Time out

Beware the bareness of a busy life. - Socrates

Now...time to re-group because between school, household and my wholesale order from terrain I've been going 8am-8pm straight through every day.


Friday night was decidedly, deliciously, slow. Kyle and I practiced Christmas carols on guitar, mandolin and melodica, occasionally stirring a big pot of homemade applesauce that simmered on the stove. Saturday I played at making "magic stones" among other things.


If you are in Philadelphia stop by terrain at Styers in Glen Mills, PA and check out my jewelry!

First....look!

I would have thought I'd come home from vacation permanently hunched over from all the time we spent looking closely at the stones, shells, sea glass, sand dollars and seaweed strewn across the beaches of Matinicus last month. I looked at pebbles closely, as I had been taught to do in Tracy Holmes class "A Day at the Beach, developing a criticial eye in regard to my own polymer clay versions. (This echoed my Dad's drawing instruction when I was little "always look at the thing you are drawing MORE than at your piece of paper".)

Here's my fiddling around. The more realistic looking ones have been sanded; the others are rough.


This might be what happens next.


And I am definitely headed in this direction but with custom sterling rings.

Learning a new language

I haven't been in the studio much these past two weeks. The rest of the things that I am responsible for in life seem quite pressing (homeschooling, peeling apples, buying new pants for boys who seem to grow over night). Then there have been days when its just so lovely...that I go here instead.


I think thats ok though. Seeds of inspiration often get planted on days such as the one pictured above.

I did start making lots and lots translucent "shell" beads, as my friend Natalie calls them.



They made an appearance in this necklace that took me months to complete. ("Why?" I ask myself because it isn't really a complicated piece in any way.)

Mentally for me though it was a departure in that being trained as a metal smith I often still design/think in metal. Then I translate to polymer, modify and moved on. This is the first piece that, in my head at least, I felt like I thought through the process in the new language (polymer). I designed it to lay asymmetrically against the neck by stringing, trying on, stringing, trying on. I'd like to be able to get a little more control over that process.

Bead, all that you can Bead

In a attempt to extend my line of necklaces, I spent a fun afternoon searching through beads at a Rings-n-Things Bead tour location a week ago. What a wonderfully tactile experience! I touched many more beads than I actually purchased. Am I the only one or does anyone else out there have this "need-to-touch" issue with beads?!

Anyway, its good they don't charge you for just picking things up. ("Um, excuse me, Miss? I am sorry but you've caressed that strand of huge turquoise beads three times now - that'll be $30.)


The serious "beaders" were purchasing mountains of beads. I controlled myself realizing that I was there just to choose compliments to my polymer pieces but it wasn't easy. The photos show some of my purchases...beads of glass, jasper, labrodorite and agate, Masai trade beads from Africa and silver beads that actually set me back the most.