Would you like to see my Etching?

Hello Dear Neglected Blog! How life has a nasty habit of sidetracking us! I have been busy learning new skills and creating new pieces. I found a use for a piece of silver which wasn't quite big enough to form a Bangle. It turned into a Cuff instead and fits so snuggly you hardly feel you're wearing it!

Blacked out off-cut of Silver with design scratched on

The Etched design out of the Acid Bath

Ready for a good hammering

The Finished Cuff

Back Soon I hope! Have a great Christmas everyone! 

Catch up!

After a brief hiatus I am back and ready to be creative once again! It's that time of year when my age turns to another number I'd rather forget about!

Cake from the Boys

I recently visited Kew Gardens (not very far from where I live). I was very impressed by The Temple of the Imagination - or rather the metal flowers adorning it! I would really like this at the bottom of my garden with the addition of some lockable doors so no one could disturb me! 

The Temple of the Imagination (photos  J.Hannah 2010)

The Temple of the Imagination (Kew Gardens)

The Temple of the Imagination (Kew Gardens)

The Temple of the Imagination (Kew Gardens)

These remind me that I have quite a large collection of Silver leaves I made a while ago out of Precious Metal Clay. I still haven't got around to doing anything with them!

Some of my Pure Silver Leaves

  I particularly like anything forged out of metal at the moment as I have been learning how to use a jewellers saw and how to create pierced and cut pieces. I am getting through a lot of blades...it's not easy! One wrong move and PING - snapped!.

My Saw with a surprisingly unbroken Blade (for now) & work in progress

Now in praise of people with real artistic talent! I recently commissioned a Pastel drawing by Artist Sarah James of three dogs from my childhood. It was a gift for my Mother and it was nice to have a picture of all three dogs sitting within the same frame! This never happend in life. Sarah only had the most awful pre-digital photos to work from and did a magnificent job.

More interestingly if you visit Sarah's Blog you can see the process by which an Artist creates a piece of work - from rough sketch through to finishing touches. It's fascinating to see an Artist's "Work in Progress".

The Dogs by Sarah James

Finally - if you have a Twitter account please feel free to click on the Tweet button at the top of this post. It took me ages to figure out how to install it! xxx

Precious Metal Clay

I decided that for father's day I would make my Husband some Cufflinks with our three Son's Fingerprints on. Now fitting three prints onto a small square piece of Precious Metal Clay (PMC) is no easy task! I could only fit partial prints but at least it looks like each Cufflink has been touched in some way by each of our little ones! These cufflinks were also a test of my newly acquired Soldering skills!

I have also been painting Leaves from our garden with PMC Paste and absolutely love the result. After a little experimentation (ok - disasters!!) I did manage to produce a few pieces I really love. I discovered that the best result came from a really thick, well veined Leaf.

This Leaf (above) was an early attempt. It looks ok but is quite sharp at the edges and I probably didn't make it thick enough.

I was really pleased with this one (above). The detail is great and I managed to smooth the edges nicely. It is a perfect replica of the original Leaf - only in Silver!