Seascape Windows and Orgonite

Last week Val came over for a 'craft day' to do seascape windows and try our hand at orgonite, which is an interesting item made with metal, quartz and resin, and which is supposed to bring balanced energy.  You can read about it HERE. 

I prepped a bunch of frame a few days beforehand by cleaning the glass and gluing it to the frames.  I went a bit over the edge on this small one.  I wanted to try it with just glass blobbies.  I like how it came out.

This one is my fave of the ones I did.  The resin came out so crystal clear!  I used Czech glass beads and unintentionally created a Cape Cod looking design.

This is Val's and it's freakin GORGEOUS.  My pic doesn't do it justice at all.

This is Val's orgonite and it's so incredibly badass I could die.  She used metal skulls as well as metal bits and quartz crystal.

The sides and bottom of the silicone mold weren't shiny so the resin set cloudy but the skulls peering out of the fog is wicked cool.

This is my piece just using metal bits (from the models I made recently), quartz & moonstone. 

Since I had the beads out....

I actually LOVE the way this looks.

 I made skull pendants for Val & Casi.

I did a hodge podge collage on this frame. 

Then I did 2 large frames too.

This is my fave of the two and I wish I'd noticed it was in a heart design cause I would've used more stuff in the top center to define the 2 sides better.  

So now I'm on the hunt for great frames because this craft is pretty addictive!  Marsha, Annette & I are hoping to get together soon to make them too!

Escaping from the Gypsy Moth Caterpillars

The day I had to get a cupcake to calm my nerves after the gypsy moth caterpillars landed on me, I wandered into Cape Kaleidoscopes at the Mashpee Commons shopping area.  They have the most beautiful stuff ever....gorgeous stained glass discs for beautiful wood kaleidoscopes.  If I won the lottery I would buy every single one of them!!!  They did, however, have a really great selection of $9 scopes, so I picked one up.  Then took pics through it after I got home.

Also started my Rudolph character ornaments kit.  "Hello, Clarice."

Hermie & Santa

Rudolph

Sam Snowman

And my absolute fave monster EVER, Bumbles!  Isn't he the cutest?  I may have to leave him out year round.

I am in love with this Four Seasons Tree diamond painting.  Tiles in every shade of the rainbow.  It's been a delight to work on.  Tsing really makes the best kits.  Here it is at the halfway point. 

Some of my friends tell me that I must have a lot of patience, but it's really so much easier than paint by number and it goes way faster too.

Ta-Da!!!!!  Done!  This was so much fun.  Addictive.  I even found a space on the wall for it.  Still have to frame that peace sign though.

Now that my diamond painting is done, I can start working on some beady things.  Soon, my pretties. Soon.

Motivation: I Lacks It

It's been so hard for me to get motivated to make jewelry and stuff for the upcoming craft shows.  My craft table is so packed with stuff that there's no room for me to spread out with all my beads.  I finally broke down and set up the second card table and took everything out.  Keep in mind, most of what's on this table was purchased when I still lived in Washington and bags of old, broken & unwanted jewelry were gave me.

So I have a table full of beads plus plastic boxes (seen on the floor under the table).

Here's Sagan, helping me after I set up the table.

What a sweet face.  He'd just had his fall bath and was so fluffy & soft.

We had such a nice fall that it's really been hard to get back to being inside and making the same old stuff, vs. wanting to try out new crafts.  Plus I was busy carving pumpkins and roasting seeds.  And another horribly time consuming chore is having my name changed on everything.  I should've started it back in September but I put it off. Finally forced myself to the DMV for the new license and registration.  Since the closest one is in Plymouth, I had to get up early and get up there by 7:45 and I was still about 15th back in line when they opened at 8. Luckily they were moving people through quickly, so I was back on the road for home by 8:30.  Of course everyone wants copies of things and don't get me started on the hell that is changing your name on Paypal.  I just did this a couple of years ago and now I get to do it again.

I have been trying to figure out how many miles I've walked since winter ended.  I remember my first longish walk in April, my back, feet legs and hips were aching after reaching the end of my street.  Now I'm regularly doing miles at a time, esp. on the Canal.  My sneakers are worn out too.  Time for a new pair of those.  Just from looking at my pictures, it looks like I walked just over 100 miles since April.  That's a lot, esp. for me, a confirmed exercise hater.

Finally forced myself to start making jewelry and having the beads all spread out has made designing so much easier.  I really love doing it so I don't understand why I couldn't get motivated.  Michelle did the wire wrapped beach glass pendant on this one, and I added the necklace part to it.  I did quite a few necklaces, some bracelets and earrings but my pics didn't come out too good!  I was in a hurry to shoot them and they ended up kinda blurry at the top and bottom.

Here's another 'never again' project.  Shells and glass stuck on a styrofoam ball.  This took over a week to finish because the styrofoam glue takes so long to dry.  The shells are from Sanibel Island in Florida, which friends brought back for me.

November 2 was Fall Back Day; my fave!  We had a wicked storm too. Started the day before with torrential rain and high winds.  The poopies were sticking close together, as they are not fans of storms.

All hell broke loose after about 2:30 AM on Sunday, 11/2, with rain and wind.  I was very grateful that Russell made sure the generator was all charged up and ready to use in case the power went out, which, fortunately, it didn't.  I got up at 8 and promptly set the clocks back to 7, and busied myself packing away the Halloween decorations and putting up the Thanksgiving ones.  When I looked outside around noon, I could not believe what I was seeing.  Snow. Just a tad early.  The temperature plummeted to the mid 30s, I caved in and turned on the heat in the house, and I had to break out the winter coat and boots to take the dogs out.

It prompted me to write this on my car.

But by day's end, the snow and wind had stopped, the cold remained but the setting sun lit up the tree tops.

I am sooooo not ready for winter!!

Miscellaneous Projects

A few months ago I found a pair of old earrings in a junk shop for $2.  The peacock blue crystals are so pretty.  I took the earrings off the backs and made a beaded hairpiece out of one of them.  This is the first time I've ever made this particular style.  Usually I do either round or oval shape. I was pleased with how it came out.

Rainbow beads in a mini bottle.  I had to use a head pin to make them stack evenly, and put the head pin into the cork bottom.

Another rock with a paint dot tree. 

And a triple moon rock.

Fall tree

And a heart.  I also made a paisley but it didn't come out that good.

I found the pattern online somewhere and it made me laugh so I made it into a card to send to Axe.  

And speaking of cards, my bff Marsha's birthday was this month so I did a beach themed card using an old fashioned linen postcard reproduction with a poem about walking by the seashore.  I added shells, beach glass and some pearl beads to it.

Inside of card.

Finally, this was another pattern from the internet so I did it into a book mark.  I changed the black R and diamonds to the house colour of copper.  Then I stitched it to some stiff felt so that it keeps the shape and hides the stitches.