YOJ11-07 Butterfly Twirl Earrings

Butterfly Twirl Earrings (2011)
Sterling silver
Formed, soldered
2 cm dia.

This week I had one more idea for the butterflies – a pair of hoop earrings.  Here, the butterflies fly around in a loop.  The earrings insert from the back of the earlobe and curl around to bring the butterflies to the front.

It’s been a frustrating week.   I went back to my projects notebook to work on one of the tutorials I wrote in the fall.  I quite often write a set of instructions, then put them away for a while, so I get it completely out of my head.  Then when I come back to it, I’m looking at it with fresh eyes.  It lets me test whether I can follow what I wrote.

I tend to go through several attempts at making the project while I’m writing instructions, refining the design as I go and making sure the steps make sense.  Because of the rising cost of silver, the prototypes for the project I’m currently reviewing were originally constructed in copper wire.

Well…  that was a mistake.

Silver, even in dead soft temper, is stiffer to work that copper – a small detail I forgot to consider – so the only thing I succeeded in doing was adding to my scrap bin.  I’m now revising the project so it will work in silver.

YOJ09-19 Mother & Child Pendant

Mother & Child Pendant (2009)
Sterling silver, formed, flame-worked
L 5.4 cm x W 2.4 cm

It’s Mother’s Day, so my piece this week is in honour of Motherhood.

I’ve had pregnancy on my mind a lot in the last week, because last weekend I had a miscarriage.  That was why I didn’t post anything for Week 18. What bugs me is not that I had the miscarriage – it’s that I had originally planned to wait until May 1 to do the pregnancy test.  Had I followed through, I would never have known I was pregnant.  Instead, I did the test on the 27th.  My husband was completely gobsmacked when I told him the news:  he thought I was too old to have any more babies.  I had to explain to him that even though I am of a somewhat advanced childbearing age, until I actually stop having periods, I can still get pregnant.  On the 30th I went to visit my GP, and that afternoon I started spotting.  I spent the evening at Emergency, where they took some blood and sent me home.  On Saturday, I started bleeding in earnest, so I went back to Emerg, where more blood tests and 5 hours of waiting confirmed what I already knew:  the pregnancy had aborted.

I knew the chances of this baby going full term were very slim.  I’m on medication that can cause birth defects, and, in the second and third trimesters, is toxic to the fetus.  Even that aside, this would have been an extraordinarily difficult and potentially life-threatening pregnancy because of my various health conditions.  I swear, my warranty ran out after I turned 40…

I’m sad, but not as upset as I was with the miscarriage two years ago.  More than anything, the experience has left both my husband and I wishing we had met ten years earlier.  I am able to take comfort in the idea that I am still “Mommy” to five children:  two I cuddle every day, and now three others I cuddle in spirit.

So, here is the Mother, full with her Child.  The design is a bit abstract, and I decided that it would not work without a bit of soldering.  I’ve wanted to do a Mother & Child piece for a long time, and, I’m pleased to finally have a design I like.

Happy Mothers Day to all the Mommies who read this :-).

More photos:

YOJ09-01 Needle Felted Circle Pendant

Needle Felted Circle Pendant (2009)
Sterling silver, wool
Needle-felted, flame-worked, cold connected
L 5.2 cm x W 4 cm

Back in 2006, when I was working with the Bonsai Rings one of the challenges I faced was to create realistic looking foliage.  A technique I thought might work well was felting.  I signed up for a felting course, but unfortunately various circumstances prevented me from taking it.

So recently, when I was putting together a Treasury on Etsy.com, I came across a shop that sold needle felting kits.  The price was good, so I took the plunge and bought one.

I decided to experiment first with the least appealing colour for foliage:  pink.

The technique is quite simple and fun.  On the first night, I made two little balls.  The next night I had a meeting with Maegen Black, a colleague who works with me on MAGazine.  She was wearing three felted bangles made by a BC artist whose name I didn’t catch.  (Edit: Maegen let me know the artist’s name is Deb Dumka). Intrigued, I tried a version of my own the next night.

Since I’m now working on my YOJ projects, I decided to use this little circle for my week 1 submission.  To jazz it up, I broke out the torch and made a bunch of sterling silver studs to decorate the circle.  Remembering the mess I got myself into during the previous YOJ, I did all of the finishing prior to assembling the pendant.