Travel Time

Again, it's been a while since I posted. Let me play catch-up. I left my home in early June. I went to Mary's house and then to Jackie's baby shower. We will soon be welcoming Makenzie Sloan. From there I journeyed to Liz's and enjoyed myself watching Brandon in his karate classes. Moving on my next stop was Cosby, TN. I had a wonderful time at my first bead retreat! What a great group of women! We had Jim
Mc Intosh teach us wire wrapping. We taught each other different techniques and projects. I learned bead crochet, Kumihimo, Viking Knit and polymer clay. I taught the Cellini bracelet project. I haven't finished any of the projects but I will! I'm still working on the bead crochet. I'm still working on my St. Petersburg lariat so since nothing is finished I'm choosing to post a picture of a necklace that I made with the St. Petersburg stitch. My daughter was given this one as a Christmas gift.
After that inspiring gathering I drove the remainder of the way to NY. I've been working at my old job as a dialysis nurse at Good Samaritan Hospital for the past two weeks. It is really great to see everyone again. I've attended a small conference held by the American Nephrology Nurse Association. I renewed some old friendships, had a great dinner, learned something new and earned some continuing educations points.

Since returning from California I've been busy! Recovering from my once-a-year cold was not too bad after starting on antibiotics. Next time I take a flight I'm loading myself up with vitamins and some type of immunity booster.
Well, anyway, my busyness consists of, what else, teaching and jewelry making. I'm really enjoying the silver smithing class! I've made four rings and the bracelet that you see above. They are by no means perfect but I always give myself learning room. With the price of silver I can afford to scrap it unless the mistake is really glaring! Maybe in a year or so I'll look at them and not be able to stand them and then scrap it but for now I'm enjoying wearing them. More pictures to come!

Black Tourmaline

Digging in Ocean View Mines resulted in the beautiful piece of black tourmaline. Since my 4 y/o grandson did some digging along side me that day I made this pendant for him. He still talks about the day he "went inside the mountain"!

Wow, how time passes! I feel like May just started and here it's half over! I've been to San Diego and back. I celebrated Mother's Day with my son and his beautiful family.
The two pictures above are pieces made by a budding jewelry designer and she's only 8 years old! Emma took immediately to the patterns. She easily followed directions for the Victorian Garden, made for her mom, and then proceeded to make one for herself! The yellow cat's eye and leopard beaded bracelet is her own design. She made it from start to finish with no help from me! The beads were given to her by my good friend, Linda. She is into all things science and math. Boy am I proud!

On the Road Again!

The traveling season is here again! In the next few months I will have visited Orlando, FL, San Diego, CA, Columbia, SC, and Long Island, NY. I'll be back at my old job in NY for six to eight weeks. I'll also be teaching jewelry making while I'm there! I'll spend the remainder of the summer in SC helping my daughter adjust to being mother of two instead of one! It'll be my pleasure to spend the time with her, my grandson and my new granddaughter! Speaking of my grandson....he has started taking karate lessons! At just 3 1/2 he is soooo excited about this! I could just hear the excitement in his voice while he was telling me all about the stripes he will get on his belt with each class! I can't wait to see him in his class!

The Spider Web or Dream Catcher is a piece done after reading the instructions on one of my Yahoo wire groups. I love it and call it Dream On! I've told the tale of the little copper butterfly being tempted by the sparkles in the center of the web. You can see that he or she gave into the temptation and can be seen flying away with one of the pretties!
I've been teaching classes these past two weeks. The above blue cab was made during one of the two wire wrap classes that I taught and the necklace is Helm's Weave or Parallel Weave that was Saturday's class. Always a big hit is the Victorian Garden Bracelet. That was Wednesday's class and I'll be teaching it again on Monday 4/28 and 5/28 at Beads & Baubles in Fort Pierce, FL. For more info on my classes go to:

http://www.new-bel.com/Classes.html

Busy Month

I've had a great month but very busy! I traveled to Irmo, SC for Easter celebrations and some R&R. I visited with my daughter and her family. My 3 1/2 y/o grandson is such a great kid! He's getting to be a regular boy instead of a toddler. It's wonderful to see the transformation. Funny, how fast they grow up! Soon he'll be a big brother when his sister arrives sometime in July! He's just getting used to the idea and we'll see how he adjusts. He, like most of the young males in this family, is enamored with Grease, the movie! He stands on the coffee table (oh my!) and sings Grease Lightning! He still insists that Greased Lightning is the man singing (John Travolta) and not the car. Each night after his bath he has his mom fix his hair Danny Zuko style. How cute!
I got to go to Beckham's Barn and drool over all the beautiful rocks! I picked up some slabs to make a few cabochons, lepord jasper, tiger eye, agate and few others. I've started on the lepord jasper already. I also went to the bead shop on Harbison. It's fairly new and I'll be teaching some wire classes there this summer when I'm there to assist my daughter with the new arrival. She is a distributor for Kazuri beads so I took the oportunity to pick up a few. I made some pendants and strung them on 18" neck wires. They are for sale in my Etsy store. I love them!

Gift Cabochons

These two picture jasper cabochons were made by and given to me by my friend and mentor Linda. Linda lives in CA and got me started in jewelry making. I've had so much fun and have met so many great people since I started making jewelry. So much thanks for everything, Linda!
I wrapped the two cabs with square copper wire and half round copper wire.