovered she was a member of Colorado Metalsmiths Association (CoMa) too. We discussed getting to know each other better at the upcoming meetings, which would be great.

Lexi introduced me to Harold O'Connor, her friend & mentor. Harold is an internationally known goldsmith and an extraordinarily gifted artist. It was great fun to finally meet him and I hope someday to take one of his workshops.

Fellow Coyote Creek Artist Cat Roberts was there with her beautiful watercolor paintings. We had a chance to talk and discussed the possibility of doing a trade of our respective works. I really enjoy doing that with other artists.

Salida is known for its artists and there is a definite charm to the city as reflected in the next couple of pictures that Dan took.



One of my favorites is of this building with the large stained glass sun in the circle window at the top.


Dan took this shot of me with some of the festival in the background. Who knows, maybe I'll apply to do the show next year? I'm wearing one of Lexi's pieces, of course!


Oh and I have a finished pendant on my other blog, it has one of my glass cabs as a center. Please stop by and take a look. Thanks!

May all of you have a wonderful week of creativity. Aspire to be more as an artist and person.

Kathleen's Newsletter

My time has been divided with LOTS of activities:

• learning metalwork techniques
• designing and publishing Lexi's new website and blog
• working on glass designs
  
• normal life stuff

Now I've added to this list and I am trying a new service, Mail Chimp, to start a newsletter. I know a number of you have monthly newsletters and I enjoy them. So I felt it was time for me to start one. If you'd like to sign up, just visit my studio site and in the upper right hand corner is a link to subscribe to the newsletter. If you are thinking about creating a newsletter, you might want to look at this service too. Initial start up is free and as your mailing list grows, then you will need to upgrade.

I do have glass projects pending in my 'work queue' which I will be publishing soon.

Here's wishing all of you a great week of creativity!

First Glass Setting

Coppery Blaze

This is my first glass piece set in a bezel. The second design that I worked on for last week's assignment.

More textures. The copper has a slight texture that was achieved with some paper that had a subtle design to it. The silver overlay has a more hammered appearance achieved with the chasing hammer. And the glass is one of my crinklized fused pieces.


Initially I had a different arrangement in mind with my design as the drawing shows. However, as I worked on this, the design evolved to have the glass cabochon setting square, rather than as a diamond. I also was thinking of doing a piercing to create the bail, but I changed my mind and rolled the tip over toward the back of the pendant.

Lexi thought that the curling of the bottom of the pendant would complete the look and she was definitely right. I'm very tickled with this piece and look forward to doing more settings with my glass cabs. Of course, I have always liked stones too, so I will be using them in my jewelry pieces too.

Lapis Pendant

This is one of the pendants I finished, with Lexi's help, on Thursday evening of last week. My homework for this lesson was to design two pendants, do all the preliminary work necessary to set a bezel in class that evening. This is the first of my two designs. The three leaf outlines on the bottom right are variations from the crystal pattern I mentioned in my last post.

The beautiful blue lapis stone is one of the ones I purchased during my weekend workshop in Fairplay last month. I liked the shape of this stone and wanted to have it offset with a small design element, the leaves.

Another part of this assignment was to create a textured surface and then I would learn how to set a bezel on that. Our back patio provided the texture for this one.

Here is the original design template that evolved after a number of drawings.

And this shows how the sterling blank looked prior to setting the stone in a bezel. I also wanted the bail to fold over and carry that leaf look.

The setting and bezel are Sterling Silver. Once I had the bezel soldered in place, I set the stone. After that, I curved the bail around and down toward the top of the pendant. I wanted that delicate leaf for the bail and carrying that theme through the piece.

Lexi showed me so many neat little ways to demonstrate craftsmanship. She is an amazing teacher!

I have another pendant to post, that was part of this assignment. Stay tuned for tomorrow's episode. :D

Inspirations

I feel somewhat scattered these days and I am finding inspirations for future works in a variety of places and things.


The flowers in my various gardens are starting to provide some wonderful displays and yes, inspirations! In my class with Lexi, she told me that I would start to see jewelry designs in almost everything I looked at. Well, my flowers are providing that for me, so I wanted to share a couple that have grabbed my attention. I see earring & pendant shapes in many of these. All keeping with how nature inspires my work.


And then, the flowers are lending themselves to designs for stained glass windows.


I have reached that point where I need to create another stained glass window....or two....or three.


