THANK YOU VETERANS

Thank you for your service. All of the freedom that the rest of us enjoy is because of you.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!!

Trunk Show

I'll be taking part in Bead Haven's fall open house and trunk show this weekend. If you are local (eastern Iowa), I'd love to see you there. I have lots of new things to share! Bead Haven will have discounts and treats and I'll be doing a couple of riveting demos on Saturday. The show is Friday (tomorrow) from 4-7 pm and Saturday from 10-5. I hope to see you there!

BEAD AND BUTTON SHOW CLASSES

Some examples of our acid etched, riveted pendant.

More examples.

Still more examples from our all day class.

Riveted Keepsake Pendant.

Acid Etching 101

I had some wonderful news last week. I, along with my wonderful friend Gail Lannum, will be teaching 4 classes at the Bead and Button Show in June. We submitted 3 classes which they accepted and at the moment at least, they'd like us to teach one of them twice! I am so excited and honored. I've always considered this show the best in the country. I've been attending the show for a number of years and have been in awe of how well such a gigantic event is run. I have taken many classes there myself from phenomenal teachers miraculously gathered in one place for a whole week. I'm excited and humbled to be included in their company. We'll be teaching a cute riveted pendant with a silver bail, an acid-etched, riveted, fabricated pendant and a basic acid etching class. We're excited about our classes because we feel that all three offer a lot of solid metalworking skills in one package. Students will learn basic fabrication, hammered textures, acid etching, riveting, bail construction, chemical and heat patinas, wire wrapping, etc. Gail and I are great friends (we met at the Bead and Button Show!) and we always have such a great time together and I think our classes, while very educational will be a whole lot of laughs too. I hope perspective students will be as excited as we are! I will be posting more information about the classes as I get it.

iNSANELY GREAT iCON

Steve Jobs

1955-2011

The world lost an icon today, one who I will personally miss very much. He was part visionary, part Svengali (minus the evil), part salesman. He was brilliant and seemed to revel in what he was doing. He made the world a better place. The world is poorer for his passing, but his legacy will live on.

SUMMER AND ALL

Part of my display at Brucemore.

Tomatoes ready for winter. Sunshine in a jar.

Dan from Chiminey Cricket fixing my chimney.

My girls know how to live. I'm trying to learn to be more like them.

Getting ready for Brucemore. What an excellent show this one is. Beautiful place, lovely people.

More new things.

And more.

Bronze ammonites with copper prong settings.

Bronze shields with handmade bronze chain, bronze nuggets and ancient Roman glass beads

Lots going on here. The last part of summer was full with deadlines for class submissions, a big show at Brucemore, making things for the big show, canning tomatoes from my garden (I should have been weeding, but during the hot spell we had I decided to go another way and try the jungle look. I believe I have succeeded), chimney repairs and trying to live without worries and angst like my cats do (I need to work harder on this one).

Autumn is almost here. Apples, football, another show (this time at my favorite place, Bead Haven), cool nights, football, planting bulbs, hot chocolate, planning new classes, and sitting in the sun watching the leaves turn. Life is good.

CLASSES AND NEW STUFF

Acid Etched Copper And Bronze.

Acid Etched Copper and Faux Bone Pendants from class. From the top clockwise is mine, Alice's, Pam's, Bonnie's, and Julie's.

Some bronze pieces of mine waiting to be assembled.

Forged Copper and Bronze Cuff

My blogging has been spotty of late, actually non-existant. Sorry about that. I'll try to do better. Lots of stuff going on. Classes are happening and things are being made. I had a very nice all day class at Bead Haven recently involving acid etching, riveting and Faux Bone. If you haven't tried Faux Bone, give it a go. It's fun stuff. It's the invention of Robert Dancik (an artist and teacher himself). It's plastic (I know, but it's very cool, trust me!) PVC actually. I remember being in a class of his once and I believe he said that it's a type of PVC that is used for making containers for caustic chemicals (yikes! fumes!), which makes it pretty indestructible. It's also really easy to work with and it mimics other materials, like bone and ivory very well. We had fun working with it. I've been luck enough to have had a class with both Robert and a class with Richard Salley where we worked with it, and it's a material that I hope to work more with in the future.

We've been having classes at Bead Haven with bronze clay and acid etching too. We'll be doing more of that and lots of other things too as fall unfolds so please come in and join us. I've been working on bunches of new things myself. I have a show this Saturday at Brucemore, a National Trust property (more on this later) so I've been working hard to get lots of new things ready for that. I'll have lots of mixed metal bracelets and bangles, etched and riveted pendants, gemstone and leather wrapped bracelets, and some bezel set silver rings and pendants. Man, are my hands tired!