Beautiful Leather Jewelry book Review

Here's another great book from Kalmbach books. This one comes to us from Melissa Cable, called, Beautiful Leather Jewelry, timeless techniques for today's trends. Melissa is a mixed media artist who love to develope new designs and techniques with traditional and non-traditional materials from metal, leather, wood, clay and found objects. Since I, too, love leather and metal this book really called to me, putting leather, metal and other components together in great jewelry pieces.
She starts off with the Basics for Leatherworking using her 'key' to how leather works and how you can use it in your projects. The first section covers the different types of leather besides cow leather. Things like Snakeskin, Fish leathers (which I've been hearing more and more about and what to try as soon as I can find some) and even Ostrich leather. Melissa also covers the different types of tanning, dyeing and grades of leather besides how to purchase it and even recycle it.
The next section covers the different tools to use as well as equivalents you may already have at home to use on your leather. This includes things like stamps, corrugators and even mallets/hammers to use to texture/shape your leather. Next is a section on hardware to use to finish your leather or decorate it and then finishing it to make clasps/closures for your pieces. There's even a part on Special Effects for your leather like dyes, paints, and sealants for your leather pieces.
Then she moves into Making Leather jewelry starting with Technique Tutorials and then the Jewelry projects. I really like cuff bracelet, so the tutorials on cuffs really intrigued me. The Mesa Pendant was interesting to me, too, since I love texture and the stacked pieces were cool.  2 of my favorite projects were the Four Seasons collar since I also really like collars and the textured leather discs and metal discs together combined 2 of my favorite mediums.

The next one is the Laurel Necklace, because I really love nature and loved the shape, look and texture of the leather leaves in this necklace.
Finally at the end is a section on Beads and More Jewelry from leather. I especially liked the Rolled Leather Column Beads with the rivet decoration in them. I can see myself using these a lot in my jewelry projects. If using leather is something you've wanted to learn more about in your projects, check out Kalmbach books for Melissa Cable's book, Beautiful Leather Jewelry.
Here is a Leather/Metal bracelet I made for my Patina challenge I was in that was inspired by my reading Melissa's book. It uses Leather, metal, rivets, chain, patina and cogs/gears in it.

If you're interested in my 'Find Your Way to My Heart' bracelet or any of my other jewelry check out my shop, KayzKreationz. There you will also find my Stained Glass, Mosaics and Fused Glass 'kreationz' for your Home and Garden.

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



Kalmbach Books Bead Soup Blog Party

With the release of Lori Anderson's new book Bead Soup-32 Projects (for my review of her book, click here)  Kalmbach books asked Bead shops across the country to send in 'Soup' mixes of a focal bead, a clasp and some coordinating beads to go with it.  Then they asked for jewelry designers to sign up and drew names to send these soups to.  I was fortunate enough to get a soup mix and it came from Wired Up Beads in Texas!  Yay!  We were to take that soup and create a piece of jewelry or more from it, using at least the focal and the clasp. We could use just their beads or we could raid our stash and add to it.  This is the soup I got from Wired Up Beads.  Isn't it great?  The focal is one from Patti Bullard at Wired Up Beads.

I chose to use only the beads they sent me and added chain and fiber from my stash.  This was my first time making a Kumihimo braid. I found 8 different strands of fiber/yarn that I thought would compliment these beads and went to work.  It wasn't long enough, however, so I capped it off, after winding some smaller chain around it and attached it to the heavier chain to lengthen the necklace.  I then attached the Teal beads to the small chain wound around the Kumihimo braid.  I then added another shorter length of chain to the main part of the necklace and made dangles with the orange/red beads and the green beads to attach to that.  I also used the smaller chain to make 3 dangles with one each of the beads, attached it to a headpin and ran it through the focal bead to make my focal pendant.  Then I had to figure out how to hang the focal pendant.  So I used the heavier chain, draped it around the Kumihimo braid and attached the Focal to it.  I used the end caps for the Kumihimo braid to make a pair of earrings, hanging one each of the 3 beads on the small chain again and running through the bead caps to the earwire.  Although it didn't really come out as I envisioned it, I think I like it.  My mother said she thinks it's gorgeous, except that my focal reminds her of a 'fishing lure'!  LOL  Didn't really expect that.  What do you think of my Bead Soup Necklace and earrings?  I think I have enough beads to make a dangle/charm bracelet to go with it.  Thanks for stopping by. This set will be showing up in my Etsy shop KayzKreationz before long, unless it sells before I get it listed.  I've had some interest in it.  And for Stained Glass, Mosaics or Fused Glass Kreationz for your Home or Garden, stop by my shop, KayzKreationz.  Plus you can go to Kalmbach's Facebook page and vote for your favorite piece. The winner gets prizes.

Thanks for stopping by and all your lovely comments.

Bead Packet Design Challenge from Sharyl's Jewelry & NKP Designs

Back at the end of September, I signed up for a Design Challenge on Sharyl's Jewelry blog.  It was in conjunction with NKP Designs, using some of her artbeads.  We were mailed a packet of beads and asked to design a piece of jewelry. The idea was to see what 10 different jewelry designers would come up with using the same beads. I loved the beads.  The colors were fantastic and I had several ideas right away.  We were required to use the large focal artbead and at least 2 other of the artbeads. Then we could use the rest of the beads or beads from our stash to finish our piece. I thought my beads all complimented themselves so well, I decided to use only the beads I received in my piece along with the silk and the chain.  This is what I finally settled on. I'm loving using Sari silk ribbons in my jewelry lately and I had the perfect colors left from some silks I'd gotten from Marsha Neal's studio that I had used in my Bead Soup Blog Party piece in August.  I found this chain that just seemed to say "Use me" with these beads and the silks.  And the toggle fit perfectly, too.  What do you think?  How did I do with my beads and the Bead Challenge?  Be sure to visit Sharyl's Jewelry blog for the rest of the participants and see what the other 9 designers did with their beads.  Here's the beads I started with (I forgot to take a pic before I started designing, so this is the pic of the beads from Sharyl's website for the challenge):

And here's my finished piece:

If you're interested in purchasing this piece, let me know. I'll be putting it in my Etsy shop, KayzKreationz shortly.  And if you're looking for Stained Glass, Mosaics or Fused Glass kreationz for your Home or Garden, be sure to check my shop out.
You can also find me on twitter:  KayzKreationz 
And on facebook:  KayzKreationzGlassKreationz
And if you're interested in keeping up with what I'm doing, sign up for my e-mail newsletter on the sidebar.  I don't e-mail out very often, but you never know when I will and what might be in the e-mail.

Neatostuff Great Marketing Exchange

Time for the next site on the Neatostuff Great Marketing Exchange. It's a cute little shop with the cutest little baby tutu's and a gift certificate if you're not quite sure what you want.

http://babymakesthree.etsy.com/

Let's all support the great shops at Etsy.

And while you're there don't forget to check out my shop for stained glass, mosaics, and fused glass. Looking for that unique gift for a gardening, bird feeding friend? I've got a cute terra cotta mosaic bird feeder and some cute little windchimes and garden twirlers. The garden twirlers are a little difficult to picture, but it's 3 diamond shaped slumped pieces of art glass that have holes drilled in them and attached to each other with fishing line and then they're all attached to a small piece of drift wood found on my ranch property. It has a chain attached to it for hanging. I have a purple one on etsy right now and have a beige one ready to list when I can get some good Pics.