Pink

Just in a pink mood.

Creative Life

I love to try to apply creativity to all areas of my life. Sometimes we just go through the everyday routine of our lives and don't think about beauty. Every moment of our lives can be made more beautiful if we give it a bit of thought. It is fun to treat my husband and family and friends to a little bit of something special whenever I can. Even if I am preparing a meal just for myself, I like to make it pretty. Art isn't just for "artists." Everyone can use the talents given to them to make the world just a little bit better. In a world full of stress and mass produced monotony, put your unique fingerprint on something that you do.

Hay baling Time

Distant Shower

Pottery shards given to me by a friend. Take trash and make treasures.

Remember Haiti

I have just listed this necklace in my Etsy Shop. All proceeds will go to Doctors Without Borders for Haitian Relief. It is made from re-purposed parts from some vintage jewelry that I had on hand and a very tiny scallop shell that I picked up at the beach in Florida last Friday.
It sounds as if there is a great outpouring of help to Haiti if they could just get the planes in with the supplies. I pray that the help goes where it is needed most.

Medals For Everyday Heroes

I saw that line in a jewelry magazine as a caption under a piece that was somewhat abstract...just a square with different colors. The piece of jewelry didn't speak to me, but the the caption got me started thinking about pins that one might give to someone in appreciation for who they are and what they do, or as encouragement to achieve, so I started making this series of pins/medals. I thought of the courage medal that Oz gave to the Cowardly Lion and the heart that he gave to the Tinman. This is what I've come up with so far.




These will be posted in my Etsy shop.

Dewy Morn

All is pretty peaceful at Stillwaters farm this week. The company (7 wonderful family members) of last week has gone home, The puppy is now happy and playing outside again with our grandpuppy Grant whom we are puppy-sitting. I hope to get back to some semblance of a routine this week and do some creating.
Here one of the pieces that I managed to do last week.

Busy Busy Days

Long time, no blog. I have been blessedly busy for the past two weeks. I just finished painting a mural of sorts for some people from our church. They have built a new house and put a prayer room in it. They framed out an area on one wall for a triptych and asked me to paint it. They had pictures that they wanted duplicated for it so I didn't do anything original. I just took the pictures that they gave me and changed them from a horizontal format to a vertical one and combined some of the images. It was such a stretch for me to paint people, but they are pleased so Hallelujah!

I have also been busy making jewelry. Shawn at Silo Studios asked me if I wanted to bring some for her next open studio sale and so I worked up some new pieces and gathered some that hadn't sold yet at other places and took them to her house yesterday. I also took some of my daughter-in-law's jewelry to sell too. Here is one of the necklaces that I made. It incorporates a vintage watch bezel with one of my little winged people inside and has brass wire and words, sterling silver wire, fresh water pearls, and glass pearls. The message is one of my favorite ones, "Time flies, be happy." I have a couple more watches that I am going to make some similar ones with. This is one of those that I was tempted to keep. I did a couple of bracelets in a similar style but forgot to take pictures of them.


I finally get to stay home today and create and work in my garden. The weather is warm and breezy. Heaven!

Mosaics and Trashion Jewelry

I have been wonderfully busy lately. I love it! I've had about a month of jewelry orders from my sister-in-law who has been selling my jewelry at the hair salon where she works. Things have slowed a bit since Valentines Day is over, but the jewelry is still selling.
Today I got to work on a couple of pieces of jewelry just for fun. I've listed them in my Etsy shop. They are made from upcycled bits and pieces with found objects.

Also this week I've been doing a commission that is a piquet assiette counter top for an island in a kitchen. The home owner also owns an antique store in town and has been saving her broken pottery and dishes for years, which she wanted me to use to make the counter top. I ended up having to cover it with resin because the thicknesses of the shards were so varied. I forgot to take a picture of it completed, but here is one of before I grouted it.

Doing a commissioned job is fun, but what I enjoy most is doing my own thing. If someone likes it and wants to buy it, great, but it they don't, then fine too. I'm just in love with the creative process.

Introducing Three New Etsy Sites

Once people find out about Etsy, they want to be a part of it. I think it is a great resource for artists everywhere. I want to showcase three new Etsy sites that I have encouraged or helped to start.
The first two, I'm very proud of because they are my daughters-in-law. They both do similar types of crafts but different in their own ways. First I helped to set up Christaloo's Etsy shop. She is doing beaded cuffs and hand sewn items. Here is one of her first cuffs...amazing detail and lots of time involved.


Next I encouraged my other DIL to make her own shop which she calls Zebrainfusion. She also makes beautifully detailed beaded cuffs and other jewelry. Here is one of her first cuffs too. These girls have such patience and attention to detail. Yes, I will brag on them.


Next is my friend that owns the shop Arts Desire in our town that used to sell some of my work. She is unfortunately going to close the doors on her shop soon and so I helped her to set up her Etsy shop so that she can keep on selling. She makes silver and copper handcrafted jewelry too.


I think that we can all reach thousands more customers with virtual Etsy shop than one ever could reach in a physical shop. It's also a great community for artists to get to know each other.