Today was like spring!    It's been a wild week and half thanks to the wind storm.  So much tree destruction in NH, I'm still amazed at how big the trees are and how many have fallen over.   Doesn't do much for my state of mind but trying to stay focused on my work which isn't easy, given that I have spring fever to cope with. 

Nancy Tobey and I collabrated on another big piece that we are submitting to a glass bead exhibition.    Nancy wanted to go beyond just stringing her handmade glass beads onto a chain, and I just happened to be knitting a silverplated necklace, so I knitted another tube, so that we could have an "Elizabethan" ruff collar.   I took all of Nancy's beads and attached, sewn, and tied the beads into the knitted necklace.   It's an outrageous, over the top collar that Queen Elizabeth the First would have loved to wear.  It's the most dramatic necklace I've ever made, and Nancy was in high heaven when she saw it.  We both didn't quite know how we would do it, but I figured out how to attached the beads onto the knitted surface.

I'm starting to wonder if I have a future in the costume industry, since my work is taking on a larger scale, more costumey look.     I don't quite know how my ideas evolve and sometimes I have to ride it out thru experimenting.  Some ideas work out, some don't but at least I try.   Now, I'm going to try making a large, or tall purse.   I'm not big on purses, but it may be fun to try it.   My ideas don't always follow a straight path, and it's bits and pieces that I follow thru.   At times, I have a clear image of what I want, and other times, I don't, and have to fall back on trying it out and see how it look.

I have a quote - "Creating art is an act of destruction before creation."   My metalwork often go thru hell and fire before it becomes beautiful.

Click to Comment

These past 4 days are best forgotten.   We had a terrific wind/rain storm on Thursday night the 25th, that turned into a disaster in New Hampshire and New England.   Many very tall, old, large trees were pushed over, creating a lot of property damage.  Brush, tree debris, branches, stuff all over the place.  We are going to be cleaning for the next few months.   So many power lines knocked down, I had no power for 4 long days.  You do not want to have a blackout in the middle of winter, and I've had two long blackouts in the wintertime.

All I want is to get back to normal, clean up and get back to my workbench since I haven't been able to work since Thursday afternoon.    I was afraid my hedgehog wouldn't survive the cold, but heat packs work great in keeping him warm.  All pets are good, heat, light and water are back, and all is good in the world. 

Click to Comment

In our car-obsessed society, it's rare to see horses used as people movers.  Today, I saw an unexpected sight - 2 horses tied up at the rail in front of the local Dunkin Donuts.   It was so funny, so odd and yet amusing to see the riders just hanging out on the porch with their coffee while the horses waited patiently.   You don't think of horses and Dunkin Donuts.  Guess the riders needed their daily java while riding their horses.  

Surprisingly, New Hampshire has a lot of horses, and I often see horses but very few cows.  Makes me wonder if the horses outnumber the cows in NH.   Even one of my students is a horse vet.   NH does not deserved it's nickname - Cow Hampshire.   In my town and next town over, we do have quite a few horses and a riding school.   It's been 30 years since I've been on a horse.

Click to Comment

With all those internet online stores and marketplaces like Ebay, Etsy, and much more, it can be a little overwhelming and you can get lost.  Before I got my website, a very limited selection of my work was on various websites, sadly, most are gone, victims of the online craze of the late '90's.   Since my website is not a selling site, but for info purposes, I needed an webstore, which, thru  Artisan's Accomplice.com, an easy to use format.   It's nice to be able to upload my images, write my blogs, send out email alerts on a monthly basis.

A few weeks ago, NativeMotif.com contacted me, interested in selling my work.   After some deliberating, I decided to get them a chance.  So far, in within a month, they sold a bracelet, so I'm hoping it will be a good online selling venue.    I don't really like to do fairs, and it's hard to get around, so trying to sell more online seems easier, less wear and tear on me and my poor car, and more economical, since doing fairs, traveling expenses can be very draining.   We'll see what happens.  Go check out http://www.nativemotif.com/  and see what you think.

Never thought I would become good with computers.   I had to be led kicking and screaming into the computer age in grad school, and to this day, Mac computers still make me break out.   I'm a PC user.  I swear, Mac computers immediately act up the minute they seen me coming.   Now, I can blog, do my own images and much more, but a lot of that is just sheer practice on my humble computer.   You hear and read about people interacting with computers, even being implanted.   I am a cyborg thanks to cochlear implants. Never thought I would have computer chips in my body, and I ended up with two cochlear implants.   Creepy, but it's the only way I'm going to hear.  You hear the old joke that you have a hole in your head?   I literally have 2 surgical holes in my head.  That old joke is very true for me.

Enough of computers and back to my art.

Click to Comment

I've been watching the monster snowstorm that slammed into Philly, DC, Maryland, Virginia and the mid-Altantic area.    As an seasoned New Hampshirer, I'm so used to snowstorms, blizzards, nasty weather, whatever Mother Nature dishes out for us hardy New Englanders, I couldn't resist chuckling at the discomfort the mid-Altantic residents had to put up with.   I go thru this every winter, and pretty much spend 4 months straight yearly just shoveling snow.   Heck, I even injuried my shoulder and I've come to hate snow.  I'm so happy I didn't have to deal with the 30" snow that hit Philly, DC, Pittsburgh and more.  This Saturday and  Sunday were beautiful, sunny days.   We New Englanders have a wry, weird and distinctly sarcastic sense of humor regarding bad weather.   It's how we survive every winter.    I do have to confess that I'm weary of snow and seriously thinking of relocating to areas that get little snow.  Guess I'm getting old and creaky and cranky ( again, that New England humor!).

I know Mother Nature isn't quite done with us in New England, and I know we'll get a few more nasty snowstorms before spring comes.  On the good side, the days are getting longer.    Maybe I can work longer in my studio.  I've been joking I have a 30 second commute to work since I've found it easier to work at home or very close by.

On the fabric issue, I've been working on my yarn knitting, and just finished a decent knit and purl sample with a border all the way around.   I'm ready to try more advanced knitting techniques.  Keep in mind, I'm solely self-taughted on knitting.

Click to Comment

I

I made "Chaos" knitted collar necklace with sterling leaf tendrils threaded thru the knitted structure last summer.  I originally called it "Dancing Leaves" but Bev, one of my students nicknamed it Chaos, so I renamed it as "Chaos".   I had this vision of silver leaves on wire, surrounding the neck like a wreath.   After trying to weave multiple strands of wire, I gave up and started knitting  a large tube that I cut open to create a Elizabethan ruff.   I originally was going to have a silver leaf on each end of each wire, but it got a little overwhelming.  I alternated hammering and balling up each end of wire on the bottom of the collar.   I ended remaking it but it's more successful.

 I had it on display at the CraftWear Exhibit at the Annual Craftsmen's Fair last year, and then sent it off to Art Ability, an international juried art show at Bryn Mawr Rehab Hospital in Malvern, PA, that is hosted every fall.   I have been doing Art Ability for years so I do my best to create new work that I normally don't make or sell in NH/MA.    Chaos ended up winning 3rd place in the craft division, and I was asked if I would allow it to remain on display for a full year.     Bryn Mawr Rehab Hospital just bought it for their permanent display, so it's fitting that Chaos will be on display for many years.   It can be worn but it's not the most practical necklace, but that's ok, it's the creativity that matters.   Sometimes you have to go out on a limb and make work that isn't practical or wearable because your vision or idea requires you to make a leap of faith.   I do enjoy pushing myself beyond what I normally do and stay fresh.  

Click to Comment

While I was in NYC last week, I wanted to go to the fabric district. Years of watching Project Runaway and watching the designers run amok at Mood's Fabric store made me want to find that place.   Well, I was in a state of shock.   I thought I died and gone to fabric heaven.   It's a big store, on 37th St between 7th and 8th Ave, spread out over 3 floors.   I didn't buy much but I had a good time drooling over the vast array of fabric, stuff I cannot find anywhere.  Mood's is expensive, so I didn't get much, but I found more fabric stores on 39th St that had a dazzling assortment which I picked up more fabric much cheaper.  As usual, I made a quick stop at Metalliferious and got what I needed.  

I'll have to make the fabric district a must stop for every time I got back to NYC.  It's worth checking out, even if you don't get anything.

Click to Comment

I usually teach at Brookfield Craft Center - www.brookfieldcraftcenter.org - a few times a year.  It's next to Danbury, CT, about 10-12 miles from the NY border.   Brookfield or BCC as it is called, is an old mill that was converted into a craft center and lots of good workshops/classes to take.   I'm teaching how to make clasps this weekend, a nice change from what I usually teach.    I plan to go back to NYC this week and go to my old hangout - Metalliferious!   I hope I find some new things.  I'm gotta try to find the fabric district, but it depends on how much time I have.    I really cannot get enough of fabric and have been sewing quite a bit this month.

Off I go to my next adventure!  ( with hedgehog in tow)

 

Click to Comment

I am really smitten by the knitting bug.   I didn't realized how obsessive I was going to be about knitting wire after knitting Glorious in Purple wire dress last summer.  Oh well, better than smoking or bad habits, right?      Now, most knitted wire is in a small tube or a narrow ( under 2") wide flat  necklace or bracelet.   I thought, if I knitted a giant tube, about 16" - 18" in diameter, I could cut it open and make it into a wide bib-like collar type necklace.   I got two necklaces out of that giant tube, and this is the finished one.  Silveplated copper wire with black copper wire border, finished with freshwater pearls and a vintage glass button for a closure.   It is named Cleopatra Collar.     The other necklace is unfinished for I am not quite sure how I want to finish the edges, but I found a lovely black jet Victorian button I will use as a closure.   If you are curious on how long it takes, I started it in Dec, and finished it in 3 weeks, working a bit at a time.

Click to Comment

About 2-3 years ago, I tried my hand at felting wool, and took a few workshops.  I loved making felted flowers, but had difficulty making ropes.  Anyway, an exhibit was coming up, and I thought I would try getting back to the felting.   This time, I didn't enjoy felting as much, but then I have a bum elbow, which made it hard to massage the wool for a long time.   I still had a few felted flowers and a bunch of thick felt cords, so I put together 3 flowers and two cords together into this necklace, and put a few glass beads of mine inside the flowers.  I'm inspired to finish 2-3 more necklaces with the remaining flowers and cords I have.    Not sure what to call it - Vines and Flowers?  Garland of Flowers?  I'm open to suggestions.

Click to Comment

I was on a measuring spoon and salad server roll.   I just got into the groove and finished 5 sets of measuring spoons and 5 sets of salad servers.   Since there's a lot of grinding, deburring, polishing, soldering, it's a really labor-intensive and dirty job.  I tend to put it off till it gets to the point I have to do it, and then do it all at once.  Might as well get seriously dirty.   It's really nice to have lots of new sets on hand and not worry about doing them for a while.  

Now I'm working with felt, glass beads and fiber, trying to make a few once of a kind jewelry that is not metal.   I also finally learned to do a proper purl and knit after doing a basic knit all my life.  Thank goodness for the Internet for basic instructions.   I have a lot of wool yarn that I want to finish knitting and then throw into the washing machine to felt them.  Who knows what I will do with them, but it'll be something weird, fun and unexpected.   I'm never sure where I go when it comes to alternative materials.

Click to Comment

It's a new year, a fresh start, the beginning of a new decade.  May 2010 be a calmer decade and more positive the the previous decade.  I've been shifting a lot in my work and feeling restless so I'm going to be trying to raise the bar to step it up.   New designs, new materials and try to do more glass beadmaking.  I would like to get back to cutlerymaking, so I'm been looking for a weekend workshop so I can understand steel better to work with it. 

