LEAVE THEM IN STITCHES

•December 29, 2009 • Leave a Comment

Last year, I started dabbling in making jewelry with seed beads.  It was one of the most frustrating things  I had ever tried to do, and soon gave up when I couldn’t get past the first couple of rows! 

Don’t call me a quitter, I just had to back away from it before I lost my mind  Well, I decided to take it up again, and you know what they say, practice makes perfect.    Anyway, I just wanted to share with you what others are doing with their precious little Myuki’s and Delica’s.   It is simply amazing what  you can do with a vial of 11/0 seed beads, beading thread, and needle.

the magic of seed beads and a gemstone cabachon

image

Do You Tube?

•December 5, 2009 • 2 Comments

As any jewelry designer knows, having a presence in Cyberspace is not only beneficial, it’s absolutely necessary!  Between finding someone to design your site ( or taking it on yourself), signing up for a domain/hosting package that suits your needs, and getting it live on the Web, it can be a daunting, and exhausting task! 

Amazingly enough, I finally got my website designed (after 38 revisions) and live! I cannot tell you how many nights I spent sitting at my computer with my coffeemaker at my side, toiling over the infinite colors schemes, text sizes, and placement of the perfect pictures of my handmade jewelry.

Now comes the hard part, generating traffic to my site, because after all, what good is having a website full of fun, beautiful jewelry if nobody can see it? So here we go! Of course I painstakingly chose all the right keywords, submitted my site to all of the search engines, and even stooped as low as to try to sneak my url into a couple of blog comments! I’ve included a “link” page where I am displaying banners of other sites I find interesting, then it hit me!

I was messing around on Youtube, looking for some video instructions on how to make my own sterling silver headpins, ( i run through a pack of 100 like they never existed!) when it struck me like one of those anvils in the Looney Tunes cartoons; why can’t I make my very own commerical to post on youtube!

Life Insurance?


Image

So I made some slides using the free photo editing program Paint.net. This is an alternative to Adobe Photoshop which is SO NOT in my budget!
I typed out my script on the slides and inserted some graphics I found at www.victorian-vignettes.blogspot.com. I absolutely love the images she has, all of them from her vast collection of vintage postcards etc…
I chose the ones I wanted to use, manipulated them in Paint and copied them to Windows Movie Maker. I added some music I found in the public domain, and programmed the way I wanted the slides to transition, and Voila! An internet commerical for Youtube was born. You can view it here.

It was super easy, and alot of fun!

•December 1, 2009 • Leave a Comment

"Mardi Gras" earrings use amethyst nuggest, and briolettes available now at www.kldezines.com

When I go to the bead shop to buy gemstones, I am often lured to the purple stones. Maybe they speak to the queen in me, as purple is the color of royalty.

Amethyst gemstones come in colors ranging from lavender with cream inclusions, to a deep translucent purple most often found in the cabachons of rings, and earrings. A majority of the Amthysts used in jewelry making today have been heat treated to achieve that majestic purple color.

Amethyst starts off as a druzy, which is a crystalline that is found growing on the surface of other rocks.

amethyst in the rough

an amethyst encrusted rock (druzy)

According to Greek mythology, Dionysis ( the god of intoxication) was enraged by a comment made by a mortal. Dionysis vowed to wreak his revenge on the next mortal who crossed his path, and made two tigers to carry out his vengenance.

Amethyst was a maiden who was on her way to pay homage to the goddess Diana, who knew of Dionysis’ plan, and turned Amethyst into a statue of solid crytsalline to protect her from an attack. Upon the site of the beautiful girl turned into stone, Dionysis wept tears of red wine, which stained the crystal statue, turning it a brilliant, deep purple color.

amethyst which had been heat treated, cut, and polished

Image
Image
Image

WWW.KLDEZINES.COM….THE WEBSITE

•November 29, 2009 • Leave a Comment

After a month-and-a-half of sleepless night, lethargic days, countless cups of black coffee, and being at the point of shucking my computer out the window, my website www.kldezines.com is finally up and running.  I am a DIY girl, and went into this in hopes that I could turn up a nice website to sell my jewelry, but also to hone my graphic design skills in perparation for returning to school for graphic design. 

