Patina Challenge Blog Hop

I had my post all ready to go, had the pictures uploaded and then had to go out of town. No problem, I was taking my iPad with me so I could polish it up some before posting.  Unfortunately, I can't seem to edit my blog posts on my iPad without deleting something.  I've tried a couple of times and it always happens. So lesson learned, just don't edit with an iPad. :)  Anyway, thanks for bearing with me and here goes:

Recently Kathy at BayMoonDesign issued a challenge. She was picking 10 people to send a Vintaj compass piece to. We were to patina it any way we wanted and then make something with it.  I haven't been happy with any of my patina efforts so far, but thought maybe this would help me figure out what to do and how to patina something I was happy with, so I signed up.  I got my wonderful compass piece, started to work on it and then had to put it up to go out of town for a business conference.  Well I THOUGH I had put it up, but my Manx cat, Lata decided he could get to it anyway. And when I came home from the conference, the compass was nowhere to be found. (It still is MIA, despite having turned half the house upside down. I'm sure one of these days it will turn up. LOL) Anyway, I e-mailed Kathy and asked if I could buy one somewhere so I could still participate.  She graciously mailed me another one.  This one I made sure was with me all the time so Lata couldn't get to it. I forgot to take a pic before I started the sanding, but in this picture I've sanded the point in the center, the direction letters, the edge and the little arrows (?) all around the outside ring.

I pretty much knew what I wanted to do with it, so now to get to work using my patina's.  I used some Ranger Alcohol Inks in the Weathered Copper which was greens/blues.  But after I got it done, I really wanted a little more color so added just a dab of Cinnabar so it would have a little of the red to blend with the red leather I was using.  I painted, sanded, painted some more, then used some Bronze Gilder's paste on it and finally sealed everything with a Ranger sealer. I think I'm finally happy with one of my patina projects.

I then took some brass and silver cogs and washers I had and patina'd them. I knew I wanted a 'steampunk' look to this bracelet(although I've never done Steampunk, so this is my first attempt at that also).  After I had the brass washers done I decided I didn't like the look of the silver cogs on the brass washers, because they just faded into the background, so I turned them over and hammered them instead.  Then I got busy punching holes in the leather. I had intended to texture the leather, but forgot. I HATE punching holes in leather because I don't have a hole punch strong enough to go through the leather. So I had to use a thick darning needle to try to start the hole and then my hole punch to finish out the hole.  This was very difficult, but I finally got all the holes punched.  However, after finally getting the little clips on the back of the compass pushed through 2 of the holes, they broke off while trying to bend them back over to hold the compass. So now what to do? I really didn't want to wire it to the leather, but Karla (from Texas Pepper Jams) and I had just gotten to play with our torches a week or two ago and had made some balled copper headpins. I punched 2 holes on the inside ring of the compass on the E/W sides, then took the balled headpins which added another little pop of red to the piece, pushed them through and twisted/spiraled them together on the back side. Viola!  My compass was now attached.

I had originally intended to rivet the cogs/washers to the leather, but realized I didn't have any rivets large enough for the holes in the washers, so stumped again.  I found 2 beads I thought would go well with the piece, took another 2 of my balled headpins, put them through the beads, through the cogs and washers and twisted/spiraled them on the backside, making sure all the wire and ends were smooth enough to not rub the skin when I wear the bracelet.

Then I attached a little silver heart I had to the bottom of the leather piece because I wanted to name this piece "Find your way to my Heart" (because of the compass) And finally I decided to make it a double chain bracelet, so punched 4 more holes in the leather, made my own jump rings our of some Annealed Steel wire I had, attached the 4 pieces of chain, made a clasp out of the same Steel wire and Viola!

"Find your way to my Heart"

Hope you like it.

Be sure to visit all the other participants of the blog hop below or going to Kathy's BayMoonDesigns blog. (Hopefully the links will work, but the way things have been going for me, they may not. LOL)   Thanks for bearing with me and stopping by.

Looking for more of my jewelry or Stained Glass, Mosaics or Fused Glass pieces, check out my shop, KayzKreationz.