I've had several requests to create some basset hound windows for some dog show art and Newton has provided plenty of inspiration for that so I need to include him in this post. He has a wonderfully expressive face and a great head. I know I'm partial, but I just find him absolutely handsome!


Over the weekend, we were finally able to mow and edge our back yard since the rains let up to the point where things were dry enough to do the necessary work. As luck or maybe misfortune would have it, we think a piece of pea gravel was thrown by the string trimmer or the mower and fractured the tempered glass in one of our living room windows. As a glass artist, I am truly fascinated by the splintering effect of tempered glass when something causes a break. I took a couple of pictures and thought this would be something cool for a design too....maybe stained glass...maybe jewelry...yet to be decided.

My journey with the combination of metal and glass has just begun. Lexi set up my torch today. I'm very close to starting work on more art jewelry. I need a few more pieces of equipment and Lexi's tutelage. The demands for her work and instruction are many; I know I am truly blessed as she has accepted me as her only student at this time. I will live up to her expectations.

Thanks to all of you too for your support and encouragement. It means more to me than words can express.

Happy Creativity All! :D

Project #5 - Bezel Setting

Project #5 from Lexi Erickson's Art Jewelry Workshop

Being able to create pieces like this, well, yes, that was my goal from this workshop. And in order to do that, I needed to learn all the techniques leading up to the creation of this piece.

Originally, I had planned to use one of my glass cabochons for the bezel setting. Here is a preliminary sketch I completed in preparation for that work.

However, as luck would have it, a gentlemen who sells stones arrived at Coyote Creek early that afternoon and Pat Pocius only sees him twice a year. When he arrives, he has tons of beautiful stones. She brought a few samples into the class and we scattered upstairs to see what he had.

Here is a picture of my selections and of course, the one in the bezel was included in that group. So by that twist of fate, I was setting a stone rather than one of my glass cabs, but hey, I'm fine with that.

In this project, we created a design that would showcase the cabochon. For this stone, Lexi felt a simple design was best and I couldn't agree more.

We learned how to fit the bezel, solder it, and set the stone. I am ready to do more as soon as I get my bench and torch set up. My hope is that will happen in a couple of weeks. I have things on order and I'm ready to get started down this path of creating art jewelry.

This is the last of the projects that we completed in the workshop. Lexi truly is a phenomenal person and excellent teacher. I will have the privilege of taking more classes with her and I look forward to it. This was an intense workshop and Lexi told us that she covered a semester's worth of work in those two days. If you ever have a chance to take one of Lexi's classes...it's a MUST!

Happy Creating All.

Project #4 - Overlay

Project #4 from Lexi Erickson's Art Jewelry Workshop

After Saturday's class we had homework. Come up with designs for our next two projects that we would do on Sunday. We also had some reading assignments. It was a nice way to relax and let some of what I had learned sink in.

That evening I came up with several designs, but none of them really 'spoke' to me. When I got up on Sunday, I had time for a nice breakfast at The Hand Hotel and I decided to walk around the hotel and explore a little bit. It is a very quaint Bed & Breakfast and had lots of nooks and crannies. Some quiet little sitting areas and I decided to relax, get out my sketch book and see what else came to mind. I had some nice subject materials around me and found this great shot of a Puffin with a mouth full of shrimp to feed her young. The design literally jumped out at me. This beautiful Puffin beak would make a great design for a pendant. And as I looked more closely, I loved the shape of her eyes. They became my design for these overlay earrings. With my trusty digital camera, I snapped this picture of a picture so I could have it to refer back to in the future for my pendant design. If anyone had seen me doing this, I'm sure they would have questioned my sanity...taking a photo of a picture in a magazine when there is so much beauty in the scenery surrounding Fairplay! However, this was important for my art. :)

As my first attempt at this technique, I made a number of mistakes. One of the eyes has some fire scale, which I can and will sand to remove. The other one moved on me in the soldering process so I have some solder on the copper and need to work on that too. I did run these through the rolling mill with some textured paper to create a very soft texture...it's hard to see in this photo. And the shapes aren't completely perfect either. However, the important thing was learning the various techniques and I'm looking forward to creating my next overlay project.

Project #3 - Pierced Piece

Project #3 from Lexi Erickson's Art Jewelry Workshop

This was such a fun piece to make. Lexi provided some designs or we could come up with our own. I have such a weakness for Aspen leaves that I came up with this design.

