June Favourites

A bit late but here we go...

A necklace with a copper filigree finding and pink and copper glass beads,
plus a shiny rhinestone in the centre.

Necklace with bright yellow polymer clay roses (made by me) and metal leaves.

A brooch with a polymer clay disc and bead embroidery on the edge. Custom order.

Simple angel earrings filled with air and light. Polymer clay. Custom order.

A five-line cuff on memory wire. I just love the purple drops.

And finally - buttons! My mother wanted me to make buttons
so she could use them on her bags. The symbol that kind of looks
like a star is a motif from Estonian national embroidery - kaheksakand.

And some earrings :)

A Special Special Order

A friend of mine recently bought a necklace with a hand-embroidered pendant in a golden setting that had some Estonian national flowers as well as a pink blossom on it. She asked me to make her a pair of earrings to go with it. 

My first thought was, well why don't you make them yourself. But as it turned out, not all schools teach things like that in Estonia. Crafts are a compulsory part of our national curriculum in middle school, but the actual content of the lessons depends on the school and the teacher. So I dug out the books I had and reminded myself of the techniques and different stitches of embroidering. 

The flowers are embroidered using woollen and cotton threads (some of them at least 20 years old by now, I have a pile of stuff like that at home), and I added some transparent seed beads to give the earrings a sort of shine. The cloth is 100% linen, though it's bleached to make it white. 

The real question for me was how to actually make the embroidered motifs into earrings. I was also afraid that the threads of the cloth might unravel when I cut it. 

The original plan was to use golden cameo settings to create a similar golden frame around the earrings as the pendant had, but that fell through because for the earrings to be reasonably light, the metal settings would've had to be quite small and I didn't want my first embroidery project in a while to be microscopic, so that it would be easier to accomplish. 

Then I realised that I have some golden Preciosa seed beads and decided to use these to create a sort of a frame. But this still left the unravelling problem. In the end I cut the motifs out larger than the earrings were supposed to be and glued the pieces onto the same cloth. I used a kind of glue that I was sure would become completely transparent as it dried. After it had dried, I cut the earrings out by the outline I had drawn and glued the pieces onto white felt. Then I brick stitched the edges with golden seed beads and added the ear wires with jump rings which sit in one of the seed beads. The end result was super light.

Making these was quite an adventure for me and I don't really think that this kind of technique would ever become my medium of choice, but hey, it's really great to try out new things and I'm sure I'll make some more things like that in the future.

History Hop - REVEAL

I participated in Leah Curtis's history themed blog hop where the participants got to choose from a list of historical periods or cultures and create jewelry inspired by that. My theme was English Romanticism and Mourning Jewelry. Though I had a lot of ideas going on around my head when I picked it out, I only managed to create two pieces - a pair of earrings and a necklace. 

First the earrings. I had a bit of trouble with them at first, but after some useful advice from my mum I got them to work.

Czech faceted glass beads and Japanese Toho seed beads.

They're really not that large, my hands are just super small.

And the necklace. 

I wasn't sure at first if the greyish tones would go with white, but I think they work fine.

The piece started revolving around this vintage metal button with rhinestones that
my mum found in one of her drawers.

I made the focal by embroidering some of the grey faceted beads around it. 

For the additional pieces I sewed beads onto grey filigree discs.

This was my first such challenge and I had a lot of fun making these pieces. Here is the list of all the other participants, so go make yourself a cuppa and enjoy the show. I know I will :)

Leah Curtis - Indus Valley - beadyeyedbunny.blogspot.co.uk
Laney Mead - Māori - laney-izzybeads.blogspot.co.uk
Becca - Art Nouveau - godsartistinresidence.blogspot.com
Melissa - English Romanticism and Mourning Jewelry - beadrecipes.wordpress.com
Tracy Stillman - Native American - tracystillmandesigns.com
Liz E - Native North American - beadcontagion.blogspot.com
Ahowin - Māori (New Zealand)  - blog.ahowinjewelry.com 
Jasvanti - Indus Valley - jewelrybyjasvanti.blogspot.com
Lizzie - Art Nouveau - theneedtobead.blogspot.co.uk
Julia Hay - Merovingian - pandanimal.blogspot.co.uk
Dini - Celtic - angazabychanges.blogspot.nl
Caroline - Art Nouveau - blueberribeads.co.uk 
Charlie - Moche of Peru - clay-space.com/blog
Karin - China - maverickbeads.blogspot.com
Niky Sayers - Rome - silverniknats.blogspot.com
Marcia Dunne - Celctic and Mourning Jewelry - thealternativefoundry.blogspot.co.uk
anafiassa - Mesopotamia - anafiassa.blogspot.com
Kokopelli - Native American - kokopellidesign.blogspot.com
Christa - Native American - adventuresofwonebeadywoman.blogspot.com
Clair - Roman - obstinatepursuit.blogspot.co.uk
Susan Bowie - Native American - susanbowie.wordpress.com
Gloria Allen - English Romanticism - gloriaallendesigns.blogspot.com
Sheila Garrett - Early Russia - 4brownowl.blogspot.co.uk 