Hostess:  Kathy Lindemer,  BayMoonDesign 

Jennifer LaVite, Dry Gulch Beads and Jewelry
Karla Morgan, Texas Pepper Jams

Carolyn Lawson, Carolyn's Creations

Shai Williams, Shaiha's Ramblings

Jessica Murray, Whimsical Monkey
Tammie Everly, TTE Designs
Kay Thomerson, KayzKreationz Blog (you are here)

Claire Fabian, Saraccino
Christie Searle Murrow,  Charis Designs



ZNETshows Keychain Lightning Round

Another great ZNETshows challenge. I was contacted a few weeks back by Hope of Crafty Hope and ZNETshows about doing a lightning round challenge with their Keychain hooks.  The idea was, we pick out 2 beads and they'll send them along with some of the keychain hooks for us to design something with.  They got delayed a little because the keychain hooks were out of stock. But I finally received them last Thursday and got to work.  I ran into a snag with my first design and am still working on it, but I got my other 2 designs finished and am presenting them here for you to see and let me know what you think.  I chose these Black Matte faceted glass bead crystals and these Orange and Cream faceted glass rondelles crystals.  I wired wrapped and attached to some silver chain I had, the Orange and Cream crystals along with some black seed beads and oval beads I had.  I attached those 3 to the bottom of the Black Faceted Crystal and Orange and Cream crystal and then attached everything to the Keychain.  This is my Black and Orange 'Chained' keychain, zipper pull or purse bling.  I prefer them as purse bling. 

My second design is my 'Tribal' keychain, zipper pull or purse bling.  Again, I prefer Purse Bling. LOL.  I hammered the end of silver colored wire, then strung the Orange and Cream crystals, the Black Faceted Crystal the and the black seed beads and oval bead I had on one of each of the 'tribal' wires. I then hammered the other end and did a simple loop to attach them to the keychain.  In between each of the 3 'tribal' wires, I hammered more silver colored wire in shorter lengths, did a simple loop and attached them in between the 'tribal' wires.  I also wire-wrapped one of the Orange and Cream crystals and attached it to the loop on the bottom of the Center 'tribal' wire for a little more dangle and bling.  Hope you like my Keychains/Purse Bling.  They are available for $17 each with free shipping till the end of the week.  Just comment here on my blog if you're interested.

KayzKreationz Purse Bling, Zipper Pull, Keychain

For more of my Beaded Wire-wrapped Jewelry and Stained Glass, Mosaics and Fused Glass Kreationz for your Home and Garden, check out my shop, KayzKreationz.

Challenge of Music

I'm so disappointed and apologize to Erin and the rest of those participating.  I eagerly signed up for Erin's of Treasures Found blog for her Challenge of Music Hop and Reveal.  We were to pick a piece of instrumental music, listen to it, let it inspire us, etc. and then design a piece of jewelry or something else from the inspiration from the song. I knew which song I wanted to do from the beginning.  I have always loved the song 'Wipeout' by the Safari's.  (Although this cheats a little, because they start the song with the words "Wipeout")  In case you don't know the song you can hear it here at YouTube. (Hopefully I did this right)



 

I've listened to this over and over. I started on Erin's ideas of  drawing and free writing while the music is playing. (I haven't gotten very far with this yet)  and I finally got some ideas of what I wanted to do.  But nothing is coming together.  Although the picture is a surfing scene and you usually think of beaches, waves, etc.  I found myself going back to psychadelic colors, frenzy, hippies, etc.  I wanted to do something with some polymer clay, perhaps some crazy colored dagger beads and smaller round clay beads in between.  But then life got in the way. I had signed up for an earlier challenge (the AJE jewelry component challenge with an enameled disc from Francesca Watson-see reveal Here).  Due to circumstances, she couldn't get the disc mailed right away and I had 2 weeks of some volunteer service I'd signed up for by the time the disc came. Still I was working on it and thinking all the while of my Music challenge piece.  Then last week, my 83 year old father developed appendicitus (very unusual in people his age the doctors tell us) and had to undergo an emergency appendectomy Thursday. So I spent all of Thursday and Friday at the hospital with my mom, sister and  him.  That was the final clincher.  I lost that time to work on my idea for beads and had to finish my volunteer work this last weekend.  In the meantime, I hurt my knee again, so have been having to keep it up with heat and ice on it.  This was stressing me out so much, I finally had to let Erin know I wouldn't have a piece done in time for the reveal yesterday.  She suggested going ahead and sharing what I had done/been thinking of while going through the process, so this is my post about that.  I loved the idea of just listening to the music and letting it take you where it will.  And I still intend to finish my ideas and my piece and post it later on.  So if you're watching or following me, keep an eye out for my Music Challenge piece at a later date.  Sorry to disappoint everyone.

