Good Earth

When my husband and I are sea glass hunting, there is the slightest little bit of, ahem, competition, around who finds the best piece. If we can even agree what makes a piece "the best piece." But the day I found this piece, I won. Which isn't usually the way it goes, so let me gloat a little. The piece is quite thick, and perfectly round. When held up to the light, the glass reveals swirls of lighter green, and tiny bubbles, indicating it is very old, likely hand blown. Its bezeled in fine silver and hangs on a sterling silver box chain.

Fall

Okay, its fall.
The calender says so.
Kids are back to school.
Some evenings I smell woodsmoke in the air.
But it was 23 degrees today.
23!
Degrees!
The trees don't care, they're turning colours anyway.
My daughter brought me home this leaf at lunchtime.
Gorgeous, firey orange, screaming to be photographed with aqua glass.
So I did.
Nothing worse than screaming leaves.

Blush pink depression glass sea glass necklace

Labour of love the last few days, coaxing the piece of pink depression sea glass from Cape Breton into a necklace. The first step was to make a bezel of fine silver to fit the curves of the glass. Its quite a bit thicker on one side than the other:



Next, the bezel was soldered to silver sheet. I don't always back the pieces as some look better with the light shining through, and cuts down on the amount of silver used, but the silver behind this piece really highlights the floral pattern. Once the bezel is soldered to the sheet, the excess backing is cut away to be used in another project:


The next step was to form a bail by gently curving some silver tubing, which was then soldered to the bezel cup:


Now my favourite part, setting the sea glass. If this was a smooth, round cabachon, I would clean up the bezel cup first, sanding and polishing before setting the stone. Sea glass, with its non-uniform shape, is more challenging to set, and the bezel may be scratched, so I leave the polishing for afterward.


After some filing, sanding, and polishing, its looking more like a pendant. I slipped it on an 18" sterling silver snake chain, soldered on a clasp, and gave it 45 minutes in the tumbler with some stainless steel shot to harden the silver and give it a final polish.



Wish I knew the story behind the glass, where it was from, how it came to be in the sea. The Secret Life of Sea Glass, good title for a novel. Well, I would read it :)

Seaside Treasury

This seaside treasury was curated by Aleutie of Montreal as a tribute to Summer, calm and soothing colours.

Etsy's Handmade Moment Video Contest

Check out crankbunny's entry to the Handmade Moment video contest on etsy, its brilliant!

Inspiration

I spent a lovely afternoon with buckets of sea glass spread out all over the floor of my studio, sorting and picking out my favourites. These gorgeous pieces were all found on Cape Breton beaches by my parents. I'm most excited about the large pink piece of depression glass, its beautifully patterned and screaming to be bezeled.


I'll be busy the next few days, drilling, wrapping and soldering to get the pieces ready for my etsy shop. Bliss.