While I have certainly NOT been busy blogging, I HAVE been busy creating.  In my little apartment in Boston, I have set up a studio and expanded my repertoire of tools, supplies and skills.
I decided to get posting again because of some of my charitable projects. Today, I wrapped up five sets of jewelry to be donated to a fundraiser for Kevin Cellucci, the young father of three who was critically injured when some students flipped their SUV over the median onto Kevin's truck.  Having lived through a serious head-injury crisis in my own family, I want to do some small part for Kevin and Tina and their boys. I will be adding photos of my donations to this post after I get them in the mail and do a few errands.  Please add Kevin to your prayer lists, readers. His wife started a Facebook page to update us on his progress.

Here's a link, and a shout-out to Tina to stay strong.

https://www.facebook.com/KeepingUpWithKevin?hc_location=stream

Photos below
Keep the faith!

This set is autumn jasper nuggets embellished with autumn jasper leaves, rounds, and gold-plated pewter caps & spacers & clasp.  The earrings are gold-coloured brass, 20 gauge, beaten and strung with unakite and jasper rounds, gold-plated rounds and autumn jasper rounds.  I am obviously enjoying my new steel block and hammer.

This set is matte-finished black agate rounds set with polished black and white agates and embellished with pewter rounds, spacers & clasp.

Just look at the beautiful striations in that agate!

This set is dyed shell, strung with aventurine nuggets & larger faux turquoise (probably magnesite)

nuggets, wood squares, & pewter spacers.The earrings are round shell strung on a pewter  ring.

This set is a handmade lampwork focal, strung with cobalt seed beads, separated by hand-made lampwork ovals and pewter findings. I made a number of them in assorted colours; I kept the other blue necklace.

I made the earrings of foiled lampwork also.

But my absolute favourite of the group is this one:

Hand made Venetian glass rounds complemented with garnets, quartz, & Czech crystals, silver-plated filigree rounds & stardust rounds, and seed & bugle beads.  It's definitely feminine and dainty.

I am hoping there are a lot of bids and that these net a good price for the Celucci family!

Earrings

So this post shows my forays into earring-making, and how that has developed.
I have given away so many earrings that I didn't document by photographing and now I wish I had.
It all started with the pearls, remember?

These are coin pearls in a copper tone, with seed pearls.

The upper left are a maroon oval pearl-somehow I found other pearl rounds that matched.
Upper right is the complement to my own Wilma coral necklace. I can't remember if the findings are pewter or sterling. I think pewter, but am not sure.
Lower left is an early effort- white potato pearls. I used to wear these a lot.
Lower right; I got these semi-frosted glass beads at Vintage Vogue & really liked them. They are paired with Japanese seed beads on the largish size, also from VV, and silver beads.  I made two pairs- my friend Ros and her friend Lynda were staying over here and Lynda loved the purple so much I gave them to her.  She sent me some Celtic knot earrings from Wales as a thank you- and I wear those a lot as well.

Top left is Lapis Lazuli-these go with my Celtic lapis necklace.
Top right is turquoise and chrysocolla to go with my other Celtic necklace.
Bottom right is aventurine, silver, pewter & Czech glass-it goes with my leafy glass necklace & bracelet.
Bottom right is a close up of my carnelian set's earrings.  I just love the striations in that carnelian.

As I got more confident with wire work I started branching out from just a single dangling head pin...

These are aventurine cylindrically-shaped beads paired with cobalt glass beads from VV. I made these to go with an aventurine & cobalt necklace Kate had given me a few years ago.

This is Czech crystal paired with gold-toned beads & Miyuki seed beads lined with gold, strung on gold-tone wire. Sparkly!

You'll see the necklace this goes to later on. It's Prehnite, peridot & black agate with Miyuki seed beads lined in silver.  Look, Ma, no head pins!

All About Me

After making a bunch of things for friends, I turned to making some stuff for myself. I also tried thinking outside the box and shaking up my colors a bit. I have a tendency to stick to sea and twilight colors for myself.

This is my own red necklace with pewter spacers and three sizes of dyed coral.

This is my carnelian set. I loved the patterns on each oval bead. I paired it with carnelian rounds, onyx rounds and gold-tone beads & clasp. See? I am capable of making and wearing gold once in a while.

