Color Breakout

Poinsettia in Afternoon Light, Jan. 2011

Maybe it's cabin fever, or a few days of warmer weather (tomorrow might approach 60F!), but suddenly I want COLOR. I took this poinsettia photo yesterday afternoon, and last night's bracelet play turned out the two pieces pictured here plus two super-springy starts that I hope to finish this evening. These two use sari silk and some brass filligree elements and classic millefiore beads from a necklace I remember my mom wearing back in the 1970s. I love the combination of primary colors with the antiqued brass, don't you? So, yes, I can appreciate the subtle tones of winter for a while, but it's just not who I am or what I love. I'll probably bounce between subtlety and saturation for another month or two until the first hints of spring push me into a new creative space. As long as I'm creating, I'm happy.

New Directions

One benefit to hibernation is uninterrupted downtime, which sometimes (when I'm lucky) becomes creative time. Yesterday, inspired by creations from two of my favorite jewelry artists, Lorelei and Stephanie, I finally figured out some cool ways to incorporate sari silk into bracelets. Above is one creation, not quite finished (I'd like to add more danglies, aka charms). The millefiore and fancy brass links came from a necklace that I remember my mom wearing back in the 1970s; a few of the links had broken so I thought repurposing the beautiful components would be appropriate. The bracelet below uses tiger eye, dichroic glass, brass, and a scrap of sari silk; it too needs some charms and then will be finished. More pictures to come as I finish more pieces on deck while watching my favorite TV dramas and some cool independent movies on this cloudy day. I hope you all find some creative time in this quiet wintry space.

Fabric Destash

I have been sorting through my stuff lately and have decided to lighten my load a bit. I have an amazing (or ridiculous, depending on your perspective) fabric collection and realized not too long ago that not only would I never find time to use it all, but I don't actually enjoy sewing nearly enough to even want to try. So I'm keeping some cotton batiks for a few quilts I'd like to make down the road but otherwise will work my way through a rather large stack of unfinished projects dating back three, four, even seven years, and will let the rest of my fabric go.

This cool cat batik is already gone, but I have many more cotton batiks, prints, and flannels at my new Etsy shop. Prices are about half the original retail; these fabrics are in new condition but I really need to unload them (and a whole lot of other stuff) before someone nominates me for Hoarders....