bronze clay....yet again

I am making another attempt at bronze clay this weekend. This time I made simpler structures and concentrated on keeping the connections clean and secure. They are in the kiln now. I will post the results tomorrow...keep your fingers crossed, this could work.

artist annual

Artists and galleries produce portfolios of their works in the form of books or artist annuals.  In my quest to validate myself as an artist I decided to create an annual of my own.  It's a mini booklet of the work that I produced this year mostly in pictures with a few comments.  I naturally chose blurb.com to make the book the book and I plan to give it to my friends and customers who have supported me in this year as I make this journey.  The book cover featured a "Rockin" jewish star charm and the back cover the same charm, but the backside! 

marketplace boutique

I will be at the Saul Spielberg Early Childhood Center Marketplace Boutique this Thursday November 19th at United Hebrew.  The boutique takes place in the evening from 5:30-9:00pm.  I will have my Jewish star necklaces, some towers as well as some inexpensive whimsical earrings. I only have 2 mezuzahs left, I've made another but I'm not sure I will have time to finish it before the show.  As always, all my jewelry and artwork is solid fine silver and make by hand by me! There should be a lot of great vendors at the show so you might want to stop by and see if you can find a unique gift for a friend, or yourself.

my new favorites

I've been wearing these earrings almost everyday. Well, not these exact earrings but some similar ones. I decided to make some less expensive earrings so that people could buy them as gifts. I made a couple different flowers and some hoops and stars, all about $35 a pair. I found myself really loving them. They look great with everything!

I made the team

 


Yesterday I got great news. Last month I reopened my Etsy shop. If you are not familiar with Etsy, you should definitely check it out. It is a wonderful resource to find one of a kind handmade items for sale. So since my reopening I have spent a lot more time and effort on making my shop look nice, photographing my work and making interesting pieces which I hope people will find unique and exciting. Anyway, through my research I found this group of PMC artists who sell on Etsy. They are talented artists, many of whom are published in books and magazines and who have won national awards. I submitted my shop to them and yesterday I found out the good news. I am honored to be part of the Etsy Metal Clay Team.
So far I have been bombarded with emails of congratulations from other team members as well as a lot of info on promoting my shop. If you haven't checked out my shop in a while you should!

recycled centerpiece

Just wanted to post this photo of the origami centerpieces that I made for Abby's Bat Mitzvah.  Here they are in their reincarnation! At Megan's Bat Mitzvah party at Third Degree Glass in St. Louis.  They look even better in this beautiful setting.  My thanks to Linda King for helping set up all the centerpieces and to Stacy Carman for the beautiful photograph.

silver and glass ring

Here is the sterling silver ring I created at metalsmithing class I took at craft alliance.  I cut a ring band out of 18 gauge sheet silver.  I cut out a little curvy design to make the shape a little more interesting.  Then I formed the ring shape around a mandrel and soldered it together.  I got this super cool tiny glass cabochon from Kara, a lampwork and silver artist in my class.  I made a silver bezel setting, soldered it on to the ring and then set the blue stone.

fusing fine silver

My fingers are killing me.  I've spent the last 3 hour in my basement studio fusing fine silver rings together on bracelets and earrings.  I love being able to use the torch without the fuss of solder.  The fine silver just melts and fuses together.  I am getting pretty good to this, but my fingers still hurt from opening and closing rings and trying to get them to fit together just right.  Plus I did a lot of cleaning up my PMC fresh from the kiln with a brass brush.  It's not exactly easy on the hands.  Oh well, I gave up on manicures years ago.

Here is a glimpse of a link bracelet and some really sweet periwinkle earrings. I am also experimenting with Jewish star earrings.....not sure about them.

making things for rachel's things

OK, I've been really busy in the studio the last few weeks, making PMC pieces.  I really love the metal smithing class, but I have to say that it's not really as fulfilling for me as creating with metal clay.  There is so much more fuss, and planning involved.  And to tell you the truth, I am not really turned on by all the hammering.  As far as the torch goes, soldering is a lot of fun, but the nasty pickle is, well...nasty. 

Back in my basement studio I am busy creating things is less time with more detail and weight then I can in class.  I am planning to be in a home show next month here in St. Louis to benefit The Reform Jewish Academy.  Someone from the school heard about my mezuzahs and invited me to participate in the show with other local St. Louis artists.  I am excited about getting back to my business after spending so much time on the Bat Mitzvah. The show also has forced me to get an inventory of items made, and also to get serious about my Esty shop, "rachelsthings" , which I have revamped and I am in the process of reopening. Here is just a sample of what I have been working on.

falling flower earrings

I finished the silver earrings.  After soldering the silver wire to each flower, I threaded them through holes I drilled, and  balled up the tip of the wire with the torch. Of course I screwed it up and had to redo a couple of torch firings.  Plus I almost lost one of the tiny flowers on the studio floor when it flew out of my hands when I was polishing it.  Thank goodness we retrieved it by sweeping up the floor!