Who knows how things will work out this year.   I'm going to try to keep blogging as much as possible, since someone told me I should be keeping a mini-journal since I tell interesting stories.   When I think about it, this blog feature is my mini-journal.   Therefore, I can keep telling my stories and my adventures in my craft.  After all, I have a lot of "happenings" that occur in my life, making my artwork and my teaching.   My students can crack me up at times. 

Today's funny comment was that I said my dog was a holy terror, and my mom heard me as "holy terrier".  Bosco is a sweet, reserved dog, but he does get a little wild in my car.  I've never seen any dog so in love with cars.  My dog will do anything to be in a car.  One last note, I finally got a male finch to keep Miss Daisy, my lone finch company.  Here's a picture of both finches.  

Now, if I can find the motivation to get some jewelry made today!

Click to Comment

I took some downtime away from my metalworking/jewelry.    I always need to stop for a week to 3 weeks after Christmas to recharge.   Even we artists need a break from our art.    I did go on a 4 day sewing spree.   I'm a frustrated apparel designer for I love fine clothing and fabulous shoes.   My mom jokes that every time we go by shoes, I'm irrestibly drawn to them.   Anyway, I do a lot of sewing for I love working with fabric, buying fabric, cutting them up and making stuff out of fabric.   I have so much fabric it's a little ridiculous, but I can't help it. 

 I confess I am a fabric addict.   Here's a picture of some fabric I bought last night.   I really go for the funky retro patterns.  The 1950's produced some of the most quirky and appealing designs and I really appreciate that and the color combinations.  I have had designed jewelry and spoons inspired on patterns I've seen, but tried to make it more my own.

Considering I love to sew, I'm unfortunately not kind to my sewing machines.  I've burned out 3 of them, am using 2 refurbished ones, and I also have collected some old ones like a beautiful New Home 1888 sewing machine, a Singer from the 20's with an early Art Deco pattern and a few other scattered here and there.  The running joke is, do I have enough sewing machines?   My mother says don't bring home another oldie from the local town dump ( excuse me, the "transfer station").  

Now, I'm racking my brains trying to think of how to make some warrior like or quirky neckpieces to be made out of felt, fur, ribbons, yard, some glass beads and a little wireworking this week.   I need to have some finished pieces ready next week for an exbihit coming up.  Since we are in the middle of a snowstorm, it's perfect for staying in studio for the next few days working.  I'll post pics of finished work once I'm done.  This is new territory for me.

Click to Comment

After all the news about the blizzard blanketing the East Coast with 2 feet of snow, I count myself lucky to get 2 inches of powdery snow.  Can't complain.  

Since I usually work myself into a frenzy in December to get everyone's orders done, this time, there wasn't as much to finish, so it was kind of nice to relax a bit.  Still have to make gifts for my family, but that's easily done.   Already thinking and starting on new designs for next year.   Usually, I spend January and February making new work for 2 annual exhibits held in Princeton, NJ and Malvern, PA.    I'm all fired up to create new work.   I really love hanging around my studio, finding excuses to solder - what can I say?  I'm a torch fiend!

I've also have experimented with my photography.  I bought bright white 50watt fluorescent bulbs that are frosted so they give a very even white light that is great for lighting.   A friend told me to try a piece of  Acrylic sheet which my father gave me, to give some reflection to rings and bracelets.  I'm going to switch to a piece of smoky glass for it's easier to keep clean and scratch-free.  For once, I managed to get some professional looking shots of rings.  However, it's time to upgrade my camera - just can't get the crisp clarity I need.    I'll be shooting more rings in the near future.

Click to Comment

 

This morning when I went out to scrape the driveway clear of the icy snow, I found these odd human-like footprints marching up my driveway, up the snowy lawn into the woods.  I don't know if it's a bear, or a really large dog, or a wolf or coyote.   I have plenty of deer, small animals in the area, but bear sightings are not that common in my neck of woods.  If anyone knows what these are, let me know.

Note : a student says these are bear prints.

Yesterday, I went to CraftBoston at the Cyclorama in Boston, and it was a small, intimate, high-end craft show.  Beautiful show, lots of exhibitors I know, but I don't know if I want to apply, since the hours are very long for 3 days, parking is a big issue, and a lot of my exhibitor friends say sales are not wonderful.   When you do the math, let's say, a 10' x 10' booth costs $1000, add $85-97 for electricity, up to $50 for parking, $30-50 for food, lodging if you have to stay at a hotel, gas, and more, on top of what you've spent for materials to create your artwork. 

You can easily spend 2 grand just to do a craft show.  If your profits are not good, then you have to decide if you want to do that show again or not.  If I don't do well at a show, I don't apply again or wait a few years to try again.   As one exhibitor said, she has to look at the big picture and see how CraftBoston fits in her future plans.   It's made me rethink if I should even apply or not for 2011 or 2012.   RISD alumni sales are easy for me to do, the booth fee is low, it's one day, and I can sell my seconds as well as my good work, so it's worthwhile for me to do them.

 

Click to Comment

I did the RISD Alumni Holiday Sale today and it was very good.  Sold so many earrings I lost count.   It was so cold, it was painful to load my car and unload my car but I'm done with fairs for 2009.  Next one won't be till May or August of 2010.   I'm now done creating work for sale, and can take a few weeks off from my bench.  I've got fabric projects, furniture restoration projects and other non-metal stuff I'll like to do.  After Christmas, I have downtime to recharge my batteries.  Debating to take an intensive bladesmithing workshop or a weekend one next year.   It's time to take classes for a change.   Even us teachers need to go back to school and take workshops and often sends us into new directions.  Who knows where I'm thinking of.......

I'll treat myself on Sunday by going to CraftBoston, a high-end craft show in Boston and be a "civilian" instead of being an exhibitor.  Looking forward to seeing great crafts.

Click to Comment

Today was another snow day - 6" this time, wet, icy slush.   At least I get to stay home and get ready for the RISD sale.   Do you know it can take up to 4 hours to bag, tag, write up an invertory sheet for stock, pack it and ship it?   Some days are devoted to getting stock out in the mail for galleries.  Getting ready for a craft show usually requires 2-3 days of prep.  Find the booth setup, make sure there's nothing missing, pack it, find wall drapes, boxes, tissue paper, pens, loose change, jewelry tags and sticky labels, the evertraveling calculator, so forth.  I try to tag all the jewelry and flatware ahead of time, make sure it's clean and tarnish free which can take a long time. 

By the time all that is done, I'm exhausted, and I haven't even gotten the car packed.   No wonder I dread having to do fairs these days.   I limit myself to 5-6 fairs a year, but many craftspeople do anywhere from 6 to 50 fairs a year.  I once did 18 fairs one year and that was too much.   It's also physically hard on the body and if you look at the average craftsperson, they are anywhere from 45 to 70 years old.  It's rare to see young craftspeople exhibiting since they are more online-oriented, having grown up with computers.   

I was once asked how many hours I spend per day working on my jewelry.  I think about it time to time, and most days, I'm lucky if I get a hour or two to work on my bench.   Usually once a week or so, I'll get 5-7 hours of work done, but most of the time, it's less than 3 hours per day.  The rest is computer time, commuting, teaching, taking care of the pets and whatever that needs to be taken care of.   I will do some work while watching TV, or if someone is driving, I can do some wireworking.  I almost always have something to work on in my bag.

When I was younger, I used to work pretty much everyday, for many hours.  Now that I'm older ( and wiser), I don't work so much daily, and find I still get a lot done since I'm gotten efficient.   My skills are so well-honed, I'm fast and get things done quicker.   I do drive my students and fellow craftspeople crazy with my speed and skill.  Oh well, I've been doing metalsmithing too long. 

Click to Comment

Today was my last workshop for the year and I'm done with classes for a few weeks.   In January, I start anew with the winter semester.   I was teaching Soldering 101 at Sharon Art Center today, and it snowed all day.   Winter is here, whether I'm ready or not   My mom has already decorated the house for Christmas, the warm glow of Christmas lights are everywhere.    

Twilight is my favorite time of the day since it's getting dark, not not quite nighttime but the trees are black again the slowly darkening sky, and the lights of houses twinkle, making it very cozy.   This is the nicest part of New England and the best time of winter.   Once all the Christmas lights are gone in January, it can get pretty bleak in February and March.  I get to slack off a bit, not work so hard on my jewelry, do other stuff and then get back into full gear in January, creating exhibit work for multiple exhibits for spring and summer of 2010.

 

Click to Comment

Since I am a faculty member at the Currier Museum Art Center in Manchester, NH, I was encouraged to participate in the Faculty Show at the Museum this month and next month.   I submitted my Flames of Passion brooch and made a new hedgehog pendant.  Since it has been a few years since I made one, I thought I would make a new hedgehog pendant. This time, I wanted to try putting the "quills" on the sides but wasn't sure how it was going to look.   Definitely looks like a naked hedgehog with lush sideburns.  No other way to describe it!   I also put a piece of rough calcite crystal inside the pendant to give it some funkiness.   I like putting crystals and other rocks inside woven pendants so it's not just a quartz crystal glued onto an end cap.   My next hedgehog pendant will have a wavy stripe of quills going down in front.  I'm not quite certain how it will look, but I'm game!

Click to Comment

My little dwarf hamster, Mr. Blackstone, passed away very early Thanksgiving day.   He was 24 months old, which is at the edge of a dwarf hamster's life expendency ( 18-24 months), so I'm surprised but pleased he lived a good long life.   He was such a dapper boy, so handsome in his smoky black fur with white feet, chin, belly and tail.  He has gotten wizened in the last few months and his fur had faded to a silver gray, but he was still fast on his feet.  He was a good boy and I'll miss his feisty spirit dearly.  Farewell, Mr. Blackstone..............

+1 replies

Photographing jewelry and metal objects, or glass is very challenging.   I usually do all of my own photographing of my work since I've found most professional photographers don't shoot my work the way I want it, even if I'm there in person to tweak my work.     I learned to photograph the old fashioned way, with black and white film in high school, shooting, developing and printing my films and prints.   For most of my artistic career, I shot a ton of slides, documenting my work over the decades.  When digital cameras came along, it became harder and harder to find slide film, much less finding someone to develop them.  Also, all of the major internet jury sites require digital images.  I bit the bullet and got my first digital camera back in the early 2000's.

In some ways, digital cameras are great for you can get instantous images.  If I screw up my images, I delete them and start over again.   No more waiting for my slide film to be develop ( which could take 3 weeks), and find out I completely ruined half of my slides.    It has taken me longer to figure out Photoshop and actually, for some reason, my computer will not work with my current Photoshop 7, so I use ArcSoft PhotoImpression 6,

I was careful to get a camera that had 4 mega pixels or more, and now that I have 2, one with 4 pixels and one with 7.2 mega pixels.   The newer camera is a tiny Sony that is great for traveling and the old camera is a big workhorse Olympus.   These 2 cameras couldn't be more different when it comes to shooting my work.  The background color can be all over the place.   I find the old Olympus much better for shooting all of my jewelry work.   As you can see, the picture above is my basic light box.  It's a small 3 sided collapsible box with a black back and base.  I use black or gray paper for my background, hang my necklaces from a wire brace hanging from the top, and use a black earring tree to hold my earrings.   Bracelets, I generally lay on the paper, as well as brooches.   As for flatware, I lay them on the paper and shoot as much as I can above.  For earrings, I try to shoot straight on or slightly above, which goes for necklaces as well.

I constantly move 1 or 2 lights to get the best lighting angle so all details shows up but not be washed out by too much lighting.  That's why I have extra white fabric draped over the light box to diffuse the lighting even more.   One curious fact I discovered with digital cameras is that they are extremely sensitive to light, while my very old but good 35mm camera with macro lens required 200-300 watts of lighting.   I actually have to tone down the lighting to compensate for the light sensitivity of my digital camera.   The light needs to be as pure white as possible, but it does not have to be more than 50-60 watts to provide enough lighting.