I must admit, because I didn’t have a clue as to what I was doing, I think it turned out pretty cool.  My first site, was a little too masculine for a jewelry site…

My first published attempt. when i found out that people weren't staying on the site, I decided to give it a whole new look.

So I changed everything around, lightened up my color scheme and VOILA!   www.kldezines.com is now up, running and fully functional!

The new banner, hopefully this will help my stats!

For beautiful jewelry handcrafted by me…remember

www.kldezines.com!

Playing with Polymer Clay…

•November 27, 2009 • 1 Comment

Good morning! When I was little, I loved to play with clay. My mother would make me and my brother some home-made clay (don’t even ask me what it was made of) and let us play with it on the kitchen table.

I would squish  it through my fingers and make whatever came to mind. Me being the silly girl that i was, would divide it into small pieces, roll it, and shape it to cover my fingernails! I remember getting yelled at when I used my mom’s fingernail polish to paint them!
Anyhow, once discovered jewelry making I rediscovered my love of sculpting with clay!

Polymer clay is not clay. However, it is a Polymer Polyvinyl Chloride which is moldable. This is an amazing medium as you can sculpt the clay into any shape you like, bake it in the oven according to the instructions, and you have a hot little peice of art!

 

 I began making small beads with polymer clay with a bead roller. This is a great little contraption used to make uniform beads in three shapes; round, bicone, and oval. Once I became comfortable enough, I began hand-rolling my beads.

Polymer Clay comes  in a variety of colors, including metallics. I think the best value is the multi packs which you can get at any Walmart ranging from $9.00- to $30.00. Of course, the more blocks of clay contained in the package, the more it costs. I love to take two to three colors and perform what is known as “marbling”. I also buy a block of the plain white clay, as you can make your beads, then paint the finished product, or mix it with the other colors.

When I first started to research making jewelry with Polymer Clay, I wasn’t sure which brand to use. There are many, but I think the most popular are Kato, Sculpey, Primo, and Femo.
Most crafters like Premo,Kato, and Fimo because they are not as soft as Sculpey, but I like working with Scupey III, which is a bit firmer than the original Sculpey.

When I make a set of chunky beads, I like using Sculpey Light. It is very lightweight, and won’t add weight to the beads, which you can then hand paint with an acrylic based paint.

Here are a couple of examples of the amazing things I have done with my Polymer Clay….

my first attempt at handrolling my own beads, this is the "marbling" technique

These beads are an example of “marbling”. I mixed powder blue Sculpey III with silver metallic, and dark green. I combined pieces of all three and mixed them until they were intergrated. Be very careful when doing this, unless you want the colors completely mixed to make one other color. I then used unmarked latex gloves to roll the beads into a large oval pillow. I then pierced the beads through the middle very gently as not to disturb their shape with a metal skewer, and suspended them on a bead backing rack which I bought at Michael’s craft store. After about fifteen minutes at 215 degrees, the beads were placed in ice water to set their shape. Be careful, the clay and metal are very hot. (I would also recommend using a dedicated toaster oven for baking the clay, and anyting else you use that comes in contact with Polymer Clay should not come in contact with food!)

After the beads wer cooled, I used my  Dremel Pro to sand and buff the beads. Sanding and buffing give them a smooth surface, but be careful because if you sand them too much you will wear grooves in them. You could also use sandpaper, but that takes too long!

After the beads are sanded and buffed, I place them on wooden skewers, dip the beads in a floor wax with acrylic, and stick the skewer in a block of styrofoam to dry. If the weather is good, and there’s no rain in the forecast, I will let them sit outside. If they get wet at this point, they will develop an opaque film on their surface. I usually dip mine a minimum of ten times, which can take an entire day, but the end result is absolutely stunning.

My "Goddess" pendant

I also made this out of red SculpeyIII. ”Goddess” is basically modeled after myself when I was pregnant.   It took about a week to get the proportions just the way I wanted,  and countless dippings in the floor wax.  I used all purpose sand paper to sand in between and under the breasts, and between the legs.  This particular pendant is pierced across the top where the shoulders are, and I attached a piece of 20 gauge silver wire, wrapped loops on both ends and attached it to a length of silver chain to wear as a necklace.

