Something New at Chocolates & More....

I have a little something new this season to go with the coffee they sell at Chocolates & More, in Minocqua. Here are two of the glass beaded coffee spoons, that are now at the store. Shouldn't your special coffee have a special vehicle to make it to your coffee maker?

An a matching canape' set to boot. The colors are ivory and a nice warm brick red with silver purple decoration and raku glass frit.

Another canape' set in cobalt, beige, and green also with silver plum decoartion and silver leaf.

A new batch of cheese knives, as well, decorated with raised stringer, murrini, and glass shards.

ETCHED METALS CLASS

 Recently I took a class in Etching Metals from the very talented Artist and Teacher, Kay Rashka. She lives in the Madison area and taught this particular course at the annual Art Glass and Bead Show. Here she demonstrates smoothing the edges of a copper rectangle in preparation for the design. She's using a pistol grip dremel tool that I admit I had a bit of tool lust for.

There were several ways to lay a design on the metal , but here she is using a hot plate and iron to heat up a special kind of paper to make a more intricate design. (Yes, I know the least I could have done was to get a shot without her magnifiers. My bad)

This photo shows the results and it is ready to be etched.

Here are the pieces that I did in class, the two smaller ones are done free hand and the larger is from a stamp. I'm excited about putting them into some of my jewelry pieces.

The earrings pictured were a Mother's Day gift to me and are done by Kay. To see more of her work check out her website

http://www.kayrashka.com/ and Facebook site https://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/pages/Kay-Rashka-Jewelry/136063103077849

I'm Back....

My apologies if you were anxiously awaiting chapter 2 of the glass tutorial, but I guess my goals were bigger than my stomach ...or something like that. I just thought I could get more done before I left on vacation than I actually did. I should probably reassess more realistic goals in the future. It's always something! There will be a chapter 2, but I might have a few posts in between. I did attend a class in Madison that I want to post a few photos of, so I'll probably throw that in first. In the meantime I'm back, we had 2 snowstorms and I can hardly believe I was in Spring less than a week ago. I think the ice may go out today though as the sun is shinning and the temperature is rising. At last! I was taking a lot of photos lately so I thought I'd post this one. It's a necklace made with multiple hollow glass beads as well as disks, with a Fine Silver handmade round bead in the center. It also has 3 strands of peacock Freshwater Pearls, and 2 shades of Serpentine. The best part of this necklace is that it also turns into a bracelet. Until next time, which I promise will be sooner than last.