I generally have to shoot anywhere from 2 to 20 images of each piece.  Some pieces shoot beautifully and other pieces, I have to keep trying over and over.  Some of my big brooches are a royal pain to shoot while many of the little earrings are a snap.   Of all jewelry, rings are the worse.  Their tiny scale requires extreme magnification, careful lighting angles and trying to keep those little suckers upright is enough to drive anyone batty.  That's why you rarely see rings on my website.   I'll try again in the future to get more rings posted on my site.

Once I downloaded all my images, I look at how they came out, crop,and/or straighthen them and pick out the best ones to post online.   Considering I was shooting images before I even started jewelrymaking, I'm very much at home with a camera and both go together well.   After all, images and marketing is everything in today's digital world.  I do love being able to send images on demand, take pictures before my work gets sent off to whatever it has to go.  Many artists have learned to shoot their own images well, but many don't, and rely on professional photographers to do all their work.  Having your work professionally shot is very expensive, and it's hard when it's not the way you like it or your work isn't posed the way it should be.   I'm lucky I learned to be a good photographer and I wondered sometimes if I didn't go into jewelry, I would have been in photography.

If you are wondering, it takes a long time to shoot my work and it can take a while for me to post new work online.   A few days to shoot, crop, write descriptions, measure the work, and post it.  It's easier for me to do a big batch of work while I have the light box, lights and everything set up for me to shoot.

+1 replies

I did the Duxbury Craft Showcase over the weekend in Duxbury, MA.   As craft fairs go, it was the usual.   I've been doing craft fairs since 1996 when I first debuted at ACC Baltimore Wholesale Show, my first big craft fair.  Since then, I've gone to do most of the major craft shows on the East Coast.  I've avoided doing fairs out in the midwest or on the West Coast.  The logistics of trying to transport or ship my booth was daunting, plus having to fly, so I prefer to drive to any fair.  I've driven to Chicago, Altanta, Washington DC ( DC in particular many times), NYC and more.  

Now I just confine myself to NH, RI, CT and MA, where it's easy enough to drive and I have a clientele.    I only do the Annual Craftsmen's Fair at Mt. Sunapee Resort every August as my only NH fair.  I've done both mid-range and high end craft shows such as CraftBoston in MA, and always do the RISD Alumni sales in RI.  For CT, sometimes I'll do the Guilford Craft Expo, althought the excessive heat and humidity in July has made me reconsider ever doing that show again.   High heat and humidity is really hard on me, and doing a 3 day craft show with very long hours ( 10 hours easily) is too much.

People think craft fairs are easy to do, fun to go and newbies think they can do a killing at a craft show.  Once you've done your first craft show and do a few more, you realize just how much work it is to get ready, have plenty of stock, set up your booth, stand on your feet for 5-10 hours for a few days, and then tear down your booth for loadout.   By the time you get finished putting together your expenses, travel, food, gas, etc, and then if you have a lousy fair, you've not made your expenses.   Craft fairs were booming in the 1980's and 1990's but by the end of the 90's, too many fairs and now the bad economy has made craft fairs unprofitable.  The customer base is simply not there anymore.   Also, there is too many craft fairs, and people think they can get a bargain buying crafts.   I get really irritated when people ask if I can do better on my price.   I've put my prices as low as I can and still cover my labor and material costs.  I'll only raise my prices if the cost of materials goes up which it has gone up a lot this year.

As for my fair booth, I've experimented over the years with various booth configurations, and am on my 3rd booth setup.   Most fair exhibitors generally start out with a table with a cloth thrown over it and work spread out, and work up to pipe and drape, which is a pipe framework with curtains hanging from the top bars.   I've had pipe and drape for a 10 x 8" space, but after using it for 6 years, I was sick of it since it would take a hour just to get the corner bolts together.  I had display cases that would take 2-4 hours to set up which after 2 years, I sold off them and moved onto long narrow display tables that broke down easily.   

A few years ago, Kathleen Dustin ( polymer clay artist) and I were doing a fair together, and she had a new booth that I admired, so I got the booth info.  It's a pop up wall, that was used in corporate conventions for many years, but it's slowly making it's way into the craft world.   I went out and got a couple of pop up walls  ( see www.aceexhibits.com for their walls) that I can set up in less than 10 minutes and looks very professional.  Best of all, it breaks down into a compact pile that will fit into a small car.    That's really important if you are a fair exhibitor that your booth can fit your vehicle.   Since the wall panels are carpet, I can use velcro to attach things to the wall or use straight pins to pin things on.    After years of cumbersome, bulky jewelry cases, I love to hang my jewelry and flatware right on the walls.  It looks better hanging up and you can see it better.  

The key thing with booth display is to keep it clean, organized, very well-lighted, prices attached to each item on display and accessible for people to touch, try on or handle.   Also, don't cram so much stuff into a small space or you get overwhelmed trying to see everything.   I've seen booths that were so overloaded with stock, you couldn't focus on anything.  My mom tend to walk by booths that are too busy.    Less is better. Showcase each piece rather than jumble them all together.    I've learned over the years how to display my work, and doing an exhibit layout every year for the League of NH Craftsmen's fair, I gain more info about effective displaying.    I never thought I would be doing exhibit layouts but it's good training for me.

+1 replies

Click to Comment

Over the weekend, I opened my studio to the public as part of the NH Open Doors weekend.   Since I have a very large studio ( which is not typical of most artist's studio) I had more room than usual.   I invited 5 of my artist friends and students to participate in my Open House.  Val Barnes, Tanya Cheropova, Lia Gormley, Marcia Herson, Julia Parkhurst and myself all showed off our work.   We were all jewelers but we all had a different style, so there was a wide range of styles.   It went well, and a lot of friends, former and present students, clients and new people all came.    My studio was really clean for a change and looked great.    Alas, my studio is now back to it's usual mode for working.    I won't be doing  NH Open Doors again for the next few years so it was a good open house for me and my fellow artists.

Click to Comment

I was invited to participated in a trunk show at a Concord, NH law firm.    Apparently it was billed as NH Movers and Shakers - NH Artisans, so I had no idea what to expect.   I dutifully packed my car with my jewelry stock, my display stands, boxes and bags, but forgot to bring a receipt book.   Once I arrived at the law offices, it was quite a lovely office space, with bright purple and soft green walls.    I set up in one of the conference rooms, and my roommate was a dear artisan friend, a great felting artist, Annie Frye of Hopkinton.    I wasn't expecting much, thinking it was a night for people to hang around, eat, drink, talk.  Well, my work flew out of the door, and sold two necklaces before the reception even offically opened.   I had lawyers running around, making sure all of us artists and guests were good and fed.  Great food, great conversation, excellent guests and overall, it was a fabulous night.   My hat is off to you, Shaheen and Gordon PA of Concord, NH and thanks for a great evening!     I knew all but one of the artisans participating in the trunk show so again, it was nice to catch up with my fellow artists. 

Click to Comment

My oldest finch, Chatterbee, passed away this evening.  He was about 4 or 5 years old, and had survived 2 previous finches.   Right now, Miss Daisy is all by herself, so I will have to get another finch in the next few days to keep her company.   Finches must be housed in pairs for they are very social and don't do well alone.    Robert, my parakeet was making a funny sound so upon investigation, it was found that Chatterbee had passed on.   Animals can sense that something is wrong long before we rather dense humans realize what's going on.    Chatterbee truly lived up to his name, being a nonstop chatterbox, always chirping since he came home.   

My dwarf hamster, Mr. Blackstone is also shrinking in size, since he is approaching 2 years in November, which is amazing, considering dwarf hamsters only live 18-24 months.  Mr. Blackstone is almost at 24 months, so he's a toughie.   He's still very fast and like quicksilver if you don't anticipate where he's gotta go next. 

Click to Comment

I just came back home from Snow Farm Craft Program, where I taught a wireworking workshop.  It was the last weekend workshop of this year, and this week is the last weeklong Adult Intensive session.  It's always bittersweet to see the end of the season for it means winter is coming, and I have to wait 6 months before I can go back to Snow Farm.   I had 9 students in my workshop so it was a full class, and there was 60 students for all workshops, making it a very lively weekend.     I finished up by leaving some of my jewelry for the famous Seconds Sale that Snow Farm hosts every November.  Then I cleaned out and closed up the metal studio so that it is ready for winter.  Since I was on top of what we needed for supplies and tools, thanksfully there will not be as much new supplies or tools to be ordered for the 2010 session.   I've been appointed the Metals Tech by Pat Bennett, who is Supply Coordinator ( and a great artist as well) for Snow Farm.   I'm sorry that this year's session is almost over but looking forward to next year.  In the meantime, go enjoy finding great artwork at reasonable prices at the Snow Farm Seconds Sale -  http://www.snowfarm.org/secondssale.html.

Click to Comment

In metalworking and jewelrymaking, there's always some metal waste, and goofs.  Over a 2-3 year period, I accummulated a bunch of sterling bezel settings that the stones wouldn't fit into anymore.   I had over 50 sterling bezels that I had to scrap.   They sat in my sterling scrap container for a while and every few weeks, I would sort thru my silver scrap for any usable silver.   I pulled out all the bezels, looked at them, and started arranging them into patterns.  I add sterling square wire for extra detailing, and by the time I got finished soldering all the bezels together, I had 5 funky pendants.   Now, I wanted to fill in the bezels, so I thought of using my enamel powder.   I had bought 5 boxes of enamel ( glass grounded into fine powder) and all the tools needed for enamelling years ago.   Now, I find doing enamelling ( fused glass on metal) tedious, so I don't do it except as demos for class which is not often.

I took clear 2 part expoy, mixed assorted colored enamels and filled in all of the bezels.   I tried to arrange them in a pleasing color scheme, like the browns, greens, yellows and purple for the flower-like pendants, and bold, graphic colors for the more abstracted pendants.   Once the expoy was cured, I sanded down the resin as it is called, to even out the surface.   It gave a flatness that I liked since it made the pendants more stylized.   I actually liked what I achieved in my pendants, so I'm going to try to make more of the resin-filled pieces.   You just never know where you will go when you experiment.  That's the part I like to do.

Click to Comment

I've been teaching nonstop for 13 years now, starting with a local art school that became NH first art college, at various schools, education programs, at MassArt, and now, I teach at Metalwerx, Currier Museum Art Center, Sharon Art Center and a handful of small jewelry programs.    I've taught so much, I can't always remember where I have to be at any given weekend, so my pretty battered calendar keeps me on track.   I have to schedule my life 9 months in advance.

Like so many jobs that were hard-hit by the recession, education  in many schools took a hit.  Enrollment are down and record number of workshops/classes keep getting cancelled.     It has been interesting ( and frustrating at times) to go from teaching 3-4 days a week plus weekend workshops to one or two classes a week, and the occasional weekend workshop.    For the first time in over a year and half, I've finally back teaching two classes back to back at Sharon Art Center.    Maybe it's not teaching so much and not having to teach a regular weekly class, but I have noticed a few things that have been a consistent lately this fall.   Or I'm being introspective lately.

Students, like people, tend to fall into two groups. One are the anal ones, who are obsessive complusive or prefectionists, and others are impulsive, are into instant gradification, and are too eager to sit still or never stop chattering away.    I find the instant gratification students are very impatient, cannot slow down or relax on certain jewelry techniques like piercing, which is using a very thin, fine sawblade to cut patterns in sheet metal.    After trying to teach a very chatty, implusive student a few weeks ago on how to saw properly, she was too abrupt and kept breaking every blade.   Finally, I said, fine, you don't need to saw.  Here, take these shears and cut the sheet metal.  Simple shapes, nothing fancy.   Keep it simple.   I have to give marching orders to the point, I actually have to move students around.    She was happier and I stopped being so frustrated.  It's the quiet students who often do very well with time-consuming, finicky, precise techniques since they work at a slower pace, taking their time.   Wish more people were like this. 

