painted lady pendant

painted lady

glass enamel on copper, bronze medallion, and copper neckring

$95

i've had so much fun playing with my glass enamels---it's called painting with fire!  and it is!

wing and a prayer in silver

 i love using pure silver for gifts of love.  it so expresses the purity of the sentiment!   

continuing with my heart theme for february, this was last bebruary's heart that i never posted.  i seem to get a little crazy this time of year while i'm gearing up to have plenty of new work for the annual Stutz Artists Open House, in april.  it makes me get off track, sometimes, forgetting the little things like posting.  this is the second version of a piece i designed for my sister.  it has the serenity prayer on the back...a prayer that has special significance for both of us.  she wears in on a 5mm wide silver neck ring on which it is stunning, if i do say so myself!

the original 'a wing and a prayer' pieces were bronze, and a little smaller.  the heat patina here shows up, here, very well.

the continuing story of the double dog portrait

i made a new mold of the teddy and sarah portrait yesterday.  i had a bit of trouble as the first metal one that i cast.  it cracked, and had to be put back together with beeswax before i could make the new mold.  don't know exactly what happened to make it crack.  it was in a place where it had cracked in the greenware state. ......that would be because i, never leaving well enough alone, saw that it had warped slightly and applied pressure to the copper greenware.  thus..... it cracked.  i repaired the crack with paste, but it broke again in the firing.  i could have gotten away with that if it were in the bronze clay.  i paste things together all the time.  i forgot to put any lavender oil in the copper paste, so maybe that was it.  any way, having lost my confidence, some what, i cast the new mold in metal clay adventure's bronze.  i really like the bronze, and the shrinkage is the same as their copper, so it fills the same purpose.  the piece came out beautifully, and another third smaller.  still have a couple of firings to go, though to gt the size i want, but aren't they pretty?

there are a couple of tiny marks that shouldn't be there, but i filled them and they should come out in the next casting.  i cast it in copper this time, and i'm drying it slower with weights in it, so we'll see if that stops the warping.  i'll let you know tomorrow....... it should go in the kiln, tonight.

wonder how i should mske the bail???