(I still always prefer silver and have had a love affair with pewter from the first time I ever engraved it.)

This necklace was originally made by Kate as a gift for me. It was too tight, she miscalculated the length. She got some more onyx beads to finish it but gave it to me to do as she was in the middle of moving.  It's jasper rounds separated by onyx 3mm rounds.  I liked the way she spaced it, so all I did was add onyx to the length. Then I made me some earrings to match. I subtracted the jasper rounds from the necklace & put them in the earrings so that the final count of jasper would not come to thirteen.

Using Gemstones for Healing

So I got this book that explains the metaphysical properties of gemstones. Pretty much everyone knows their birthstone and what that stone represents.  In other culture, gemstones represent healing and chakra alignment. Crystal healing is a huge industry.
I am not sure how much I buy into that, but hey, it can't hurt. Planning jewelry for people with an eye to "boosting" systems they want boosted is apparently a new talent of mine.
I made jewelry for everyone I work with. I included quartz, which is supposedly good for people who work on computers a lot, in each one. I didn't take photos of all the stuff I made unfortunately.  I also made a bracelet for each neighbor.

This one is ocean jasper rounds (sacral & solar plexus chakras, stress reduction, adrenal function), pearls (hormone balance, harmonizes emotion, balances fluids in body), peridot (heart chakra, cell regeneration, neutralizes toxicities) and pewter.

This one is tree agate (stress reduction, recovery, increases optimism) & jasper squares (sacral & solar plexus chakras, stress reduction, adrenal function), tiny coral beads (good fortune), moonstone spears (hormonal balance, emotional stress), black agate and pewter.

This set is for a friend & is one of my personal favourites. It has fluorite rounds in green (heart chakra, heals emotional stress) and purple (heals bony structure of body, helps with physical trauma, mental focus) , fluorite purple chunks, moonstone spears, peridot, quartz rounds (cleansing & refocusing) and pewter spacer beads.

Because I tend to be really symmetrical, I got some fluorite large nuggets at the last show.  Unable to just mix them up, I separated them by color. This necklace I made for a friend who loves blue. It's ice blue fluorite, chunky potato pearls, pewter beads & clasp. Because I didn't like the way the bead wire showed between the irregular chunks, I separated each chunk with a tiny seed bead from Japan that is lined with silver.  The silver shines through and not only separates each chunk, it helps the light pass through and brightens the piece. I use this technique all the time now, but most often when I am working with irregular beads.
I liked the blue so much I made a second set.

This time I added pewter beads that make me think of waves. The fluorite is two colors of blue. The earrings were an experiment in seed beads paired with irregular chunks.  I ended up taking them apart because they did not please me, but the friends I showed them to seemed to like them.

Failte!

As my beading skills progress, I wanted a forum in which to show my friends what I have created. Since I am  obsessive about photographing my creations, this should not be a problem.
I've been making earrings for a few years now. My visit to Hawai'i started me off when I picked up a bunch of pearls. Then I started using bead from the two bead shops in town. (Yes, we have TWO bead shops in town-it's kind of a mandatory hobby, I guess.)
My first creations were for my son's wedding. I made jewelry for myself, my daughter and a friend.

This was my first; a gift for my sister. I found the glass shells at a bead show. The beads are jasper and the clasp is gold. 

This is a coral and sterling silver simple necklace I made for my friend to go with her dress of white with black flower print.  I call it Wilma.

She can't wear pierced earrings so I made a few clips for her.
I liked them so much I made a few for myself.:)

Goldstone is a man-made semi-precious gemstone. Originally invented in the alchemic quest for making gold from other natural materials, it was made nearly exclusively by an Italian family, its recipe handed down through the generations. It comes in several colors, usually seen in a warm brown. I favour the dark blue with its silver glints.

My daughter's dress was blue, so I made this for her, accented with sterling spacers and Swarovsky jet black crystals. I also liked the funky sterling clasp- very modern, so I knew she'd like it.
Apparently, I neglected to take a picture of my own set, an amethyst and sterling creation that matched my lilac-colored gown. I guess that will be the topic of my next post.