Implusive people are like kids, you got to keep them occupied with quick, easy to learn skills and keep the tricks coming all the time.     They can be very needy, requiring me to be next to them at the expense of the other students, and it is very draining on me.    I've had classes where one student would hog me for  the entire day/class and I would turn into a zombie a hour or two before it's over.  The worst ones are the chatterboxes, which means I have to focus on them for the entire class, thus draining me to the point I'm barely functional.    I lost much of my hearing, some of it from pounding metal for so long, so I rely on cochlear implants to hear and reading lips to understand.  Works well except if I have someone who speaks very poorly or has a ( forgive me) a motormouth.   Just having to concentrate on lipreading for 2 hours is enough.  Add 3 hours or a full day, and I cannot focus anymore.   Lipreading is hard enough. 

Of course, so much of fine jewelrymaking and metalworking isn't quick, or easy, and take years to learn and master.   After 25 years, most of metalsmithing is as natural as breathing to me.   Trying to convey that it takes time to master the skills is too long for many people.   Fortunately, there are some people who get it, and can fall into the rhythm of metalworking if they are willing.    I'm content to knit wire all day, solder metal all day and hammer metal.   Just don't ask me to saw all day.    To the right person, once discovering metalsmithing or jewelrymaking, it's like magic and it changes your life.   I took a jewelry class in high school and 25 years later, I'm still as passionate about metal as I was back then.  I just love working with metal.  It is the perfect medium and I can do so much, and not enough time to do everything. 

 Another observation I made just recently is that if I get a class or workshop that is a mixture of rank beginners and some experienced jewelry students, the beginners go thru so much wire and sheet metal, it costs me a lot of money in the materials alone.  The more experienced students use less metal and are more thoughtful of what they make.  The beginners are so eager to learn, they make as much as they can crank out in one day, thus using so much metal, they clean me out, often leaving nothing for other students to use.   Makes calculating cost of materials per student a nightmare so it's hard to put a fixed rate per student.

Those two observations I made will help me much more in figuring out how to keep the implusive ones happy while giving the quiet ones ( or the anal ones) the time they need.    Definitely a lot of wireworking is the key for the most part.    The learning pace and needs of students has changed tremendously in the past decade, and it's more of keep it shorter, simpler, project-oriented that they can take home things they've made than hardcore metalsmithing.   There are times I worry that traditional metalsmithing or jewelrymaking will suffer and that the skills hard-earned since the Egyptians will be lost, but somehow, skills get carried on from generation to generation.   I feel an obligation to keep passing on my skills so that it does not die out but be carried on by future generations.   

I know this is a long blog, but it's overdue in a way.   I had burned out on teaching thanks to too many very needy students and after a fairly long absence of teaching regularly, I was back into a weekly teaching schedule.    I do look and approach teaching differently now than what I did when I first started out.    One last thing, once I teach how to forge or hammer metal, my students turn into hammering fiends, making as much racket as they possibly can.  Pounding metal does relieve stress, but it's hard on the tools and on the body ( plus my overly abused ears!). 

Click to Comment

I had to drive up to Lebanon, NH which is the Upper Valley, over by Hanover where Dartmouth College is located this morning.  Usually I go up to Lebanon/Hanover 3-5 times a year.  It's a long drive but necessary. This morning,  I left the house while it was still dark, at 6am.     By the time I was driving on I-89north past New Loudon, NH, there was snow on the ground.  It's only Oct 13th, and it's snowing in upper NH.   I don't think I'm ready for the snow.  Good thing I put some gloves and a snarf in my car.   Living in NH requires that you have cold weather gear and snow removing tools such as scrapers/brushes in your car.   I've even had shovels, and salty sand in my car.   Winter has come very early this year in NH.  I only hope I don't have to deal with 3' snow piles too often.  Last time I measured the snow accumulation on my lawn, it was 16" and that was in Feb-March.    I'm still looking for a heating pad that can run 24/7 without shutting off to keep my hedgehog warm for the winter.  The heat had to be turned on for the first time since April in my house. Brrr.....  The wool sweaters have been taken out of storage and I'm keeping warm. 

As for work, I am rolling out silver ingots into wire, so I can make more sterling wire to make silver chain necklaces for the Currier Museum Gift Shop, which carries my work.   Still working on making my studio presentable ( and organized for me) for the NH Open Doors on Nov 7-8th. 

 

Click to Comment

Yesterday, I did the Oct RISD Alumni Sale in Providence, RI.   As usual, it was a madhouse.   It started off slowly, with a small crowd in the morning due to the unpredictable weather, but by noon, it was so packed, you couldn't move easily in the aisle.   We were out on Benefit Street, but we were all under a long tent to provide a little cover from the rain.   I kept getting hit by flying leaves as the wind whipped the tree branches.   I'm still finding dry leaves in my booth stuff as I unpack today.   The sale was ok, which was unusual since people look forward to the 3 yearly RISD sales ( May, Oct and Dec), so I'm not sure what was going on.   I'm glad it's over, for it's exhausting.       

Now I need to get my studio cleaned and organized for the NH Open Doors in less than 4 weeks from now.   I really like it when my studio is clean, organized and I can find everything!   Artists are not necessarily known for their neatness but as I get older, I really have a need for order.   Chaos throws me off and makes it harder to be productive.  A little order goes a long way.................

Click to Comment

Today was a beautiful day, and the air felt delightful.  Every year, I photograph the trees and greenery around my rural driveway, and the colors changes yearly.  This year, the ground cover wasn't as vividly red as it used to be.   However, some of the trees glow red, peach, yellow in the sunlight and I love looking out of the windows.  The lighting changes from morning to late afternoon and it's fascinating to see what colors pop out during the day. 

With the lovely weather, it's distracting trying to work.  After a year of not making any flatware, I managed to get multiple sets of measuring spoons and salad servers made.  Some are in brass/copper/bronze and some have been sent out to be silverplated and rhodium-plated.  Now, I'm trying to get some silver chains made for necklaces.   This Sat I am doing the RISD Alumni Sale in Providence, so I have to finish tagging all of my stock and get the car packed with my booth stuff.   I rather enjoy the weather but duty calls.  Back to work!

Click to Comment

Every day, when I turn on the computer, I have to check my email to see if there's any crisises that needs to dealt with, any emails that needs to be responded to, so forth, then I go to Cute Overload for my daily cuteness quota.   Cute Overload is a website of animals in cute positions or situations.   In a world full of ugliness, cruelty, and dispiriting news, it's soul-lifting to feast on cute animals and pets.  Hedgehogs, kittens, dogs, sloths, hamsters, birds, you name them, they are all on Cute Overload.   Certain pets get posted more often, and Winston, the longhaired cat is a Cute Overload favorite.   There was a video of Winston being bathed, and I was laughing so much.    I just love to see what new posts are daily and always leaves me smiling.  Even the captions are funny, for the creator of Cute Overload has a gift for writing.    My favorite section is the hedgehog section, and then small animals for I love to look at the dwarf hamsters and squirrels.    If you ever get a chance, go visit Cute Overload and get your daily cuteness quota which I need on a regular basis.  

If you ever wonder about the 4 legged creatures in my household, the list is - 2 finches, 1 social parakeet, one lopsided face syrian hamster named Elvis, an elderly but spunky dwarf hamster named Mr. Blackstone, Cal the hedgehog and Bosco, my chihuahua/dachshund/Yorkie dog ( yes, you read that correctly).   I cannot be without more than 5-6 pets at any given time.  I tend to have small pets, for I love holding and playing with small pets.   I've had many pets over the years and will continue to be a mom to all creatures, small or large.

Click to Comment

Fall is finally here and I'm loving the cooler weather.  Fall is my favorite time of the year, and it's astonishing just how many colors the leaves can change.  I see shades of yellow to peach to orange to reds, to coral, salmon, eggplant purples and a few other shades as well that cannot be defined.   Living in New Hampshire allows me to see the fullness of the fall foliage, and being out in a more rural suburb, I get to see so many colors, depending where I stand.  I also spent a lot of time commuting on back roads which my mom calls me the Queen of back roads, so I can see foliage off the beaten path.   Somehow all those colors doesn't exactly translate into my artwork, but my house is colorful, with bold paint schemes that work very well.  I do have a colorful, funky basement studio that is pretty much my domain.   I can see why so many men retreat to their garages, dens or workshops, because I'm always in my studio, surrounded by pretty much everything I need.  

Now, if I can get my groove back so I can create new work, I would.  Nearby two months of traveling has left my productivity shot, so I'm slowly getting back into working.  I have a series of sterling neckchains I would like to finished.  I had so many sterling bails which are the little loops that connect pendants to a chain, so I linked all the bails together and it made a very nice chain.   I'm always creating something from odds and ends.  I have a box full of brass bullet casings that are given to me so I want to make some necklaces, bracelets and more measuring spoons out of them.  

As a last note, Cal Jr, my hedgehog is all grown up at over 5 months and is like a hamster in a hedgehog body.  He's the most mellow hedgehog I've ever had, and he's my ninth hedgie.

Click to Comment

I've been traveling so much, I'm not always sure where I have to be, so I rely on my increasing battered calender to see where I go off to next.   I just came back from Brookfield, CT, where I was teaching Stonesetting at Brookfield Craft Center, in Brookfield, CT.  A great place to take a workshop or class, in a historic mill or 1800's train station.    I built in two days, so I could go to NYC.        

Usually, I drive down to NYC, park on Riverside Drive, walk up to Harlem on Broadway St to pick up the Metro at 145th St.  Parking is free along the Riverside Dr in the 100th streets up to 166th St, and that came from a tip from a student of mine who lives on Riverside Dr.   There's a great place to look for jewelry supplies and a fascinating selection of brass, copper and steel stampings, called Metalliferous on 134th 46th St, between 5th and 6th Ave.    I can lose myself poking around in the cramped showroom, just crammed with all kinds of great stuff.   I only go 2-3 times a year, and the staff now knows me.  It's nice to be recongized in NYC.    You can browse Metalliferous on their website, but it's worth visiting their showroom. 

Hopefully, I can stay home for 2-3 weeks before going off to travel again.  I've been at Snow Farm twice in one month, CT, doing the Sunapee Fair in early Aug, so I just want to stay home a bit.  My productivity is completely shot.   It's hard to get motivated now.  I also finally finished Dan Brown's new novel, The Lost Symbol.  It's an interesting book, and made me think.  I need to reread it again. at least twice to really get the guist of the book. 

Now, it's time to get a little rest and get ready for new classes starting this week and next week for the fall.

Click to Comment

August was an brutal month for me.  I had to do the Sunapee fair for 9 days, and then go straight to Snow Farm to teach.  I think I was only home for a week, and we had a heat wave which left me a limp rag.   I went on vacation up in the mountains of NH, visited a couple of the League galleries, gave them new jewelry stock and played tourist.   Now that I'm back home, I recently finished a sewing spree that resulted in new shorts, new skirts, some mending.       

 I'm not quite ready to go back to my workbench.   Sometimes I don't want to pick up my tools and work for a few days.    Now, it's time to look at what's left on my desk and see what I want to get started on.  I haven't done any measuring spoons in almost a year, and I want to make some new patterns.  I have some delightful brass leaf stampings that will look fabulous on the handles of the measuring spoons.   I also want to make some unusual fancy sterling neckchains that incorporates leaf shapes.    I'll post some images once I get some done, maybe in a week.  

+1 replies

Today, while doing errands, I stopped at the local grocery store.  When I came out, I saw a sight I never thought I would ever see.  It was the Wienermobile, in all of it's hot dog glory.    I never thought it would come to little Bedford, New Hampshire, but it did.   It's one cool car, spotlessly clean and very colorful.   I'm glad to see it once in my life.   May it keep on cruising, bringing hot dog delight everywhere!

