Simple Joys

Hessonite Earrings

Elaine and I were at Starbucks a couple of weeks ago and I decided to make a pair of cascade type earrings with some hessonite onion briolettes that I had.  I used gold filled chain and gold filled wire and although it was a simple design, I really liked how they came out.  I just love hessonite!  It's a garnet family semi-precious stone and comes in graduated shades from a light pale translucent yellow to a very dark reddish brown.  I hung them from 14k gold-filled earwires.

I was so happy with them I wore them right away :) and got several compliments - thank you! - so I made one for the etsy shop . 

Speaking of the etsy shop, I reopened it last week and got three sales already!  Yay!  Thank you to my new customers!  I'm excited! :)

Girls Day Goodies

Ray and I made goodies for the P.O.s for girl's day.  It was supposed to be simple, and it looks simple, but it wasn't so simple!  LOL!  Ray did a wonderful job with the printing (even though I asked her to change it a couple times - yikes!)  Good job Ray! 

So she made a sample out of regular copy paper and it came out great!  I brought the colored cardstockand she printed it all out and cut it and gave it to me.  We decided to go to Starbucks to put them together and oh-oh . . . the cardstock was a little too thick for the design.  Oh well, too bad . . . it's a little crinkled but it's still cute!  So we put them all together with a little pack of kaki mochi or mochi crunch or some people call it rice crackers and a little lychee candy.  All done - pau - right?

Nope.  I was home sick for a few days and decided to take pictures for this post.  I opened the bag of goodies and . . . yikes . . . about 3/4 of them were coming apart and opening!  The cardstock is way to heavy for this project.  The heavy duty two-way tape wasn't even holding.   What to do . . . what to do . . . too late to remake them . . . hmm . . . okay, stick them back together and h-h-o-o-l-l-d-d-d-d them together so they stick.  Cross you fingers!

Here's some pics:

 

   

Have a Happy Girl's day on March 3rd!

Pearl Necklace

With one daughter gone for the long weekend, I found some extra time to create.  I fixed several earrings, made a simple one for my younger daughter, fixed a bracelet, and finished my double pearl necklace!  Here's a couple pics of the necklace:

I love the color of these golden - brown - champagne pearls!  They are fresh water pearls that I got at a trade show.  I made one necklace and Elaine said I should make it a double strand.  What I actually did was make two necklaces at different lengths and both with adjustable chains in the back so I have more wearable options.  I love it.  If I were to do it again though, I'd probably put a link of chain between each wire wrapped pearl so it doesn't kink between loops.  I still love it though!  Gotta get more jewelry boxes by Redenvelope!

I also made a couple new earrings to put in my etsy shop:

 

This one has a square copper link and a flat square czech glass bead and picasso finished rondelle hanging from it.  It hangs from a copper plated leverback earwire.

 This set is made with gunmetal links, ball headpins and earwires.  I love the color of the flat czech glass beads and the rondelles. 

Okay, yes, after all these months, or has it been a year, or more, I am reopening my etsy.  I will upload a bunch of earrings by the end of the week.  I want to get involved again with this blog and my etsy store.  My plan is that if I reopen the store, it serves two purposes, I can sell some of the jewelry that I continue to make (because I can't wear everything!) and it will help me be more committed to this blog - which I REALLY want to try to upkeep this year. 

Happy President's Day off! :)

Mermaid Necklace

Today was the first free Saturday I've had in a long time.  I restrung a necklace that I have been meaning to do for weeks now, took pictures to post here, watched tv, and took a 3 hour nap!  Whoo hoo!  Here's a picture of the mermaid necklace I restrung:

Elaine made the first mermaid necklace.  She gave Deb and I the materials to make one for ourselves one night at Starbucks and we strung em up.  I wore it a couple of times, but realized that I'd get to wear it more if I made it a little longer.  The length it was at hit a lot of the necklines of the tops I wear.  I asked Elaine for more stuff to make it longer and she generously gave me more.  That was a couple weeks ago.  I finally was able to restring it today and it's perfect now.  Yay!  Thanks Elaine!  Here's a closer look at it:

Elaine also gifted me with some goodies she brought back from her trip to Tucson.  She let Kammie and I choose a little girl pendant each. I also got a cool strand of carnelian rondelles, beautiful gold vermeil leaf earrings that I totally love, and yes, those pearls are Tahitian pearls to make earrings with, all wrapped up in the pretty little sari bag!  Thank you Elaine!  Here's pics:

Happy Valentine's Day!

Happy Valentine's Day!  This is a picture of my first heart rock.  I'd been seeing pictures of other heart rock finds and collections that people have posted for the past few years now (ever since I started blogging actually) and I've always wanted to find one.  Well, this one was actually given to me.  A co-worker was placing rocks in her orchid plant a couple of months ago when she found this rock and said, "Look!"  I looked over and exclaimed, "Ooo a heart rock!"  She smiled and said, "Here, you can have it."  "No, you have to keep it.  It's a heart rock!" I said to her.  She insisted that I have it.  I love it!  And I'm so excited to post it here on Valentine's Day!  Thank you Carrie!  Happy Valentine's Day everyone!

 

Little Valentine Cuties

Wow.  It's been a long time since I've posted.  I've thought about it so many times.  I've even planned what pictures I'd use or what things I could post about but never got around to doing it.  So bad.  I'm such a slow transitioner.  I started back to work full-time a couple of years ago and fell out of so many things - exercising, crafting (everything but jewelry), Christmas cards (haven't sent any the past two Christmases), keeping in touch with people, keeping the car maintenanced, putting pictures in albums, and on and on, and of course . . . blogging. 

Well, I am yet again going to attempt to blog more frequently, with hopes that somehow it will be the catalyst to bringing back other enjoyable and/or important things in my life that have been put aside.

I've wanted to do some other crafting besides jewelry for some time now.  Actually, the first project was this Christmas.  Ray and I combined our resources and made some adorable jars of candy for all the clerical staff and P.O.s in our unit (P.O.= probation officers).  They turned out really well and Ray even personalized each one with their first name initial.  Sorry, no pics.

Okay, I know, nothing about this post so far has anything to do with the title of the post - "Little Valentine Cuties" - but I had to do a little catching up.  Sooo . . .  Ray and I again pulled our resources together and made these little valentine cuties for everyone!

Ray has a wonderful diecut machine called a "Cricut Expressions".  It cut all the templates for the boxes.  It still took time to score and put together all the boxes, but it would have been a huge task to also cut out all the templates without this machine.  Actually, it would have been next to impossible because with the Cricut, we could customize the size of the box!  How cool is that?  We programed it to 4", but if you plan on making these, use 4 1/4".  Ours came out a little tight but we found out a little late - grin.  We just gently tapped down the slight arch on the last candy - ha! ha!  We made it in three colors - pale pink, dark pink, and red.

We didn't plan this, but the word "Bliss" fits perfectly in the heart shaped window!  Ray also had cellophane with little hearts on it so she cut pieces out and taped them to the back of the windows.  So cute!

We also didn't plan it, but the heart cutouts worked perfectly for out tags.  We tied them on with red and white bakers string.  No waste with this project!  Yay!

Here they are already to gift!  Have a Happy Valentine's Day!!