CharmBarn Link Challenge

Back in July I signed up for a 'Link' challenge from Peggy of The Charm Barn.  I wasn't really sure what acrylic links were, but it sounded like fun.  We had to e-mail her if we were interested, and if we were one of the first 20 people to sign up we were in.  I made it!  She sent me 25 acrylic links with 3 weeks to create a jewelry masterpiece with them.  When I received my 25 black acrylic links I knew immediately what I wanted to do with them. It took me a little while to figure out how to link them. Actually, my daughter in law and son were here visiting, and she figured it out. I was afraid I'd break them, but she just kept working with them and got them linked. Once she figured it out (and that they wouldn't break) we went to town linking them together.  I wanted to wrap them with leather and then add some charms. I picked Teal, Purple and Green leather. I wasn't sure what I wanted to use as a clasp, but when we went to Hobby Lobby to get the leather, I thought, Hey, buttons would be great as a clasp with the leather.  It took a while to figure out the 'right' button to use, but I finally found it, a purple one to match one of the leather colors.  It was a little harder wrapping the leather around them than I figured it would be. I had to take it apart twice, since I kept wrapping it too tight and the links wouldn't lay flat or curve around my wrist.  Plus, I couldn't keep the links laying the same way as I was wrapping the leather.  Once I got one side finished (on the third go-around, LOL) it was easy peasy.  It was also a little bit of a challenge to figure out how to leave the loop in the leather for the button clasp without it getting smaller and smaller as I worked with the leather, but I finally got it.  The next challenge was what to use as charms/dangles and how to put them together and attach them. My daughter in law loves Ladybugs, so she picked out that one.  Then we saw this cute little silver envelope charm.  I found a little silver charm that looked like a letter/card to attach to it and some co-ordinating beads to use for the rest of the charms.  Then I made my own jump rings, wire-wrapped all the charms and attached them by the button clasp.  So without further ado, here's my Link Challenge Leather wrapped bracelet.  Please go to The Charm Barn to vote for my Leather wrapped bracelet, so I can get a chance to win a gift certificate to Peggy's Etsy shop for some more great components.  Not sure if I'll put this up for sale in my Etsy shop, KayzKreationz, or keep it for myself.

And here is the list of the rest of the participants, be sure to check out what they made:

Ilenia Ruzza - http://ile1974.blogspot.it/

Shelley Graham Turner  -  www.shelleygrahamturner.blogspot.com

Tania Spivey -  www.moobiegracedesigns.blogspot.com

Ambra Gostoli -  http://chicandfrog.wordpress.com/

Kashmira Patel - http://sadafulee.blogspot.com/

Linda Florian - http://lilysofthevalleyjewelry.blogspot.com/

Jami Shipp - http://celebratinglifewithdamamashipp.blogspot.com/

Terri Gauthier - http://terrisbloomingideas.blogspot.com/

Miranda Ackerley - http://mirandack.com

Mischelle Fanucchi  - http://thesecretlifeofmicheladas.blogspot.com/

Mary Govaars - www.mlhjewelrydesigns.com

Sarah Goode - www.pookledo.blogspot.com

paula hisel - http://simplybeadiful.weebly.com/simply-stated.html

Shai Williams - http://shaihasramblings.blogspot.com/

Jennifer Reno - http://jenrenjewelry.blogspot.com/

Kay Thomerson - KayzKreationz (you are here)

Denielle Hagerman  - www.somebeadsandotherthings.com

Janeen Sorensen  -  http://wildvanilladesigns.com/

Emma Todd  -  www.apolymerpenchant.blogspot.com

Audrey Bélanger  -  http://esperianterra.blogspot.com/

Michelle Andrade - Micheladas Musings

Don't forget to vote for my bracelets, here.  Thanks.

Color Challenge

Erin from Treasures Found blog, issued a challenge recently.  It was a Color Challenge.  When we signed up to participate, we told her a color we'd like to use.  She then picked a color palete from Design Seeds.  Jessica at Design Seeds designs wonderful color palettes.  I'm in awe of the colors she puts together and comes up with.  Anyway, Erin picked a color palette for each of us from the color we picked and we're challenged to come up with a piece of jewelry using any or all of those colors.  I picked purple and this is the color palette Erin picked for me.  Isn't it gorgeous?  Autumn Spectrum.   I love it.  I had some beads in my stash that perfectly matched the main colors of this palette and now am in the process of trying to put them together.  There will be a blog hop of all 54 Color Palette Challenge participants on November 30th.  So stay tuned to see what we all come up with from our color palette.  I'm trying to use all 5 of the colors, so we'll see if I can pull that off or not.