Fini Friday! Treasure Trove!

Hello Everyone! 

Welcome to Fini Friday! 

I hope your week has been lively and your weekend full of fun plans! I've shinies and loot to show you today! 

This is a cache of treasures from a good friend.

They were originally from a dear relative of hers who was downsizing her jewelry collection. Aren't they marvelous? I love the eclectic collection of styles, shapes and colours!  I don't have any concrete ideas just yet for this menagerie, but I find it all fascinating!  The faceting on the clear glass beads winks demurely at me.  The baby blue beads have a soft allure to them.  The more rough red beads to the left and multi-coloured milifori beads to the right are a bit bohemian and organic.  The silvery chain and matte white beads are interesting in an architectural and textural way....Hmmmm..... It will be fun to create with these!! YAY!

My last batch of loot for today is these golden beauties!

The chain to the left and top is a wonderful Greek Key design with three different styles of Goddesses every so often.  Aren't they lovely?

The brooches to the right are secured together by that fabulous chain.  I love the geometric designs, swirls and, of course, the Keys!

Hmmm.. there seems to be a theme to this trove - keys!  How apt, since they are treasures already unlocked!

So that's it for this Fini Friday!

Just a quick reminder... I've an exciting event this

Sunday at 5pm (CST, USA)! I and Cheryl Patton will be teaming up for a special show Welcome To Being Human! Many times, people feel (especially in the various Healing paths) restricted in their ability to experience and express the entire range of human emotions and actions.
Often, we are offered a "barrage of rainbows" or not allowed to "go negative" during stressful times.
Where did this impossible pedestal we're on come from and who put us up here, anyway?!

Listen in while Amy and Cheryl chat about accepting our role of being human!

Do join us!

Have a fabu weekend!
Ciao!

Magical Monday! A Colourful, Wonderful Life!

Hello Everyone! 
Welcome to Magical Monday! 
This post is quite a bit about repurposing or making art of the mundane, a small bit about history and a good bit about an artful or colourful life! All things near and dear to my heart! 
Let's dive right in to the history bit (HA)!
  Credits and information about this photo are here! I'm not certain about the model of the plane, there are some who believe it is a United States Army AC-47C, which is based off of the DC-3. I love the photo and the sentiment behind it! 
 
Shaking ourselves dry and continuing on a land-based route, let's start with with a key! Or rather... a Keytar!
Hee hee!! So awesome! Credits and information about this photo are here! 

    And what might this be a key to?  Perhaps this!!! A gorgeous repurposing of an old school bus and that looks to be put to beautiful use! Credits and information about this photo are here! 

And let's finishing up with the making of a colourful life! This is a fabulous and intriguing short move! 
Click the link to view! Amazing, intriguing and fun!!! Whee!!!

And that's a wrap for this Magical Monday! 
I hope you had as much fun as I did!
I'll see you on Whimsy Wednesday!!!
Ciao!

Fini Friday! Molds, Keys and Treasure Bottles!

Hello Everyone!

Welcome to Fini Friday!

I've been having fun with creating with resin and I'll show you what I've been up to!

Last Friday I blogged about making molds from old keys.  Today I'll show you the first prototype from those molds!

The coloured resin keys on the top right.  I think these are good first attempts.  As you can see, however, the larger of the keys will need some cleaning up and may need to be mounted in some way so as to be more durable.  The smaller key and mold required little clean-up and will make good pendants. 

I also spent some time with a good friend and fabulous costumer this weekend who was gracious enough to share his mold-making skills and expertise with me.  I have a few new techniques to try in both creating new and better molds and creating molds that will allow my resin creations to become three-dimensional!  YAAY!! Stay tuned for that!

This next series of photos are Treasure Bottles that I've been creating over the space of a few weeks.  The final bottles have three layers of hand-coloured resin in them!  The photograph on the left is at the finish of the second pouring or layer of resin! That's how I am able to give the look of the various materials being suspended in glittery water or air or etc.! 

What is in there?  As of the second pouring; a goldstone star, a wrench charm, and Fire Opals!  The bottle on the left also includes a bead shaped like an orange!

The photograph on the right includes the third and final resin layer, which includes a pearl for each bottle.  The bottle on the left includes a shell, while the bottle on the right contains a tiiiny, little pinecone (yup! a real shell and pinecone!)!

I also painted on a bit of the (non-toxic) resin on and around the cork for each bottle and they are secured with star-shaped silver spacer beads above and below the cork!  These really should be quite durable!  The metal is sterling silver.

So, there you have it!  A little of what I've been up to in the studio this week!

Just FYI, I'll be combining Whimsy Wednesday and Fini Friday next week as I'll be at CONvergence most of the week!

Maybe I'll see some of you there!

Ciao!

Fini Friday! Keys, Levels and a Gadget!