Click to Comment

The past month had been very hectic with the Sunapee fair, which thanksfully went well, with great sales, and then I went straight to Snow Farm right after I broke down my booth to teach for a week.  Finally came home Sat afternoon from Snow Farm, gave my car a much-needed carwash, and unload all my teaching stuff.    The weather was very hot, hazy and rendered me completely wiped out.  Couldn't do anything for two days but be listless.  Got some reading done, some serious quality time with my dog and had a little adventure trying to find my hamster, after he pulled a fast one on me, escaping.  My dog found my hamster and little Mr. Blackstone is unharmed after his escape.  

Now, my sewing machines are calling me and I want to get some sewing done this week.  I'm a frustrated apparel designer and have been sewing since I was 11, starting with doll clothes.  I've burned out 3 sewing machines, and the fourth is barely hanging on and the 5th machine is a heavy-duty oldie but goodie.   I make many of my clothes, just because they fit better than commercially made clothing that requires major alterations just to fit properly. Not to mention it's nice to be able to repair clothing as needed.  I do make covers for my booth, cloth bags to hold my flatware and things needed around the house.    I love working with fabric.

Click to Comment

This is my second lamp I've made.  It is called Tree of Life, made of copper and brass.   Nancy Tobey, my glass bead friend, gave me a number of tiny glass shades she made and asked if I could try making something using them, so after a half year of thinking, this is my result.  The lamp base was a copper tube I formed into a sculptural stem back in college, which is over 20 years ago.  It's taken me this long to do something with the copper tube.   The bottom of lamp is to represent water ripples.  The tree branches is recycled copper electrical wire I had.   5 pieces of thin copper tubing were used to hold each glass shade.  I had my father wire the lamp, and it was a challenge for him.   He ended up using Christmas lights since it was the smallest he could find on short notice but it works.  

The lamp is shown on display at the Living with Crafts Exhibition at the Annual Craftsmen's Fair.

Click to Comment

Today I found out I won Public Choice Award for my Glorious in Purple wire dress, which I handknitted over a 3 month period.   It's the same  dress I've written about in previous blogs, and it is on display at the CraftWear Exhibit at the League of NH Craftsmen Fair, which is ending on this Sunday the 9th.    It's not typical to find a dress made out of wire but I enjoyed knitting the wire and proved it was possible to make a wire dress.    Now the hard part to figuring out what to do with it after the fair is over.   I'm going to bring home the mannequin with dress on it and figure out how to take dress off, since it's literally knitted onto the mannequin.  I can worry about that later this summer.

One more day of Sunapee fair to go and then I'm done for the year.  I go off to Snow Farm right after I break down my booth to teach for the week.   I have 9 students and will have my hands full!

Click to Comment

This is my Guardian of the Garden sculpture which I've nicknamed her "Bird Woman".  She is the largest piece of artwork I've ever done, being 6'4 tall, with 2' feet, a 4' arm span, a beak that is a good foot long, and big hands!  She's all welded steel, which I started at Snow Farm back in May, worked on it in July, and finished it on 7/29.  She is painted in shades of black, bronze, deep red and some gold, and has copper panels stitched into place around her waist to give her some definition.    She is currently on display at the Sculpture Garden at the League of NH Craftsmen Fair, which is running Aug 1 to 9th in Newbury, NH.    I hope she sells, for it's going to be a headache getting her home since I have to borrow a van for my little car is too small.  It is nice to go really big and know I'm capable of working big.

The Sunapee fair ( as the League of NH Craftsmen Fair is known as by locals), is going great, much to my surprise.  The weather is great, people are coming in and buying and just enjoying the good weather.  I'm a lot more tanned than I expected to be.   I brought my hedgehog, Cal Jr. up so that my craftmen friends can meet him and he was a big hit at the fair today.  People were coming to my booth to meet the hedgehog.  Cal Jr was so outgoing, and so active it was like he was on speed, the way he was running around in the grass or when I'm holding him.     3 more days to go and then the fair will be over.

Click to Comment

For the past 3 weeks, I've been pre-occupied in getting ready for the Annual Craftsmen's Fair up at Mt. Sunapee Resort in Newbury, NH.  On Sat, Aug 1, the fair opened to the public, and turnout was good on Sat, plus, Mother Nature gave us sun for a change.  I had good sales on Sat, so that was a relief. Sunday was rainy ( no surprise), but Monday was great.   Tuesday was unexpectly busy and very good with lots of my work selling, so I'm ahead of what I expected.  It was so nice to see friends, old customers, students and people I haven't seen in a while.   I was not optimistic in sales, but people were buying, so I was happy for a change.    My 6'4 Guardian of the Garden sculpture is huge compared to most of the other garden sculptures in the Sculpture Garden.   People didn't recognize my knitted wire dress as my work and were very surprised, so it's nice to show that I can be unexpected in my new work.  Overall, the Sunapee fair is going great.  Only problem is I need 30 hours a day to get anything done at home!

I'll post some pics of various images of Sunapee if I can get out with my camera so wish me luck.  It's hard to get away from my booth.

Click to Comment

I've been preoccupied for the past 2 weeks in getting ready for the Annual Craftsmen's Fair, which is held every year in Mt. Sunapee Resort, Newbury, NH.  It always opens on the first Sat of every August.  It's a huge fair, lasting 9 days, so it's an endurance marathon for us craftspeople, League of NH Craftsmen staff and the staff at Mt. Sunapee Resort.   For the past 4 years, I've been the Layout Designer for the CraftWear Exhibition, which is an exhibit and retail shop of clothing, jewelry and accessories.   It's hard on me, for I have to get my work done, and be up at Sunapee for two weeks befoe the fair even opens.   I don't know why I do this, but I get good experience in doing display layout, to showcase crafts at it's best ( as much as I can do).   I'm almost ready for the fair, but need to tweak my booth a bit.  I have the jewelry stock but more concerned in being ready.

Also, over the past weekend, I taught my first welding workshop.   Since it was a trial by fire to speak, I bought everything possible for welding.  It went well, and I proved I can teach small-scale gas welding in a jewelry classroom, so I am going to do more welding workshops for the future.   My students enjoyed being able to weld, but it was the jewelers who had to make quite an adjustment to weld since they were so used to jewelry soldering.  Welding is different from jewelry soldering, and I find that if I do a lot of welding, and then go back to jewelry soldering, my soldering suffers a bit.   I can do things with welding that I can't do with jewelry soldering, so it's nice to be able to do both and let my ideas flow. 

I could barely get anything done in the last two weeks.  I wish I could have more work done, but it's hard to do artwork when you are physically and mentally exhausted, as I have been in the last 2 weeks.  Maybe I'll get some earrings done, but I'm not going to hold my breath.  In the meantime, I hope whoever reads this blog can come visit me at my booth at the Annual Craftmen Fair or Sunapee as we like to call it.

Click to Comment

In a previous blog, I had said that I was making a knitted dress out of wire.  Here is it.  It's about 3/4 done, but needs a few more inches on the skirt, and finish knitting the neckline.   I also need to figure out a strap to keep dress on the mannequin.   A ruffly knitted bracelet adds decoration to the bare arm.   I had to go climbing in the packed barn at the League of NH Craftmen headquarters ( HQ as we League members call it) to get the mannequin out of storage.   I'm bringing the entire mannequin with dress on it to Mt. Sunapee Resort in Newbury, NH for the Annual Craftsmen Fair http://www.nhcrafts.org/craftsmens_fair/fair_home.html which is Aug 1-9.   The dress is part of the CraftWear Exhibit.   I also do the exhibition layout design for Craftwear which is good experience for me.  I get to work on how to effectively display beautiful handcrafted clothing, accessories and jewelry in a professional setting.

I do like to push myself out of my comfort zone and do exhibit pieces that really challenge me.  It's easy to make more beautiful jewelry, but after 20 odd years, I like to think outside the box when making exhibit pieces.   I also have a welded steel sculpture that is over 6 feet tall that is for the Sculpture Garden, again at the Annual Craftsmen Fair.  I have enough stock for my booth, just focusing on the exhibit pieces that needs to be done by the 21st.   I hope you get to come up to the fair.  You can find me in Tent 4, Booth 409.

Click to Comment

My favorite activity is soldering, and using torches, so I tend to design my work to be quite solder intensive, so I can spend as much time soldering.   I have a large range of assorted torches, plus a number of "retired" torches.     Recently, my trusty 15 year old Little Torch wasn't working properly, so I took it out and put in a second Little Torch in it's place.  Sure enough, it wouldn't turn off when I was done soldering, so both torches needed repair.  On my old welding torch, one of the tips wasn't lighting correctly, and despite cleaning, wasn't  performing. 

I took both Little Torches and all of the welding torch tips to the local Airgas office where I get my acetylene/oxygen supplies.    The Little Torches were taken in to be fixed and then the office guy tried to look up in the catalog for more of the welding torch tips.    His partner went off to call the welding manufacturer to get the correct code of the torch tips.   She came back and said, my welding torch was an antique.  It was over 50 years old and they no longer make the parts for the torch.   We were all laughing in disbelief as just how old my torch was.  Why, the torch was practically new when it was given to me by my father, along with another welding torch.   So when I got home, I found the original manual to the torch plus ads for welding supplies.

Here's a picture of the "antique" welding torch that is laying on the paper with the tips in the middle.  The torch on the bottom is by Purox, again an oldie, plus a fabulous curvy old tank wrench I use, and on top is my grandfather's cutting torch.  I had that one serviced and the guys at Airgas were drooling over it since it was a big, nice one, from the 80's.  The torch on the left with the coiled hose is an UniWeld acetylene torch, my very first one that I bought and  used for many years.  It's now my backup torch and when I travel, it often comes with me. 

The second picture is my gallery of "retired" torches, odd torches I've picked up here and there, some from my undergrad college where they were throwing them out.   I just like hanging old tools on the wall.  In fact, an antique dealer pulled out this thing when I was browsing thru her store and I recognized it as an old torch so I told her that.  She just gave it to me plus a few odd things.  Torches have a way of finding me since so many of my torches were given to me.  I think I only bought 5 or 6 and the rest which is probably a dozen given to me.  My motto is, you can never have enough torches.   The more, the better!   As long as the working ones are kept maintained.

+1 replies

Cal Jr has gain weight and is a good inch bigger all the way around, so he's growing into adulthood.   Hedgehogs become adults after 3-4 months, so a few more weeks for him.  He's delightful, a lot more curious and just a great pet.  Even my dog is starting to tolerate Cal Jr after a few tense encounters.   All is well with all my pets.

Click to Comment

Generally in New England, the weather is never predictable.   We joke we have construction and winter.   Fall is my favorite season - the air is cool and crisp, the sunlight is so bright and clear, and the trees look like they are flaming in their vivid fall foliage colors.  

However, for the past 3 weeks, it has been nothing but rain, overcast skies and generally miserable weather.   I said on Facebook this is the year that summer never came.    I think we got 3 sunny days out of 3 weeks.   We are going to have a bumper crop of mushrooms from all the rain.   It's hard on me as well, and it's despiriting on my spirits.  I've had to push myself to work and discovered I cannot hammer as much as I used to.   Just hurts my hands too much, so sticking to fabrication and stonesetting right now.

   I'm in the final 4 weeks leading up to the Annual Craftsmen Fair at Mt. Sunapee Resort - www.nhcrafts.org/craftsmens_fair/fair_home.html  so I have to start burning the midnight oil to be done on time.   I should be, I always manage to be finished in time.   I hope we have a good turnout for the fair for it's fun, lots of good things to see, demos to watch, live music and much more.   I've been involved in the Sunapee fair as we NH'ers tend to call it, for over 20 years, and it's interesting to see how each year goes.

