What I'm working on...

I broke open my jar of sea glass marbles this week.  I'm a little stingy with  my marbles, such a find, but they aren't doing anybody any good sitting in a jar in my studio. So I liberated a few to find new homes in Mermaid Me necklaces. The marble in the pic above is made from clay, and it likely quite old. Its beautifully worn and pitted from the salt water leaching the minerals from the surface.

Aqua Cats Eye Marble

Cobalt Blue Marble Sea Glass Necklace

 

 

 

 

Maritime Artisan Lynne Bowland

This stunning lampwork bead almost looks like it could be living.

The artisan is Lynne Bowland, owner and artist in residence at Fireball Beeds and Fireball Gallery and Studio in Deer Island, Western New Brunswick. Lynne's work has an ethereal quality about it, often reflecting themes of nature. Her Spring Snow Bead, below, was inspired by the view from her studio and encases enamels and fine silver wire.

Lynne's gallery features her lampwork beads, glass art, finished jewelry, and  fibre arts, along with fine craft from 30 to 40 other Canadian women, including pottery, handmade soaps, woodworking, and textiles.

And on top of all that, she still has time to look glamorous. Isn't this a great shot? She calls it her Wicked Lady Pose. We should all have a Wicked Lady pose. Hats off to Lynne for making a living doing what she loves and for providing that same opportunity to fellow Canadian artisans!

What I'm working on...

Its been a good week, lots of fun happenings and lots of time to create. My other half was in the USA on business all week, which logically should result in me having less time, as I pick up "his jobs" and run the kids around more often. But somehow it doesn't work that way. Which I must admit I kind of like. Absence makes the heart grow fonder and all that :)

I picked out a few special pieces of glass from my collection this week, gorgeous colours that were sick of sitting in a bottle on the shelf, waiting to be framed and adorned. The piece above came from one of the Hawaiin Islands-a couple of summers ago I traded some finished pieces of jewelry for sea glass gathered in Hawaii by  a gentlemen from Lunenburg. The piece above is a beautiful orange red with a little star on top, so very like a sunset.

These little earrings were forged from silver wire, and are meant to be leaves, although they turned out a little less leaf-like than I had in mind. Next time I will include a vein in the centre of the leaf.

I'm still in love with brass, and it photographs beautifully, contrasting with the aqua glass.

And finally, my favourite, a calla lily hand forged from sterling silver cradles a drop of brilliant red sea glass, this one from a Nova Scotia beach. Its been fun making the flowers, and I plan to do lots more botanical jewelry over the next few months. Here's hoping this week will be a good one for us all!

What I'm working on...

I spent last night casting a custom order for a lovely etsy customer. I hadn't done any casting in awhile, and it was good to get back to it. The starfish was cast in sand using molten pewter (lead free of course), the oldest and simplest method of casting. Its a technique my son taught me, messy and fun. I'll  do a tutorial in the next couple of weeks. This is the underbelly of the fish:

And a johnny crab claw which will find its way to my shop later tonight:

What I'm working on...

Well, its finally finished after a couple of false starts. The cobalt blue I had originally planned to use chipped when I was drilling it (sigh, it happens more frequently with bonfire glass than regular sea glass), and I originally replaced it with an amber, but  the blue was so much more lovely. I dug through my collection again and found this lighter blue, with a bit of white fused at the top. And was happy. I'm really enjoying working with brass. Here are  some other pieces to come out of the studio this week.

Sea Lily, turquoise glass

Brass in Pocket earrings

Cobalt Sea Lily necklace

White sea glass and brass earrings

Front Page Happiness

I woke up to find my Branching Out necklace on etsy's front page this morning, a nice Sunday morning surprise! Thank you to The Lost Earring for curating this lovely list. The Lost Earring's shop is inspired by all of the beloved earrings she has lost over the years. She incorporates natural elements in her jewelry, designing beautiful one of a kind pieces. Take a look at her Leafy Dream Pressed Leaf Floral earrings:

And her Cedar on Blue Sterling Silver Earrings:

These will certainly make up for any earrings you may have lost over the years, don't you think?

What's New in Our Etsy Shop

New in our etsy shop, this little guy is hand forged from sterling silver and hangs on a sterling silver box chain. He is a bigger version of the Strength inukshuk we have available with a little piece of sea glass. Did you know that the plural form is inuksuit? 

Grey Goose

Another gorgeous find by my parents in Cape Breton. They found a few greys this summer, rare in themselves, but this one is my favourite. Its perfectly smooth, with lots of frosting and some bubbles evident in the glass, usually indicative of hand blown or very old glass. Too beautiful a piece to cover or compete with fussy metalwork, it was drilled with simple jump ring bails and hangs on a 20" sterling silver ball chain. It was freezing cold here today, called for snow last night, but we didn't get it (thank goodness as we're in the process of having new windows installed). Sea Glass hunting days are almost over for another year. How can that be?

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.

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 :)

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.

Fishy Fishy

I just posted this little fellow, a hand forged sterling silver fish, complete with hammered "scales". It was fun to make, but I got a little carried away and made him bigger than I meant to. He's definitely not the one who got away.

Sunny Yellow

Just finished this custom order for a lady in the US who sent me her gorgeous piece of glass to bezel. The sunny yellow sings against the silver. Yellow sea glass is very rare, especially a clear bright yellow like this. I want to keep it. But I won`t. I promise.

Sea Glassing in Cape Breton

We just spent a fabulous weekend in Cape Breton, sea glassing, snorkeling, and getting fattened up by my mother's cooking. Its as good as life gets. And then some. We found some truly beautiful pieces of glass, including the one above, but what takes the cake are the thousands of pieces my parents have gathered (and sorted!) since the ice melted off the beaches a few short months ago. Stunning pieces of glass and pottery that are screaming to be made into necklaces, earrings and art. They'll have to scream a bit longer as I have to work at my Other Life Job tomorrow, and then work on some custom orders, but should have some new pieces ready for my etsy shop by the end of the week.



Neil's Harbour beach, where I grew up. My father was a lobster fisherman and once was caretaker for the lighthouse.



Shyloh, patiently waiting for someone to throw her stick, wondering why her people spend so much time poking around on the beach.

VivalaModa Online Magazine

Have you checked out VivaLaModa, online magazine? Its an amazing collection of handmade, independent designers, vintage, and all things beautiful. We are very happy to have our sea pottery necklace featured along side other jewelry designers in their Beachcombing article. Warning: I lost myself for half an hour in the magazine, beautiful finds!

Little Sea Creature

The newest addition to our Little Sea Creature necklaces, our aqua jellyfish. The sea glass used in the piece is quite thick and you can see little bubbles in the glass, which usually means that the piece is very old, before glass was mass produced. One of my favourite things about making jewelry with sea glass is resusing what was once discarded material, and giving it new life. He'll be joining the rest of his family in our etsy shop and after that, who knows where he'll be off to? A well traveled jellyfish. Anyone have a wonderful idea for another sea creature to tackle?

Home Sweet (you know the rest...)

Its always exciting to find pieces of sea pottery with images, and houses and castles are my very favourite. And bittersweet, because we're trying to sell our home right now, which isn't my favourite thing to do. It probably doesn't help that what would be a dining room (if we were civilized folk) is my studio, crammed with our sea glass finds and floating in silver dust. This piece of sea pottery is bezeled in fine silver and hangs on an 18" sterling silver snake chain. If you'd like to see more pics of this, visit the listing in our etsy shop (and buy my house please).