This is my absolute favorite pendant to make.  This is one of those instances where I used the regular white Sclupey to make the base of the pendant.  I then rolled out the brownish-orange color and laid it over the base, carving it on the back of the pendant which is white.  I then rolled out a thin sheet of black clay, and used an xacto knife to cut out the stripes, which I then placed on the orange surface.  I also attached a loop on the top to make a bail, and baked it on a stone tile in the oven.  Here is the finished product.

Tiger Pendant made with SculpeyIII

As you can see, when working with clay, you are only limited by your own imagination.  Happy sculpting!!!!

Check out my Slide Show!

•November 27, 2009 • Leave a Comment

Cool Jewelry Making Products II

•November 27, 2009 • 2 Comments

As a jewelry designer, I’m always on the look out for items that can make my job a little easier. Although I genuinely enjoy every aspect of jewelry making, some things can be more than a little redundant, such as wire wrapping 250 3mm Swarovski crytal bicone beads! So here are some things that I think should be in every jewelry makers stash.

I hate when I’m adding beads to chain, and the weight of the necklace causes it to slip from my grasp. I’ve chipped quite a few beads this way. So I was as pleased as punch to know that someone invented the Chain Sta’. This little gadget lets you attach chain, and it keeps it in place while you add beads, charms, or whatever. The best thing about Chain Sta is that it can double as a way to display your necklaces and bracelets!
Image
Another plus is that it’s relatively inexpensive, www.rings-things.com sells them for $11.25 each, which won’t break your jewelry making budget!

Another thing I’m excited about is the Ferido x1 jewelry adhesive. This stuff is a crafters dream. Basically it’s an adhesive in clay form. You can use it a number of different ways to adhere things like flat backed rhinestones to flat surfaces like wood, glass, or metal, or you can roll it into beads that cure with no heat! Not so inexpensive, a 50 gram package costs in the neighborhood of $25.00 at www.firemountaingems.com, and comes in a variety of colors.

beads made with ferido x1


Image

Gemstones A-Z: Amazonite

•November 27, 2009 • Leave a Comment


In an earlier post, I told you all about gemstone mines, and one of the gems I wrote about was the Amazonite stone which I find absolutely beautiful.

Amozonite is a stone that is aqua-blue and with cream inclusions. It is called the “stone of hope” because it is reputed to have properties that give the one wearing it hope and confindence. Some believe the stone was named for the Amazon River, but others believe that it was named after the warrior women of the Bronze age who were a matriarchal society. I’ll pick the latter!

Image
Image

HAPPY THANKSGIVING

•November 26, 2009 • Leave a Comment

I hope everyone has a very nice Thanksgiving. Some of the many things I am thankful for are my family, as I have often times taken them for granted. My own children whom I think about everyday, and I know I wouldn’t be the same person if they were not here! I am thannkful for what I have, as there are those who have so much less than I do! It’s very easy to forget that others are suffering, hungry, homeless, and have a slew of problems!!! I am also thankful that I have found something that keeps me passionate about life, and that is jewelry making!

RIP Kenyi
Wanda
Yvonne
Angela
Aunt Leoda
Aunt Lethia
Aunt Mildred…I feel like I lost a part of myself since you all have gone on.

Out With the Old…

•November 21, 2009 • 1 Comment

Although I haven’t been blogging, I have taken time to really step up my jewelry making game.  First, I had to really think about where I wanted to take this.  I had to decide between it being just a hobby, or something I wanted turn into a source of income.  I think the definition of the “American Dream” is doing what you love to do, and getting paid to do it.  Is that considered work?  I don’t think so.   I do know that if you are really passionate about what you do, then you will be succesful. 

I made some things at the beginning of this year, and looking back at them, decided that they weren’t hardly good enough.  This necklace was one of those things.  I mean don’t get me wrong, I liked it, but I didn’t love it.  I kept thinking that it was missing that something that could make it a great piece of jewelry, as opposed to an okay piece of jewlery. 

So I had to dismantle it.  Here is how it looked before. 

It was nice enought but it didn’t move me.  This is how it looks now…..

I kept the pink cubic zirc, and got rid of the copper replacing it with sterling silver.  I then wire wrapped some green and pink crystals and placed them between two green Swarovski bicone beads.  I think adding the crystal drops at the top, and the wire wrapped beads surrounding the cz gave it more color, and more texture.    It reminds me of a spring flower.