Let's hope the darn rain stops soon!  Or I'll have mold growing everywhere which I don't want.

Click to Comment

I'm still enjoying my hedgehog very much - I feel like a mom adoring her newborn baby.   His name is Cal Jr - in honor of Calgary, probably my favorite hedgehog that I had for 3 years and passed away a few years ago.   Cal Jr. has so many of the same mannerisms and quirks that Calgary had, and Calgary was a very distinctive hedgehog.  This little baby has the same loud "voice" but very little of the chronic grouchness Calgary was notorious for.   Here's Cal Jr checking out the newly made Ruffly bracelet.

I've had to take some days off from working after overdoing it on hammering metal and knitting in 20 gauge wire, rather than the thinner 22g. wire so my hands/arms were very achy this week.  It's taken me years to learn to take it easy and work in moderation.  As they say, wisdom comes with age and experience, and it's very true.  After 25 years of working in metal, I can ease up a bit when needed.

Click to Comment

I used to keep hedgehogs as pets and I had 8 various hedgehogs over a 8 year span.   My last one, Pumpkin, passed away over a year ago.   I thought I would take a break from hedgehogs and got a dog last fall.   This year, I went into severe hedgehog withdrawl, and really wanted a hedgehog but kept telling myself to wait till next year.   Well, life works in unexpected ways.   My hedgehog breeder ( Prickly Pair Hedgehogs of Swanzey, NH) emailed me earlier this month and asked if I wanted to take a baby hedgehog that was unfortunately got mauled a bit by his mom hedgehog ( it happens sometimes for birthing female  hedgehogs can get a little aggressive for no clear reason).   I'm known among my friends that my home is open to pets that need a home, and at least 4 hedgehogs came to me because they needed a new home.  

Well, little Mr. Spunky which is his nickname for now, is 8 weeks old, and despite a split ear, some scarring, is so gosh-darn cute!  I love, I mean, I love my new hedgehog, and he fills the hole in my heart.   I adore hedgehogs in a way it's hard to describe, and I had missed them terribly.  Mr. Spunky has such a beautiful little face, has so much spunk and inquisitiveness and is used to be handled.   I fell so hard for him  and he's my baby now, having wrapped his "quills" around my heart.  He fits in my hand so well.

I don't care if hedgehogs are perfect or are the runt of the litter.  I rather give the underdog hedgehog a home than a perfect one, which sometimes does not have half the personality of an underdog hedgehog.  Mr. Spunky is tiny for his size and age, but makes up for it.   I love hedgehogs and I'm known as the hedgehog lady in the crafts world.    My life is now complete, with 1 hedgehog, 2 hamsters, 3 birds and a chihuahua/dachshund/Yorkie dog who is my faithful companion.

Hedgehogs have influenced me in such a deep way that I create jewelry with "quills" such as silver hedgehog pendants and my hedgie bird sculpture is a direct blending of hedgehogs and birds.   I think in terms of "spikeness" since I really like the hedgehog quills, which are hard and sharp, but when hedgehogs are relaxed, it  is like stroking rice.   I'm so used to hedgehog quills, fur often feels too soft for me.   My hands are like hard leather from working with metal for so long.

Click to Comment

I've been weaving wire for over 20 years, all freehand, or basketweaving, or on a rigid frame I make like a bowl form.  I've never attempted to weave wire on a loom nor do I want to.  I like to weave wire in a 3-dimensional format.   Last year, I had an idea to knit a dress out of wire  ( yes, you read that correctly) while I was weaving  my copper bustier and hat that was on display at the Annual Craftsmen Fair at Mt. Sunapee Resort, NH last year. 

I started knitting the bodice back in March and finished it in late April.   I started knitting a sleeve to go onto the bodice, and as you can see, it's the tall dark purple tube with lime green edging.   I figure, I'll either cure myself of knitting wire or love it even more.  As it turned out, I got very hooked on knitting wire.   It's done by make a smaller loop, threading it thru an existing loop and enlarging the smaller loop to make it the same size as all other loops.  The little funny-looking tool at the lower left side of picture is an old awl I found in an antique shop, and it's perfect for making consistent loops.   So far, I have 3 knitted bracelets and one sleeve.   It doesn't take as long as it looks, and I can do it by feel, even though I check each loop quickly to make sure I'm not dropping a stitch.

You can knit wire with knitting needles, but it has to be 26g.or thinner wire, and it's very loose, which I find it is untidy.  A crotchet hook can be used as well and there are artists who do amazing work with a crotchet hook, but I find I fight the hook a lot.  A simple awl works best for me since it's used mostly to make the loops a consistent size.  There's about 4-6 ways to knit wire, so you have to find one method that works best for me.  I like to do the Viking chain method best.

Now I have to figure out how to attach sleeve to bodice and then finish the skirt, which will be hundreds of wire loops that attach together to make a flexible mesh skirt.  I wanted to change the texture so that the skirt and bodice are slightly different.   I need a mannequin to put the bodice on so I can do the skirt.  Where can I find one?   I'll see if I can borrow one.  

Click to Comment

I spent a week teaching at Snow Farm but I wasn't ready to leave Snow Farm, so I stayed on and took a hollow glass bead workshop that ran for 3 days.    I made a number of glass beads, both in Moretti glass and borosilicate glass.   I prefer working in borosilicate glass which is often called "boro" glass by lampworkers and glass artists.  Using a propane and oxygen torch that is clamped to a fire-proof bench, 1/4" glass rods of assorted colors are heated in the flame and melted onto a steel rod.  Using dots, stripes, swirls, marblizing patterns, you can get a very wide range of patterns, shapes and colors.   I have a tough time doing round beads, so I make a lot of large tubular and bi-cone beads.    This time, using boro glass, I was able to make more roundish beads and some interesting shapes. 

I also made a small number of hollow glass beads and forms, all out of boro glass.   It is safe to say I will never be a hollow form glass artist - it drove me crazy trying to keep the hollow beads and shapes symmetrical.  I rather make beads in boro glass.   Boro glass has an incredible range of colors and metallic tones that are out of the world.   Moretti glass, often called soft glass, is a lower-melting glass that is more brittle, and I find it too "droopy" to work with.  The colors tends to be opaque or transparent, with very little of the incredible metallic shimmer that boro glass is known for.    Boro glass is stiffer, requires more heat to work with, but I like the stiffness of it compared to soft glass.    

Now, I have to figure out what to do with my beads.   I have many beads in my drawers, since I have been working with hot glass off and on for over 20 years.  I have even blown glass in college and it's not as easy as it looks.    Glass is a second favorite material to work with.  Metal is my first love, glass and photography are a close second.  Fortunately, I'm able to do all three.   I do all the photography in my webstore if you were wondering where's my photos.

Click to Comment

Just finished up teaching my weeklong workshop at Snow Farm.   My 7 students were a handful, that was sure.   I was kept hopping all day long attending to students' work, answering questions and handing out supplies as needed.   I found I did not want to leave Snow Farm and wanted to stay longer, so I'm staying to take a glass lampworking workshop over the weekend. 

   I did try to make Bird Woman but scaling up to 5-6 feet tall is much more work than I thought in cutting the steel, welding it together, grinding off excess steel and figuring out how things will fit together.  If I can try to cut all the steel rods while I'm at Snow Farm, then I can gas-weld them together at my studio.  I'm used to working on a 1 foot to 2 feet scale, and going up to 4-6 feet is challenging.  Some of the steel rods were so hard to saw thru, I had to use a plasma cutter to cut it and it's really cool to use a plasma cutter.  Boy, I sound like a hardcore metalhead, do I?     I really am a hardcore metalsmith, not just a jeweler.  So many tools, so little time or money ....... the bane of a craftsperson.   I love tools and will get excited in a hardware store.

Click to Comment

I know it's been a while since I last blogged  ( hangs head in shame )    I don't know if it was a delayed reaction having recovered from bronchitis in the past month, but I felt like I was hit by a truck for a week.  Just too tired to do anything.   Now that I feel a lot perkier and raring to go, I'm packing up to go back to Snow Farm which I've anxiously waited for.   I have 7 students in my Jewelry/Metalsmithing class which is very large for me for a Snow Farm class.    Car is slowly being packed and I hope I don't leave anything behind.  I joke I bring everything but the kitchen sink when I do a workshop.   Since I operate on the assumption that whether school or studio I'm going to be teaching at will not have what I specifically need, I bring everything I will need and more.   Sometimes I bring too much.   Knowing Snow Farm's metal studio by heart, I know what to bring.   I gave the metals studio a good cleaning and organizing a few weeks ago, and having plumbed the depths of the metal studio, I know where everything is, once and for all.

I bought a lot of steel rods and steel tubing and hope to get started on Bird Woman, a steel sculpture for the Sculpture Garden for the 75th Annual Craftsmen Fair in Newbury, NH, Aug 1-9.  Here's a picture of a mockup I made to figure out how I want Bird Woman to look like.    I will make prototypes of projects if I'm not sure how it will come out or look like.  Comes in handy when I make wedding rings for clients and I'll make a silver prototype ring so client can see how their rings will look like before I do it in gold or other metal.

I'll post new blogs while I'm at Snow Farm. 

Click to Comment

Just finished with the RISD Alumn Sale that was held this Sat, May 2 in Providence, RI.   With the economy being so bad, I wasn't sure if sales were going to be good, but man, the morning was a madhouse.  I did much better than I dare hope and exceeded last year's sales so that was great.   People were in a buying mood.   Weather was typical New England - cool and rainy in the morning, sunny and high 60's/low70's by mid-afternoon.    My mother and I joke that the RISD Spring sale, which is always held on the first Sat every May, the weather is either miserable cold, runny and in the 50's, or blistering hot in the 80's.  Today, the temps were perfect.    Saw many of my customers and quite a few friends, so that was great to reconnect with them.    Now, I have to hope I can get into the October alumni sale but I'll certainly be doing the Dec alumni sale.  I had a chance to introduce my welded nails bird sculptures at the RISD sale.

Click to Comment

I'm back home now from Snow Farm.    As usual, I enjoyed Snow Farm, but it can be tiring.   I managed to get some glass beads made in the lampworking school, so I have to figure out how to incorporate my glass beads into my hedgie bird sculptures.   A little color would be great on the birds.   Now, I'm trying to make more work to ship out to a couple of galleries and be ready for the RISD Alumni Sale on Saturday, May 2, on Benefit St, Providence, RI, 10am to 4pm.    I only hope I can be productive all week.   At least I'm feeling better and my bronchitis is going away, so that's great for me.  

Click to Comment

I'm back at Snow Farm Craft Program to teaching Stonesetting this weekend.   I got the metals studio cleaned out and all organized.  Now I know where everything is in the studio for the first time for once.    Normally, when I go teach at a school or at an educational program, I have to spend the whole day figuring out where is everything, where is all the tools, on top of trying to teach whatever subject I'm teaching.   To have the metals studio at Snow Farm all put together, I can actually relax a bit and focus on my students instead of searching for tools.   I'm deep in the woods in the Berkshires and it's beautiful.  I'm waiting for the flowers to bloom.

On another subject, I got my welded "hedgie birds" nail sculpture accepted into the League of NH Craftsmen, so pretty soon my birds will be taking wing and flying to the various galleries.   I'll be sorry to see my babies leaving the nest but happy to know they will go on to good homes.    Those birds will in my booth at the Annual Craftsmen Fair at Mt. Sunapee Resort in early August.

Click to Comment

I'm so glad to have spring and balmier weather but still under the weather.    I got my first cold in over a year and that went quickly, but bronchitis moved in and took up residence in my lungs, so I still feel crappy.   Hopefully that'll move on and I can enjoy the growing flora and fauna.  Every day, the land gets greener and greener and makes me feel more optimistic.   I'm off to Snow Farm this week to teach Stone Setting.  Last weekend I was teaching up in Littleton, NH, way up north, not far from the  Canadian border.  

