Silver Linings

I am thankful to G-d that he always supplies a silver lining to every cloud or thunderstorm we have to endure in life. I have been going through some pretty intense times the past few months and July and August are never good months for me to start with and these have been no different. For one thing I have been without transportation for over a month now because my car didn't pass inspection and we can't afford to fix what's wrong and I am too law abiding to drive it even though we paid the insurance and the registration, so I've been home bound and it's not easy. Then I had trouble with my online connection and my security being breached which limited me even more. To top it off I've been being harassed by some who I thought were fellow peers in my current field and no resolution could be made, especially after lie after lie was being told about me. Because of all this and other personal problems I have been quite out of sorts and have been having problems with my heart again and don't want to end up back in the hospital so have been trying to deal with this as best I could. Because my computer is back in my studio I had to clean off my table to get ready for someone to come in and fix it, but I think I shall get it all back out today and try to make something.

(You can click on the pictures to see a larger view but make sure to hit the back button to return here to finish reading because it doesn't open in a separate window! )

Two good things happened to me this week though, I found out I was the monthly winner at Art Bead Scenes drawing of some fabulous beads and a gift certificate, for my entry in the LasCaux Cave painting challenge! It was such an unexpected surprise and a bit of a lift from something I'd found out that day. If you haven't visited Art Bead Scene, please do, there are always inspiring articles, and lots of tutorials, photos and eye candy to oggle and dream over, and be sure to check out all the entries from this past months challenge of the cave paintings, I've never seen such wonderful diversity in the previous challenges I've followed. It's a gallery of pieces all inspired by these ancient drawings and a wealth of inspiration to others as well!

I also received in the mail these beautiful earrings from EmandaJ from a drawing she had. She is also having a giveaway drawing this week too, so stop by the blog of this fellow infj and have a look, and leave a nice comment to be entered. I promise it's a great read and lots of color!
She also sent me this sweet little birds nest made from copper wire with two bluish freshwater pearls. It reminds me of the Robins nest we had this spring right outside our side door, atop the downspout. I watched as both Mr. and Mrs. worked very hard to build this very sturdy and huge nest! I never did get to see the babies fledge but later after they had I saw some juvenile robin's trying out the ground bird bath we have and they were a joy to watch.




I want to do something with this really cool nest Emanda made me and thought I might try and add it to this feather I made with a skinner metallic blend. I think the colors go well together and if all goes well for me today with my heart I shall try I think to bring this together. I'll show you a peek at it when it's done.


Mean while maybe you'd like a look at some of the things I was able to finally photograph, which shall (hopefully) soon appear in OrganicOdysseys .

These are some earrings of a different style I've been working on, using up some Donna Kato style brocade sheets. They have three layers to them, the copper bottom which is embossed with a secret texturing tool :) then the next layer is my version of Donna's Brocade surface technique and the top layer is smooth, polished black clay that has been imprinted with a Chinese character stamp and highlighted with gold. I like how these came out and I think I shall try this with other mixtures of finishes.

In keeping with the Asian influence I sculpted these bamboo earrings, this time using green clay instead of the white which I painted and distressed in my last version. Simple and yet effective I think, and flattering on any woman.

And again keeping with the Asian theme, while the pattern isn't exactly Asian the technique is, this is one of my older UFO's (un-finished objects) that has been sitting around in my bamboo bowl for ages. I finally decided what I wanted to do with it. This is one of my first attempts at Mokume Gane done in copper, black and white. In fact this was about 5 years ago when I tried to entice my husband into finding a hobby , maybe PC? by telling him the story of MG hoping it might interest him as he works with metal (or did at the time, now he actually works with polymers, just different than what I do :) ). He covered a belt buckle and we covered a terracotta urn together but it didn't hold his interest. This was a piece left over from the slab so I tried one of my favorite ivy leaf stamps in it. I liked it but didn't know quite what to do with it but I think it makes a wonderful brooch.