A few years back, I decided I wanted to learn how to draw, and I have been slowly working myself towards the goal of drawing faces. I started 2010 out by taking an online face drawing/painting course with Misty Mawn. It was a wonderful experience, and inspired me to continue on my quest.

Some of the faces I have been drawing are quick 5 minute sketches, while others take me a few hours to draw.

I love to brush paint or dye onto paper - be it tissue paper, paper towels, hand made paper, paper from old books, or new paper. I also like to add colour to material of a variety of sorts, so my supply of colourful paper/material is quite large.

Yesterday morning, I came up to my little studio - just because the urge was too strong to ignore, and I have learnt that if I ignore it, I feel unsettled and out of alignment with who I am. So follow the muse I did.

I tore decorated sheets of paper, and cut decorated material into long strips, and glued them all down onto a base piece of paper. I then covered that all with a wash of colour
(a golden yellow in this case).

Well - nervous as I was, I decided it just had to be time to fill my bezels with images and resin. I choose some images (all except the butterfly is either a photo I took, or from a painting I made) and mounted them as described. I read the instructions for the resin a few times (very unlike me to read instructions) rewatched the video on pouring resin from my amazing online course with Stephanie Lee and then collected my courage and mixed and poured the resin. AND then I waited - it was supposed to set up in 6 hours - but it didn't, so I waited 4 more hours and it was still sticky - but it was time for bed. Some of the information I had read said if you didn't but enough hardener in the resin wouldn't harden up..... so I slept, and thought positive thoughts of my resin setting as I slept. First thing the next morning, before anyone else was up I checked on the bezels, and I cheered a quiet cheer as the resin had hardened after all! Although these are not perfect in any way, I am happy with how they turned out. I enjoyed just about every minute of making them (except the anxious ones where the resin wasn't setting).

Here is a necklace that I have made using one of the smaller bezels I made.

Some people have asked me how it was taking an online jewellery course, and all I can say is this one was GREAT. I learned so much, and enjoyed every minute of it! I look forward to many more minutes of creative play with what I have learned!

Last night I HAD to paint a picture. I had been looking through this blog, - she paints wonderfully loose and colourful faces, and I knew I had to paint a face or else I wouldn't be able to sleep. This is the painting that came out of that need. Still not as loose as I want - but the colours were fun.

My Rules......

Last October I was fortunate enough to take a course with Carla Sonheim. My daughter and I travelled together to Oregon and took some art courses together in celebration of her 16th birthday. We had a wonderful time, and took an Imaginary Creatures course together. Carla has recently written a book that has many workshops in it, and one of them is imaginary creatures. I was looking at this book the last couple of days, and it reminded me of what fun I had creating these creatures. I do have to find some time this winter to do some more imaginary creature making - hopefully with some friends!

But lately my creative time has been spend with torch and solder in hand making jewellery components - now I need to get busy and make jewellery out of this pile of things.... I have done a wee bit of soldering before, but never this much. I also have never done resin work before, but I have ordered some resin, and am waiting for it to arrive to give it a try. If it works out I will post it here for anyone to see.... if it doesn't work out - well I guess I will try and try again!

P.S. The on line jewellery making class was amazing - I learned so much, and will continue to learn. It was with the multi talented Stephanie Lee

I have been so busy with soldering lately..... I have a pile of soldered pieces made that are ready to be used in jewellery - I find it so relaxing sitting with my torch on and soldering little bits and pieces.... who knew I could be so relaxed with a hot torch being held in my almost useless left hand while the right hand is busy with bits of wire and metal. I wish I was better at patting my head while rubbing my tummy - which is a bit of what this soldering metal bits is like - different motions with each hand at the same time. I will continue to practice. Above is a piece I added some beads too - but I couldn't find a good place to take a picture of it, so it ended up on my piano!

I have been hunting through some items I have created to use in the jewelry bezels I have made. I am not sure what I am looking for. I love the look of the textured paper I made in the above piece - it was made of layers of old drawings, dyed paper towels, old text, painted tissue paper etc. which was then layered with paint and stamped on. I eventually mounted some of these pieces onto cards. This is the only bit I have left of it - it reminded me of how much fun I had when I created it, and perhaps how I should do it again. I may use a small piece of it to mount in a bezel......

This image I painted some time ago - I may use part of the bird inside a bezel.....

and perhaps part of these buds with a word or two beside it .... we will see.

Earlier this year, I decided I should try to carve some basic stamps that I could use in my makings. I much prefer to use whatever I can make then buying items, and decided carving stamps was next on my list. These three stamps were what I ended up with. I thought I would try some more in the near future. Well as often happens to me - the near future is farther away then I usually imagine.......

but, finally I got around to doing two small carvings - I drew some simple designs....

and then carved them out and started to stamp. I know they are simple and rustic, but it is a start. I would love to do more - just not sure when the time will arrive again.

I am still enjoying - practicing and learning from the online jewelry course I am taking. The piece above was very tricky to make. It took me some time to figure out how to join all the pieces to make it eventually hold together in what I pictured in my mind's eye.

The reason it is tricky is because I had to heat the metal six times, and every time I heated the metal, the component I had soldered into place on the previous heating of course became loose. The funniest part was adding the top flat metal piece, as when I heated the piece the air and flux inside the middle section expanded, and little puffs of air kept lifting the lid to escape. In the end I was pleased with the piece - I wanted it rustic and not perfectly round shaped - and that is how it turned out.

I am taking an online jewelry course from Stephanie Lee. It started a week and a half ago - but I just started playing with things, as my supplies were slow to arrive. Today I had a day off work, and I spent the whole day learning to solder. I had a torch, and metals, and solder and flux and cutters and pliers etc. all spread out around me.... and with some trepidation I turned on the flame and learned to solder. The above are decorative pieces that I may incorporate into some jewelry.

And here are some bezels I made - to eventually be filled with something nice