I'll post any photos of Snow Farm when I get a chance but I'm glad to be back at one of my favorite schools.  Go check it out if you get a chance - www.snowfarm.org.     I highly recommend it if you want to take a weekend workshop or a weeklong workshop.                      

Click to Comment

I know I haven't blogged in over a week, but been dealing with taxes, catching up on studio work and just now, my first cold in over a year.   I hate getting sick and having to start new classes for the spring semester.   I'll survive as usual - New England makes you tough.   I'll post a blog about my new paper flower earrings soon, when I get pictures of them.     Wild flowers are blooming, the grass is green and spring is here.  I'm feeling more optimistic as the weather gets warmer.   I'll be in touch ..........

Click to Comment

After having some torch tip issues, I was able to get new torch tips and finish 5 birds - 4 in progress birds and 1 new bird.  I was busy welding Sat and today and spray-painting  all birds today.   I did start a 6th bird but decided to wait till Monday.  It feels so good to finish all those twittering birds that were perched all over my studio.   Even the Flying Hedgehog bird got painted, in shades of black, copper and dark green.  My favorite is the two small ones - Bristling Baby Bird and Quilly Bird.

When it comes to torches, you cannot mess around.  I use oxygen/acetylene welding torches for gas welding, as it is known in the welding trade, and straight acetylene for brazing torches for jewelymaking.  Welding torches have temps that go up to 6300 degrees while brazing torches ( or jewelry torches as they are known) go up to 2000 degrees.  When you work with steel or iron, you need a welding torch to melt steel at 2300 degrees or higher.  If you work with silver, gold, brass, bronze, nickel or copper, they all vary between 1600 degrees to 1900 degrees for copper for the melting point of each metal.  Gold, silver, brass and bronze generally are around 1600-1762 degrees, so we jewelers work in a 1200 to 1450 degree range when we solder the metals together.  

When you work with such high temperatures, even 2000 degrees seem low.   You do have to be careful not to touch any metal that is on a soldering block and I'm in the habit of always using tweezers to pick up any metal.  You have to constantly check to make sure torches and gas tanks are not leaking, that all connections are tight, the hoses have no holes and secure tanks so that they don't fall over.  If you knock over an oxygen tank, it will turn itself into a missile, since all the oxygen is trying to escape at once, the tank literally blasts thru any obstacles.  I've never had any tank issues since I'm always aware of that and make sure that my tanks don't get banged around.   If you ever wonder why propane tanks are always outside, it's because propane is a heavy gas, it sinks to the ground and pools at the lowest point.  The slightest spark such as flipping a light switch can cause an explosion.    Acetylene, on the other hand, tends to dispere if there's a leaking tank, so it's easy to clear out a room if there's a gas leak.  That is something that rarely happens.

Anytime I start teaching soldering, I always ask my students if anyone has a fear of fire.  You'll be surprised at how many people are afraid of fire and I don't push it if a student is really fearful of fire.  Fire doesn't bother me since I'm so used to working with it.  In fact, I joke that I have torch in one hand and hammer in other hand, since torches and hammers are my favorite tools.

One of these days, I'll write a blog about the wondeful world of hammers.  In the meantime, enjoy the twittering birds.

Click to Comment

I am the guest artist for April to June for the Collective Gallery, so come visit the gallery if you are in Woodstock, VT.   I'll be there for Friday the 3rd for the Wine and Cheese Reception.   Hope to see you there!

Click to Comment

 One One of my students challenged me to make a flying hedgehog so here's a new arrival.   Wobbly from just hatching, the Flying Hedgie takes tentative steps, balancing himself from toppling over onto his beak as he tries out his new wings.   Will he take flight?   Will he be able to fly........      We'll see.  He's rough around the edges, just fresh off the welding table, not cleaned up or painted.  He's as raw as they come.

Flying Hedgie is dedicated to you, Julia.   May you get a chuckle out of him!

+1 replies

Usually, when I am at a craft fair, I'm an exhibitor.  Once in a while, I will go visit a craft show and I joke that I'm a "civilian", not a participating exhibitor.  This weekend was CraftBoston, in Boston, MA, a very classy, high-end craft show with a lot of fabulous artwork and crafts.   I was an exhibitor back in 2005 and 2007, but chose not to apply for this year due to the economy.   This year, I play host to Sara Sally LeGrande, a glass bead artist who combines wireworking/weaving with her glass beads, so she has very unique jewelry.   Since she didn't have a booth, I rented her my booth, and helped her to set it up.   It was very strange to see my booth, but with someone else's work in it.    Her work looked great and she said she had a good fair, so that was reassuring.

It was really nice to reconnect with fellow craftspeople, some that I hasn't seen in years and just catch up on what they were doing.    It was good to see new exhibitors, new artwork and if I had a million dollars, I would spend it on fine crafts.   We craftspeople usually end up trading which is a very nice bonus.   I had fun wandering up and down the aisles, seeing the wider range of artwork.   Once in a while, it's necessary to get out and see what's out there.    I have some  new ideas and will have to sit down at my workbench to create what I have in mind.

My next fair is the RISD Alumni Spring sale, May 2, on Benefit St, Providence, RI.   That's one thing every craftperson will ask - "when's your next fair?"   I only have 2 scheduled for this spring/summer.

Click to Comment

I signed up to be a member of NH Made, an organization promoting New Hampshire products, services and businesses.   With this economy, I'm trying to spread out more, be more creative in getting my name out there and join various organizations.   I'm not a "joiner" by nature, and don't sign up to become members of many organizations, only the ones I want to be but now I have tried to get out more.    

Before the Internet, it was a lot of meeting people, going out to every gallery opening, trying to call people or send letters.  I was shy by nature and it was terrifying to have to deal with people when I was younger.   After teaching for so long, I'm comfortable dealing with people for the most part and I'm gotten more outgoing.     

Now, with the Internet, it's easy to find whatever I want, send emails, sign up with this or that.  Even Facebook was a leap of faith, but I'm reconnecting with classmates and friends I haven't seen since grad school, so that's good for me.    I'm joining a lot more organizations so I'm starting to feel less isolated.   Being an artist can be very lonely.  Artists work alone, for many hours, many days, and sometimes only personal contact is at the grocery store.   Even my mother tells me I have to get out more so being online does helps.

The point is, to get out, reach out, and connect as much as you can.

Click to Comment

For a very long time, I was a hard-core metalsmith, meaning I only used metal, gemstones and occasionally, plastic handles for my flatware.   In the past few years, I've been loosing up, trying out new materials.   A few weeks ago I was at an AC Moore craft store getting rubber stamps and ink.  I happened to pass thru a scrapbooking aisle and saw these fabric and paper flower cutouts.  On a whim, I bought them and thought how I can make them into earrings.  I was wondering, what is exactly scrapbooking?   I think I get the idea.

Anyway, after a few experiments with thread and needle on the fabric flowers and lacquering the paper flowers, I made a series of flower earrings using the paper flowers with a metal earwire.   I think they are very cute, and just perfect for spring.   You never know where inspiration hits you.  Sometimes it hits you over the head and other times, it takes a while before ideas crystalizes.  I do go through a lot of trial and error  to get some designs right.  Other times, my work magically come together and I'm like in a state of wonder.  That is rare and generally I spent a lot of time, sweat, sometimes a few tears and just get the job done.  

Click to Comment

As I reported in the previous blog, I was making over 2 pairs of earrings.   Here is the finished version and I like them much better than the original version.   I really enjoy the new look of the earrings.  One pair has a light, sagey green glass pearls and the other pair has black glass pearls.

Click to Comment

 

Like everything else in life, even jewelry needs a makeover.   Last year, I had a bunch of Precious Metal Clay ( PMC) that I wanted to try.   After all the hype of the wonders of PMC, and the zillion questions my students ask me about PMC, I figure it was time to try it out.   PMC is extremely fine pure silver particles in an organic binder, so it is a silver clay.   Upon playing with it, it was like a plasticized rubber, it doesn't stick to itself and you have to be very gentle with it.   Once you finish working with PMC, you let it dry out, just like regular clay, and then you fire it in a kiln at 1500 degrees or less, depending on the type of PMC you are working with.  There are 3 grades of PMC, Original, PMC Plus and PMC3.   Once the PMC is fired, the organic binder burned off the and silver particles fuse together to create a piece of pure silver.   You have to brush it or tumble it to get it shiny.  

I found I did not like PMC.  I prefer to pound my metal, torch it, fight with it and having to be very gentle, using delicate movements was not my cup of tea.  In other words, I like metal fighting me.   I made a series of 4 petal flower earrings out of PMC, and used glass pearls as accents.    After a year, it was clear people were not responding to the earrings, so yesterday, I took a pair of earrings and completely made over it.  Took off the glass bead, took off the original earwire, and added little flower accents, added a new earwire that I coiled to give the tendril look.  I really like the new look very much.  

As you can see from the photo, the earrings on the left are the original design and the earrings on the right are the new made-over version.   I will be making over the original earrings asap.   Now I have to think of a new name for the made over earrings.

PS - it was 60 degrees in NH - yeah - Spring is coming!!!

Click to Comment

As I reported in an earlier blog, I have 2 finches, Chatterbee and Miss Daisy.   Miss Daisy has been sitting on 2 eggs for 2 weeks.   Alas, the eggs never hatched, and under bright light, all it shows is egg yolks.    It would been very exciting to have baby finches.   Maybe the love birds will try again and I'll keep my fingers crossed for a successful hatching in the future.

In the meantime, here's a picture of Robert, my very social parakeet.

Click to Comment

After a glorious springlike weekend, once again I woke up to another snowstorm.   Weather forecast was 3" to 6" of snow, but it's clear I have more than 6" of snow.    I probably got 8" at least.

As an artist, I'm trained to look at the world in a different way, to see beauty and wonder in the most mundane way.    While getting my mail, I stood there looking at my mailbox, which had this lovely cap of snow.   I took several pictures and here how it looks with it's snowy cap.    That brings up another story involving my mailbox.   Living out in the country has it's own challenges.   We have a joke in my town that you either live on ledge rock or on swampland.   I happened to live on a rock pile and it is so rocky, if you try to dig into the ground, you pull out more rock than soil.   My first year in the town I currently live in, I tried to install  my first mailbox on a post.  Trying to find a spot that was all soil was almost impossible, so I ended up putting my mailbox next to a culvert.   For 4 years, the mailbox stood there, getting a little more tilted yearly.   Finally, the mailbox fell off one day.  Took a few weeks and a new cordless drill to reinstall a new mailbox.   That held up till the spring, where the maibox and post drifted almost a foot back, and it was either falling into the culvert every time I want to get my mail.   That was not something I was looking forward to.

I decided it was time to relocate my mailbox and post.   It got moved about 50 feet downhill, and again, it was an impossible task to find a rock-free area to put post in.  I sort of jury-rigged post and put a pile of rocks at the base for stablity.  You do what you can.   Almost a year later, the mailbox fell off again.  This time, I knew I had to do something different. My father suggested I get a steel wheel hub, put a wood post on hub and mount mailbox on the wood post.

I went to a junk car lot, which happened to be a "green" lot and a lot cleaner than I expected.   Found a wheel hub, hauled that heavy sucker home, wired a steel post mounting onto the hub, nailed two 2 x 4 lumber together to make a post, put wood into the wheel post mounting, installed the mailbox onto the wood post and voila, I have my first freestanding mailbox that I can move around as needed.   Hopefully the mailbox will never fall off!   The things I have to do just to get my mail.   