May Favourites

As the month of May is almost over, I wanted to share some of the pieces I've created during it. So, without further ado, here goes...

A sunny bracelet with glass beads and bronze coloured details.
I made the chain myself form these bronze hoops that had just been lying around for a while now...
just one of those things you're not really sure what to do with once you've got them.

A set of a necklace and matching earrings. I made the primrose blossoms out of
polymer clay already in January but only used them now. I matched the blossoms with
light yellow or perhaps creamish glass beads with a structured surface.

Here I used up another set of polymer clay beads I made in January.
I decided to spice the necklace up with seed bead covered glass beads and silver-plated
findings. Also, on each clay bead, one of the blossoms is set with a shiny rhinestone.

Here I decided to try my hand at making brooches. Though bead embroidery is
time-consuming and sometimes quite irritating - especially when the thread tangles up and
it's too dark in the middle of the night to untangle it -, I find myself getting hooked on the technique.
I used Japanese Toho seed beads and some glass beads that had been lying around for ages.

And this set is my absolute favourite from May. Turquoise and gold coloured beads
- faceted, crackled, bicones, Czech seed beads and what not -
make for a fabulous pendant and earrings and all in a simple brick stitch.
Simple, yet intricate, don't you think. And I've never sold a set that quickly.

And here are some earrings as well. As I create quite a lot of earrings, I decided to put them all in the same image - less scrolling that way. 

See the red+copper butterflies in the upper right-hand corner? Those are mine :D

I think posts like this one might become a monthly thing. I'm much too lazy to post over every individual thing that I feel that I especially like and it might become boring for others as well, so this is a good solution.

Summer Is Coming

It's super-warm here and plants and trees are blossoming behind my window. So here, have some roses to go with that :)

I used various shapes and sizes of glass beads, bronze-coloured details and these wonderful pink acrylic roses I found last week in the local bead shop. Not my usual style, but I'm feeling very dreamy today.

A Brave New Blog and Introductions

Hi. My name is Gerda and after surfing the net for hours and hours I decided to create a crafts blog of my own. Other people just seemed to be having so much fun and I didn't want to miss out on that. This was already a couple of weeks ago, but now I decided to actually start typing.

I thought I'd start by saying a couple of words about myself. I studied English and got my BA last spring and now I'm in the MA program. However, I decided to drop that - it was just toooo dry - and am now in the process of dropping out of school - and this gives me a lot of free time (so why not use it to start a blog, right?). In July, I'm going to enroll in the Tartu Healthcare College to study 4,5 years to become a midwife. So there's a change of course for you - hence the title for this blog.

I've been making jewelry for about 2,5 years for now. I don't really have a favourite medium (if you don't count beads as such, heh), but I love to learn new techniques and try different things. I've tried the basics such as wire work, polymer clay, beading, etc. I guess I just work in phases. For example, in January, after my last exam period at uni, I sat on my table for five days straight and created these little Estonian ethnic pendants from Fimo. (Oh yeah, did I mention that I'm Estonian?) I sometimes make other stuff, besides jewelry, as well. Buttons, for example. And last year, after seeing how expensive they are in shops, I made a jewelry box for my mum for Mother's Day. But yeah, this blog will probably be mainly about jewelry. And since tomorrow's Mother's Day again, you can have a peek of the earrings I made her this year: 

Bronze-coloured details and semi-precious chips (not exactly sure, what).

You like?

Other things I like include TV-shows, books, cats and nature in general. 

I think that's enough for my first post on this blog. I was working in the garden all day and I'm tired. Tomorrow (or on another day quite soon), I'll tell you about Leah's History Hop that I signed up for :) (Look at the button, look, look!)