Some new stuff

I've always wanted to do something with recycled jewellery, I have a collection of bits of jewellery, a lot given to me by my mother, and some I've collected over the years. I started in a small way adding occasional bits to the beaded stuff as embellishments, but I actually took the plunge and made the pieces of an old brooch into pendants the other day.
These are made from a rather ugly brooch which was probably from the 1950s or thereabouts, I don't remember where it came from.

There were sparkly 'flowers' making up the brooch, three like this and two like the one below. I rather like the effect of the inadvertant flash in the right hand pic. I always turn flash off but my camera's default setting is auto, so my first shot usually uses flash, then I curse, delete it and turn the flash off! This time I kept it, it gives a good idea of the really flashy glass stones.

This is the other style of flower, the brooch was a bunch of flowers on thin metal stems emerging from a single crystal stone like the one in the centre of this flower. I have a drawing of the brooch, done from memory as I cut it up ages ago, but for some reason blogger won't let me load it.
I've just started to make a piece from the hands of an old clock, I bought three for 50p from my local collectors market, I don't think they come from the same clock although they are all made from blued steel, one is in better condition than the others and quite fancy. I've fixed two together, they turn, which is quite fun, I need to figure how to make a piece of jewellery so that they still can when worn.

I think I'll use a bead from this necklace, and maybe some other parts of it too somehow. Not sure how yet.

On a completely different subject I'm watching Agora while I write this, about the destruction of the great library at Alexandria. I work in a library which is struggling with too few staff, no lending dept manager and a ban on overtime. At a recent consultation meeting about budget cuts within the county council, a councillor was going around the groups of people voting for their ideas on what to cut, suggesting that closing the libraries would save lots of money. When he was asked what the schools would do without the library service he replied  'they have their own libraries.' It was pointed out that the county schools library service is where the schools get their library books from, he was amazed, as he didn't know that. It's very worrying that such ignorance of a service should be allowed to suggest closing it. I had a similar experience a few years ago, I ran an arts centre for young people, we offered classes in all the arts and had recently begun providing specialist assistance for young people with disabilities. The borough council responsible for it was required to make huge cuts and my centre was being offered as the sacrifice within the arts service. At a meeting with elected members I was asked to describe the services offered at the centre, when I had finished the councillors said, 'we had no idea you did so much there!' They still closed it though.
The fall of the Roman Empire began with the closing of a library.........