First we make a template of the actual design and glued that to our piece of copper. Then we started to saw around the template to create the desired shape. In this case, I allowed for a bail that was folded down for a chain to pass through. Now the fun really started once the outline was cut. We had to punch a staring hole at a point in the piece to pass our saw blade through, reattach the blade to the saw and begin cutting the inner shape....which became the cut out design. This process is known as piercing and you can do all sorts of fun things with these outlines, such as solder them onto another background piece of the same or different metal....depending on your skill.

Once the shape was right, all the edges needed to be smoothed with a file. That took a while and I'm sure I will get better with that part of the process with practice. Rule #1 is jewelry shouldn't hurt the wearer, so no sharp points or edges.

Next I was introduced to the rolling mill. What a cool tool! I selected a decorative plate and placed that with my copper piece, running it between the rollers to stamp the design on the copper. Sort of like those machines at the state fair or amusement parks where you can put in a copper penny and roll the lever so the design of the event is now pressed into the penny. Of course the penny gets flattened and elongated in the process. And that flattening and elongation happens here too, but you can control how much you want.

One of the last steps was the liver of silver treatment again to darken the surface. Using some brushes the high points of the piece had some of the dark color removed so you can see little highlights in the piece.

It was so much fun. I keep thinking about all the possibilities this brings to my future work.

Project #2 - Three Stacking Rings

Project # 2 from the Lexi Erickson Art Jewelry Workshop.

Our second project was a set of three sterling silver stacking rings. This gave us the opportunity to experiment more with textures and it was my first attempt to solder metal. I love to solder and prior to this experience, I had lots of soldering experience with stained glass window construction. Well, this is nothing like stained glass soldering.

I learned about the torch and how to solder these three bands. Totally new for me. We learned how to size the rings. Add a variety of textures, which this photo doesn't show very well. One was hammered, another had a bit of sawing to add furrows and the last one was left plain. We learned the importance of having a flat edge to create a butt joint. And then, the soldering. Clean up in the pickle solution (a combination of sulfuric acid and water in a mini crock pot). And then the final polishing. I was hooked with project #1, but it just kept getting better.


As promised, here is a picture of the second set of earrings from Project #1. I created a different texture on this pair and we learned about applying liver of sulpher to darken the copper. Basically the same shape as the first pair, just another technique applied.

Each project built on the skills learned in the previous project. It just became more fascinating to me.

Project #1

My first of five projects from this past weekend's Lexi Erickson's Art Jewelry Workshop.

All I can say is WOW. I'm still assimilating information and I think it is going to take some time to process what I learned. Plus, I will be practicing the techniques Lexi taught and developing new designs for my jewelry.

Let me tell you that Lexi is a fantastic instructor, friend, mentor. If you ever have an opportunity to take one of her workshops.... just DO IT!!! She is so sharing and willing to teach you what she knows.

Now I realize that these aren't the most fantastic earrings you will ever see, but these are my first pieces of metal work and I was delighted with the techniques I've learned so far. Part of Lexi's lesson plan is to build on each technique you acquire. And we did just that....wait til you see Project #5!!!!

The first project showed us how to get familiar with our saw, cut circles, add texture, shape, drill and finish. Pretty cool stuff from my perspective.

So I will share this photo of me (taken by Lexi) that shows my initial interaction with the saw and cutting the copper circle that eventually became two pairs of earrings. Yes, a second pair will make their debut tomorrow.

I did have a great weekend of creativity!

Coyote Creek ~ Sneak Preview

Dan took some great pictures at Coyote Creek yesterday. I thought I would share a few here and if you would like to see some more, check out the new group I formed on Facebook for Coyote Creek Studio Arts.

It was a nice day, we had a good turnout of first time patrons. The inside of the gallery has undergone this wonderful transformation of gorgeous works by all the artists.

An added bonus, Dan took in his portfolio of photographs and was immediately accepted! That's my guy. Lexi Erickson, who is the President of Coyote Creek, said he had her vote the minute she saw his photos on our website. Lexi is pictured here, outside the gallery with a large floral sculpture and a few of the artist, including the mayor of Fairplay (Fred on the left).












And yes, here is yours truly inside the gallery. The camera is not always my best friend, but it's a shot where I'm talking to Dan, my personal photographer. :D

By the way, Lexi and I have become fast friends. There are those wonderful, rare occasions when you meet someone and experience an immediate connection. We did that and I cannot tell you how much that means to me. I am enrolled in Lexi's Art Jewelry Workshop in June and we are going to take my jewelry to the next level!