Stitches & Ridges

I was inspired by fancifuldevices long skinny wrist wraps/cuff/bracelets.

I have been meaning to get back to my fabric stash and sari trim haul from India. I've been stashing and hoarding bits that have been given to me along the way.

 I was all set to give this to my niece that just graduated from college when I remembered that the salmon skin leather 

  button hole clasp wouldn't be up her alley (she's vegan or do you say, "she's a vegan"?) so I'll make her an all fabric one along the same lines. Meanwhile one of my fellow vendors at my farmer's market wanted to give it to her daughter and wanted to show it on facebook for her approval and immediately another vendor came RUNNING to my booth gasping "Where is it!" The first gal decided to relinquish

it to the other gal knowing that this woman NEVER bought jewelry and it was really meant for her. So don't underestimate the power of facebook even if you are within yards of folks in realtime. It's kind of sadly telling that it was a slow day for sales at the market and any of you that do shows probably realize that when it slows down, vendors start buying from each other.

I'm getting the hang of my ridged press now. I had sort of put it aside as they were coming out al squishy and extruded mostly. Now I have learned how to make the bicones come out more consistently.

Let bicones be bicones, I say!

And they are all the better when they get the crust factor going. 

I think I had a record day for beads made a few days ago.

Here are some orfinks that are up for grabs. Speak up here as I won't be listing them on Etsy. I'll just use them myself because it doesn't matter to me if they aren't matchy. ( there are a couple of matching pairs in the bunch actually.

Limpet bead caps

antifreeze glow

and shiny antifreeze glow.

I did a guest post about headpins over at Love My Art Jewelry Blog a few days ago and there are plenty of other posts you may find interesting over there if you haven't checked it out yet.

Back to the Alaskan Garaj Mahal Studio

I had some nails waiting for me in my studio when I returned north.

My friend Mountain Heather that makes simply wonderful hats had asked me last year when she was in the Adirondacks whether I thought that I could use some old barn nails that she had found.

This was before I had thought of lampworking onto rusty  nails. I knew that I would be able to use them for something so  how nice it was to return to this stash of antique nails  to use. I had brought a few of my feeler gap gauges back home too.

Then there was a hardware store in our little town that had been closed since the pipeline days in the 70's. The were having a sellout sale at half price 70's prices. They were Alaskan prices mind you  which were quite high in comparison to stateside prices but still quite a good deal. So when I found a case of the cut nails that I was about to buy in a regular hardware store I knew I had clear the shelves of whatever they had. So these are truly vintage nails although they were brand new out of the box.

I got my new ridgy press to play with and definitely experimenting with going outside the press.

This one came out lopsided so I decided to pierce the more bulbous edge and quite liked the effect.

More edgy ridgies....the tootsie roll pop effect

It's a great big crusty whorl

Criffle crazy~ blue ink color

"Cirrus" color from two different lots of the same kind of glass.

You can see that two of the strike opaque and the other three are semi opaque .

Funny glass....and funny scan too

I think this color is called "kryptonite"

"Fremen" with frit and soda technique

New colors! I got a shipment in today. so exciting to try out some new ones.

Back when I first started making beads in the late 90's the palette available was much more limited.

They're coming out with so many new odd colors with a much more organic look that I prefer. 

Clockwise from the top

Blueberry Shake

Mojito

Mint Lozenge

Lichen

I'll have to get back to you on the next one ...I forget

and in the middle the pale ones are Strawberry Shake and 

Orange  Flint.

They change colors in the flame with the addition of the *frit and the baking soda.

The pure colors can come out quite different.

                                                 * Frit is crushed glass and the kind I use is called reduction frit which has metallic oxides in it that can change the way a glass looks.

a couple more ridgy guys

It still may be a bit before I list these, the weather hasn't been cooperating lately with some fierce winds. I need to get my photography setup figured out now at this place. I had finally found the most ideal set-up for good photos down in Arizona so bear with me please.

Feel free to contact me if you care to put anything on reserve before it hits my Etsy shop.

I'm more than happy to oblige.