Revisiting a piece of jewellery started ages ago

I believe I may have written about my plans for a blue and white ceramic piece quite some time ago. I've recently started working on it again and have got to the stage of attaching some vintage lace to one side of it.

This is the stage it got to before being put aside for months, I've taken it much further now, it's not been planned on paper, as most of my stuff isn't, but there's a definite image in my head of what I want it to be.

Here it is with all the beading finished, the problem with these 'plate' pieces is the amount of time it takes to attach the beads so that none of the backing shows anywhere. You can tell that it's been sitting around for a while in the first picture, as something has stained the backing! Not sure what but luckily it gets totally hidden in the finished piece.

In this picture you can see the edge row, this hides the join between the original backing and the leather which covers it and hides the tangled spiders web of stitches that hold all those beads in place. The lace behind it was my first idea for what to use I've sinced added another layer of different lace to go under it.

the underlayer of lace is attached to one edge of the piece, the other piece of lace will go on top and the two will be gathered and ruched and beaded within an inch of their lives. I want an effect of surf, or at least a suggestion of that, the ceramic pieces and the beads are the waves you see. I know what I mean anyway.

Here is where it is at now. Totally ungramatical sentence I know but I'm tired and it says what I mean sort of. Hopefully you can see the beginnings of the ruching. The two pieces are joined along the long edges of the top piece, both are attached to the ceramic 'plate'. Eventually there will be bead weaving extending from the end of the lower lace piece to form one side of a necklace. The other side will be all beading, but I expect I'll throw some wierdness in there, holes and twists, that sort of thing.

Watch this space. 

As an after thought I recently altered a piece I made a few years ago, which I was never happy with, I realised that it didn't hang right because it was too long. Now any one who does bead weaving will know how hard it is to take it apart, especially if you only want to take a little bit apart and leave the rest intact, well I finally got the time and the nerve to tackle it and I'm much happier with it now.

 The bottom picture show my much younger neighbour modelling the original, the other two are me showing it shortened, it looks much better on Caz but I still think it looks better shorter.

another 'plate' piece, I call it River.

A new adventure

It's been a while since I've done anything here. Lots happening in my life, after finally passing my driving test in January I now own a little car. It's a Citroen Saxo and although it's quite old it runs ok. Lots of people told me that after you pass your test is when you learn to drive, they were absolutely right. I'm getting used to not having power steering, hard work, but it's good exercise for my arms!

Well, since picking the car up on Wednesday 28th I've driven home from Barnstaple and back in again twice, have shopped in Tesco and driven down to Ilfracombe. I have a couple of people to thank for this new found freedom. First of all my incredibly patient instructor, Paul Troke. If anyone in North Devon is thinking of learnng I can thoroughly recommend Paul. Secondly my very kind neighbour Ross who came to look at cars with me, I know nothing about them, certainly not enough to choose one to buy, he also helped me park it properly the first time I brought it home, had trouble reversing up hill.

Today was a big one I drove all the way to Parracombe for lunch at the Fox and Goose. Lunch was delicious, I took my friend Mike up on his offer to park the car for me, got to get better at that. Thanks to Fran for organising the lunch. I then drove in to Lynton to visit the Art and Craft Centre for some gardeners soap. I bought a bar a couple of years ago and it's down to a tiny sliver. Unfortunately the people who make it haven't put their name on the packaging so can't tell you who they are.

I'm taking part in the first Ilfracombe Art Trail next weekend. My little house will be open from 10.00 - 5.00 on Saturday 9th and Sunday 10th May.
I've just completed a piece that's been waiting for me to finish it for ages. Really quite pleased with it, I bought the sari silk strips recently and it seemed the ideal thing to make the support for this pendant.

Just a bit of a rambling catch up and new jewellery.

It's been a while since I wrote anything on here. Lots happened recently, first of all, and most exciting, I passed my driving test, took 2 and a half years and three attempts. Many thanks to my instructor, of infinite patience, Paul Troke

 All I need to do now is buy a car! That could take a while.

Secondly I took on the role of chair for the conservation group I belong to, only because we have to have one and everyone else was avoiding the question!

So far nothing too scary, just signing forms and supposedly chairing a meeting. 

Few bits of jewellery I've made recently:

This needs finishing a bit. silver wire melted onto copper heart.

Open Heart, simple silver and copper pendant.

This is a brooch I was commissioned to make for a friend. sea glass in the centre, czech glass flowers around it and a row of flourite beads with my usual vintage and modern seed beads. The pin is silver wire.

https://folksy.com/items/6597799-Silver-wire-and-Aventurine-Orbit-brooch

This is a new style of work, I had this idea running around my head for a while and I made it up as another suggestion for my frend's commission. Just silver wire wrapped around an Aventurine bead. The bead measures about 3/4" (2cm) long.