Click to Comment

As I said in my previous blog, I love old stuff.   I found this great page of a human head on Etsy, and it is from the 1920's.   I had to get it for it shows a very humorous picture of how you imagine the brain as a "big business".   I especially love the camera men in the eye sockets.   Hope you enjoy the picture as much as I did.

Click to Comment

When you think you have enough of winter, Mother Nature will surprise us New Englanders with a warm, balmy day in the middle of winter.  This Sat and Sun were in the 50's, sunny, and a most welcome break.   All the sun and balminess just lifts my spirits and remind me that spring is around the corner.

My friend Marissa, ( www.brokenbranches.com) has this amazing rubber stamp collection that is out of this world.    She wanted me to teach her etching, so about a month ago, I went down to her house, and we merrily stamped our way thru multiple pieces of copper sheet.  I had 6 fabulous copper panels that looked like very old scientific illustrations.   There are thousands of great rubber stamps and I was using scripts, writing, astrological themes, astronomy, eyes, nature themes and more.   I'm fascinated with scientific themes, antique scientific intruments, astronomy, some astrological themes, astrolabes, orreries, hydrometers, glass, the universe, the moon, and how things work.   I also love old illustrations and prints, and it's fascinating to look at 1700's and 1800's prints of machines, orreries, flora and fauna, the universe, the 1920's and 30's, 50's images and more.   I collect old prints and use them as themes.   Also along the lines of old stuff. I love old electronics.   Radio tubes, old tv, old radios, fans, etc, you name them, I love them.   I retro-fitted an 1950's TV cabinet to hold my circa 1992 TV which still works perfectly and a 1939 radio cabinet became a shelf case which doubles as a nightstand.   I keep all the old electronics and try to incorporate them into my artwork.  Currently a huge glass cathrode TV tube is awaiting to be made into a garden sculpture.  I use 60 year old metal fans in the summer and they are better than today's plastic crap that are supposed to be fans, but don't blow air at all.

Anyway, to get back on track, I went back to Marissa's this weekend and did some more stamping.  I used paper to create my own "scientific illustrations" and some more brass/copper plates to be etched later.   Here's a picture of what I've been doing.   I am loving the possiblities of stamping images onto metal.  To etch metal, you need to use an acid-resistant medium such as nail polish, lacquer, permanent ink, rubber sheet, plastic tape, to name a few.   Clean a piece of copper, brass, bronze or nickel sheet very well, so that there are no fingerprints, oil, dirt or anything on the sheet metal.  Tape up the back of the sheet metal, then apply the acid-resistant medium, which I use dark nail polish or permanent ink, so that the bare metal that is exposed will be etch.  Put sheet metal face down in a plastic or glass container, add enough ferris chloride to cover metal, and check periodically.  I find 1 to 2 hours is enough to get a good etch.      In using the rubber stamps, I choose the pattern, apply Starz-O permanent ink on the rubber stamp and them press stamp firmly onto the metal surface.   That will leave a clear, dark image in bold relief.   As you can see in the image, the brass sheets have the black ink stamped on and not etched yet.   I'll etch the brass sheets at a later time.

I now want to start collect specific rubber stamps so I can continue on with my explorations since I really love how the images come out on paper and sheet metal.     I normally don't etch on a regular basis, but I may just do so this year.   Thanks Marissa for turning me onto a new hobby!

Click to Comment

Today I woke up to the aftermath of a Nor'easter.   It is March 2, and it promises to be a stormy March.   19 more days before spring is officially here.    I counted 10.5" of snow on my lawn.   My mother and   I've gotten the driveway clear and the pathways shoveled out now.

 On another note, I've had finches for almost 20 years now.   When you get a finch, you have to have a pair of finches.  Doesn't matter if it's same sex or a male/female pair, because finches are very social and require pairing.   I've had zebra finches, Cordon Blue finches, Gouldian finches, society finches, spice finch and orange-cheek waxbill ( my favorite).  Right now, it's Chatterbee, a very dark society finch and Miss Daisy, a gray/white zebra finch.  Miss Daisy has been laying eggs, and right now, she's sitting in her nest on 4 eggs.  I have no idea if they will hatch or not, so my mom and I are anxious to find out if we will be having hatchlings.  I'll post any news about new baby birds.    I'll probably be having finches for the rest of my life!   Those little eggs are only about 3/4" and perfect in their wee size.

   My other bird is a parakeet, a very social one, who loves to hang out with me and any other human.   He came from a good friend of mine, and was originally called Donald.  For some reason, my mom kept calling him Robert, and it got to the point he wouldn't respond to Donald anymore.  He's officially "Robert" and it's hard to believe he's been with me for 4 years now.   He's probably 6 years old by now.

Here's a picture of my Adirondark chair and side table completely covered with snow.  2 days ago, it was bare and ready to sit in and now you can see the 10 plus inches of snow.   I use the chair as a barometer of how much snow accummulates per snow.   I've seen worst but it's impressive how much snow you can get in one day.

Click to Comment

                                                                 I've got a serious case of the winter blahs.   3 snowstorms in 5 days and still another 4-6 weeks of winter left before spring finally gets here.   In NH, we have a joke - 9 months of winter and 3 months of summer.  That also goes for road contruction - it never ends, just takes a break for a month or so in the winter.

Remember the flower pin posted in a previous blog?  I decided to go flower crazy, and made another flower brooch, and then proceeded to make a new series of flower earrings with coiled stems, which is completely new for me.   I just need to have a little springtime to remind myself it'll get warm soon.   I finally posted some of my welded hedgie birds on my webstore, and also on www.Etsy.com.    If you want to check out my work on Etsy, my seller name is spoonlady so come and visit my Etsy store.

I also ended up on Facebook, so you can go to my Joy Raskin page if you are a Facebook member.   I sort of got sucked into it thanks to my college alumni "connection" who had to set up a new RISD page for all the RISD alumni.  For those of you who don't know, RISD is Rhode Island School of Design and I'm a jewelry/metal graduate, '90.  That was over 20 years ago!

Enough of my ramblings and let's hope spring come soon!

Click to Comment

I've been posting new work on my webstore, so there's a variety to choose from.    I've been taking so many pictures, I've had to do some serious editing, reorganizing and putting pictures into the appropriate folders.   In between, I have been teaching 4-5 classes a week, and working on several custom orders.   I also have been making more hedgie birds - I certainly love welding now.   I even made 2 hedgehogs out of welded nails.  The hard part is figuring how to make those skinny little legs hedgehogs have.  Having a lot of hedgehogs over a number of years as pets has shown me how hedgehogs look and behave.   Sadly, my last hedgehog died last year, and I've gotten a very comical dog this time.  Here's a picture of my soldering bench, which is a mess since I have nails everywhere, and a few welded pieces.   I spent a lot of time with my torch which is my favorite tool.

Click to Comment

It's been a while since I posted a new blog, so here goes nothing.   I've been starting new classes at the Currier Museum Art Center in Manchester, NH  and at Metalwerx in Waltham, MA.   Now I'm writing up class proposals and workshop proposals for spring and summer, so check my Workshops section on my www.joyraskin.com site to see where I'm teaching.   I'm gonna offer small-scale welding workshops so that people can try welding right at their jewelry bench without needing large welding equipment. 

I've decided to try Etsy to sell, so you can find me as "spoonlady" as my Etsy shop.    As for artwork, I've made a few more hedgie birds from welded nails, and doing custom work for clients.   In between all that, I struggle to keep Mother Nature at bay, shoveling more snow than I care to remember.  Today was a snowy day, followed by icy rains.  Not the most ideal conditons.    My dog does not like the rain!   It's fun to watch him do his best to avoid getting wet.   Now, if I can train him to help me work in my studio, that would be great. 

Here's a picture of a flower brooch I made for an exhibit opening on Friday Feb 6 at Gallery 205, 205 N. Main St, Concord, NH.   For those who are weary of winter, this flower brooch will remind you of spring when the flowers start blooming.  Spring is not that far away!

+1 replies

Been doing my end of the year fall/winter cleanup and working on projects I want to do.  I got back to my welding, and I was able to do small-scale oxygen/acetylene welding with my Little Torch.  I made a series of small hedgehog/birds, which I nickname "hedgie birds", since they are birds with spiky quills.  This bird is the 3rd one I did.  It's nice to put down my jewelry tools and just be casual, weld nails, steel, iron, whatever I get my hands on.  The next few months are going to be very experimental, since I don't have any fairs or shows to do till May, so it's playtime for me.

+1 replies

I wanted to wish all of you a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year's!  2009 promises to be a very interesting year.   

Click to Comment

I got my power back after 4 days of blackout thanks to the Ice Storm of 2008 in NH.  It was so bad, electric crews from all over US and Canada came to help restore power.  Even through it's been a week and half since the ice storm, some communities are without power.  Now, Mother Nature keeps dumping snow, and as of 5pm, I've counted 17" of snow on my lawn.   I thought I could try uploading some images but so far, it's not quite working.  I'll keep plugging away.      I've spent 2 days just shovelling, plowing, scraping ice off car, anything to keep the snow at bay.   It's beautiful, seeing all the snow, everything is white and pristine. The best time is at the end of a snowstorm or when the snow is just drifting, and it's another world.  Of all seasons, fall is my favorite but nothing beats a snowstorm and all of it's white glory.  At twilight, when the sun is down, but the sky is not quite dark, and the house lights are on, twinkling thru the dark trees, now that is the magical hour.  Add snow, and I'm content.

I haven't done any jewelry work, and am content to work on other projects since it is end of the year.  Who knows what I'll be making after New Years.  Hopefully I can get back to making garden sculptures, since I relearn how to weld, and made a series of garden critters out of nails, which are delightful, whimsical creatures.

Click to Comment

Well, I did my RISD Holiday Alumni sale yesterday in Providence.  As usual, it was a madhouse, didn't quiet down till mid-afternoon.   The economy may have been bad, but people were happy to be out shopping at the RISD sale.    I am just glad to have it over with and can get back to my desk.   It was good for me, so I'm pleased.

As you may have heard from the news, there was a nasty ice storm on Thursday/Friday morning in the Northeast.   I have had no power since the ice storm and completely pissed off.  You forget how much we depend on power and to be in a cold, dark house is not fun.   At least I had plenty of candles and it's amazing how a few candles can really light up a room.   After all, our pioneers survived for thousands of years, using candles and fireplaces for warmth and lighting.   A number of us exhibitors at the RISD sale were all complaining about having no power and how it threw us off.  I was grateful I had packed my booth and stock 2 days in advance so I didn't have to do much but pack my car.  This is one of those rare times I was pretty prepared ahead of time.    I was supposed to do a craft fair in York, Maine for Friday but never made it to York.  I wasn't going to try driving in an ice storm.   Pray I get power back soon! 

Click to Comment

This is my first blog so bear with me as I explore the new and strange world of blogging.   Since I just set up a new online website, I figure it was time to start blogging.  I've forgotten how much time it takes to photograph my work, upload them and organize them to create my catagories, such as earrings, bracelets, etc...............

I'll try to post a few times a month of what's up, what I'm working on, where I will be teaching or doing a fair.  This Sat, Dec 13, I'm off to do the RISD Holiday Alumni Sale at the RI Convention Center, 5 Sabin St, Providence, RI, 10am to 5pm.   My booth is #528.   RISD fairs are always good for me, but they are so exhausting to do but at the same time, it's great to see familiar friends, catch up on friends and customers.  

Nancy Tobey, who is a fabulous lampworking glass bead artist, and I have collaborated to create a small line of silver jewelry incorporating her beads and my silverwork.   We hope that people will like the new work we have done together and I plan to unveil the new work at the RISD sale.   There will be earrings, bracelets and necklaces for sale, as soon as I can get the images downloaded into the online store.

I'll be in touch...................

+2 replies