I decided to mount the earrings so that you see the balled up wires, but you could reverse the ear wires and wear them so the balls don't show.  I made the ear wires too.  Just a 2" length of 20 gauge sterling balled up with the torch on one end and then formed into a shepherd's hook earring.

metalsmith earrings

Last week I soldered! I had to solder silver wire on to the backs of the tiny flowers I cut out.  I will thread the wire through small holes I drilled in the flowers to attach the flowers together.  The whole soldering process was pretty easy.  But I have to admit I am not a fan of all the mess and toxic fumes and chemicals.  Plus, this kind of metalworking requires a real studio with proper and expensive equipment and ventilation.  So I think I will continue to taking classes at Craft Alliance and learn more techniques but I will stick to metal clay at my home studio.

more mystery tour

Part of our party tour was dinner and cooking demo at the Viking Cooking School. We provided these aprons personalized at Embroid me.

magical mystery tour

I'm posting 2 final posts on ideas from Abby's Bat Mitzvah!

So for Abby's party, we hosted 20 girls in a hummer limo on a "magical mystery tour". Yea, I know, not exactly eco-friendly! Anyway, here are some cool gifts for the girls. Blue heather hoodies, from Alternative Apparel, printed with our logo at Embroid me.

metalsmithing class

I am taking a metal fabrication class at Craft Alliance in St. Louis. This is old school, not the metal clay I have been working with. I think that going back to basics will be a good learning experience for me and can only help me more with my metal clay pieces.

I haven't worked metal like this since Mr. Marshall's class at Ladue High School, but it's all coming back to me. I am really good at fine sawing, to me it's just like drawing real slow. I decided to dive right in and work with silver, you put the same amount of effort as you would with copper or brass, you might as well end up with something that doesn't make your skin turn green.

My teacher, Cindy Howenstein is really great. What I like about the class is that there are no specific projects to make. The students can explore the medium and make whatever they want, and she demos different procedures as they come up. We are making bezels, learning to solder, and learning polishing techniques. There are also advanced students in the class who are working independently, and you can learn from them just by observing.

So far I have cut out these tiny silver hydrangeas which I am going to either solder together or join them some other way so there is movement. They are going to be earrings. I'll post my progress.

blurb book

OK, here is the coolest thing ever. All those pictures that I used for the photo collages, I spent lots of time scanning old family photos. But, not just for the posters. I used the pictures for this very special pictures book I made for Abigail. I presented it to her right before her Bat Mitzvah. The book has chapters on youth, family hobbies, friends and more. At the end there are autograph pages which her friends signed at her kid's party! I built the book using Blurb software. I cannot tell you how much I enjoyed making the book. I worked on it for about 8 months before I published it, but that is because I wanted to get it just right. The quality of the book is just beautiful. It's a great keepsake for any occasion.

photo montage

You can't show a video montage of your Bar or Bat Mitzvah kid on Shabbat, so instead I decided to make some photo collages and displayed them on easels outside the sanctuary. I made these though Snapfish. The only complaint that I had about the process is that you cannot choose exactly which pictures went where in each collage. They just scramble randomly and you just have to settle on a layout that you think looks best. Still the price was right, about 15 dollars a poster! It cost more to have the posters mounted on foam core after I received them in the mail, but I think they looked great!

Bat Mitzvah booklet

In many temples and synagogues, they have handouts available for congregants and guests. We decided to personalize these handouts and actually made them ourselves on our home computer and printer! It really wasn't that hard, it just took a bit of time. I designed the booklets in Microsoft Publisher. Inside I wrote a welcome letter, information on the Bat Mitzvah girl, the temple, service, and the special honors given to family and guests. On the front and back cover I put pictures of Abigail that were taken by our professional photographer, Lisa Mandel. I printed the cover on heavier stock (recycled). It took a lot of ink, but printing the booklets myself cost about 1/4 of what it would at a print shop.
Instead of staples, I punched two holes on the spine and tied them with blue and green raffia ribbon.

kippot

We are trying to make this Bat Mitzvah as "green" and eco-friendly as possible so no leather yamakahs! There are a lot of options out there, but Abby thought these crochet straw ones were pretty cool. I got them from Kippot World . Their website is pretty easy to navigate, but the color card that they have on line isn't great. Because straw is hand dyed, matching exact colors is pretty much out of the question. I called them directly and asked for samples and they were not the best at customer relations, but we decided to take a leap of faith and just go for it. Abby wanted blue and green and the resulting kippah was just perfect!
We ordered the upgraded personalization on the inside, which looks really great. And everyone must have liked them because I thought I over ordered, but there was not one left after the services!

the tables

Abby's Bat Mitzvah went off without a hitch labor day weekend. So for the next few posts I'm going to show you exactly what I did to decorate and accessorize the event, and how I did it. Please feel free to comment and ask questions.

The centerpieces looked great and the impact of 18 tables decorated was great. It took about an hour to set it up. Then we added the personalized biodegradable plastic cups and napkins. The paper plates were also personalized but they were placed at the buffet line. All the personalized paper goods were purchased from Printglobe online. They were pretty easy to work with, the quality was fine. My only complaint is that they charged an extra surcharge after the fact, which I was warned about. But still remember there is a surcharge, so the price you are quoted may not be the final price.

I would like to post more pictures of the room but one cannot take pictures during the Bat Mitzvah as it is on Shabbat. But trust me, it looked good.

out of towner bags

These are the reusable totes that we filled with goodies and are giving to those guests who will be visiting from out of town. We collected information on St. Louis attractions, some sweets, nuts, and energy bars, water, and St. Louis rootbeer. My daughter Abby designed the Bat Mitzvah recycle logo and we had it printed on the bags! The bags are finished and ready to be delivered to the hotels Friday. We used this logo again other places; I'll post those pictures soon.