Hello Everyone! Welcome to Fini Friday!

 I've had a steadily busy week this week in the studio and it has been a lot of fun! I've been playing with resin quite a bit! 

 I even cracked open my batch of Silicone Mold Putty and played a bit making molds from old keys! 

Let me show you a bit of what's been going on! Here are the molds and the keys that created them on the top or right.  These seem good for first attempts, but I think the larger key mold is likely too shallow.  I'll probably need to do some carving and cleaning up on the casting.  We'll see! 

These are the levels I showed you a little while ago.  This little photo is showing you what they look like with beadcaps and wires glued in.  This was taken while waiting for the glue to cure.  I think they look pretty spiffy!  The next step is to paint them with resin, both to secure the beadcaps (why yes!  I *do* overengineer things, Thanks!) and also to add a bit of Faerie-ness and sparkle!

 This last creation is another in my Pen collection! 

 Title: A Peculiar Gadget

Ingredients:  Steel pen (USA), glass, acrylic, spring steel, lead-free pewter.

I chose the glass bead between the clear-and-gold-flecked bead and the spring because I thought it had the appropriate finish to look like those blued connectors on machines that had absorbed a *little too much* heat!  This is very much inspired by Steampunk and along the lines of a generator or energy-generating gadget!  Also?  The spring in the middle does work and therefore this pen doubles as a fidget-toy!  WHEE!!! 

If you'd like to see this and more creations not showcased in this blog, in person, I'll be in Saint Paul this Sunday! 

See below for details!

This weekend you can find me basking in air-conditioned splendor!

Arts and Crafts Show Sunday, June 24th Only!

10am to 5pm

Temple of Aaron

616 So. Mississippi Blvd Saint Paul, MN 55116

That about wraps this up!!
See you either this Sunday or for Magical Monday!

Ciao!

Whimsy Wednesday! Keys!

Hello Hello!
Welcome to Whimsy Wednesday!
I have all sorts of things about keys to show you today!
But first! I wanted to give you an update on what happened with the two pairs of earrings and bracelet (you can see one of the earring pairs here and the bracelet here!) that were donated to be part of a friend's fundraiser for Breast Cancer! The earring pairs were grouped together as one auction item and the bracelet as another. I'm happy and proud to say that the earrings sparked a bidding war! That is so awesome!
OK! Onward!
Let's start with keys that might not pop to mind right away for some of you - computer keys!
Title: Home is Where the Heart Is
Ingredients: repurposed laptop keyboard key, hand-made furnace glass heart(USA), coated copper wire, anodized aluminum, silver-plated surgical steel earwires.

I hope you see the pun!
I actually rip the keys off of a defunct laptop keyboard, drill them out with my Dremel and create from there! Eco-friendly creativity at it's best!!! Woohoo!!

Title: Can't Stop the Signal
Ingredients: repurposed laptop keyboard keys, Czech glass heart, metal, silver-plated surgical steel earwires.

Yup! Those are the "signal" and "max sound" keys from a laptop keyboard! These are especially for all of you Firefly/Serenity fans out there!
Both of these earring creations can be found in my Etsy shoppe here and here!

And one last little bit of whimsy for today!
I started this lanyard some time ago, as a gift for a friend. She is a fellow cat-lover and when I saw the shoelaces with the most cheerful cat (with a star on it's collar!) EVER!!! I had to play with it! I wanted to make something practical and fun for her and so... Voila!

A lanyard with a keychain and clippy thing at the bottom! She has two cats, both grey and, of course, they needed to be included ! Those are the two grey fellows you see at the bottom! One has a very colourful bead at the top of his head as he seems to like being a well-dressed cat, wearing ascots and so forth in colours that offset his classic, elegantly-hued fur!

So there you have it! Keys abounding everywhere in this post!
I hope you have a fantabulous week and I'll see you on Friday!
Ciao!

Fini Friday! KEYS!!

Hellooooo!!!
I'm going to switch up this week's Fini Friday and show you the beginning of a creation process for me! Then you can walk along with me as we see this through to a complete Creation! Let's start with keys, shall we?
I love keys! Much like a few other artists I know, keys are mysterious, fascinating things to me. I always wonder what they unlock, where they came from and what treasures they guarded!
So, I have a ring of several keys that were given to me by a good friend after her father's recent passing (the keys were his).



I was so excited and honored to receive all of these nifty keys!! There are so many intriguing kinds!
However, I'd like to do more with them than simply use them as pendants... so! I'm going to attempt to make molds from the keys and then make my own!

This is the part where we will walk together through the creative process... I'll post and show you how the mold-making progresses. I've not tried mold-making before so this should be interesting and we'll learn a lot!
So!! With that adventure in mind, have a fabulous weekend and I'll see you next week!!