Friday, June 24, 2005

How I Spent My Summer Vacation

I've been gone. I learned to make these:

silver bits 3

Very Small Silver Bits, from ArtClay Silver. While at Midwest Weavers Conference in Sheboygan WI, I had enough free time to take a silver clay class. I had not fully realized my potential for Obsessive Compulsive behavior until I took this class. I made tiny bits. Everyone else made pieces you could actually see without magnifying glasses.

I tried to justify my tiny bits by adding beads and hanging wires:

silver bits and beads

A bit better, but tiny bits nonetheless. I put some on coins, you get a better picture of scale:

fish bits

Isn't that bottom handblown fish just the cutest little fish ever? The fish beads were a gift from my son in Hawaii. Later, after I had spent countless hours burnishing tiny bits of silver, I made a few rings and some bigger bits:

silver bits and rings

More rings than I have fingers available. I blackened these Slightly Bigger Bits to show off some of the detail, but hey, they are still obsessive little bits. I will work on the rings, finishing up the edges so they look a bit less like pipe parts, but I have been wearing three of them obsessively (how appropriate) ever since the conference.

The rest will be charms, or embellishments on bags. I was so happy to take the class, particularly the interaction with some of my classmates. I try to be a good student, not disruptive, nor demanding (I think I may sometimes fail here). I certainly had fun, and I learned something I have wanted to try.

I was among friends, in a beautiful place, with good weather! The food? Well, let's just say we did leave the campus a few times for excellent dinners in the area. In Plymouth, there was also a piper playing (and a woman with a self-acknowledged Bad Haircut), and in Elkhart Lake, we ate among the pagans and heathens who had driven up from Chicago (the Bad Haircut Woman was there too. We must be a fascinating bunch to follow!). A good time was had by all.

8 Comments:

Blogger claudia said...

Your bits are lovely. Unsurprising that you aren't a big bit girl.

1:05 PM  
Blogger Marcy said...

Oooo! Pretty bits! I like them.

2:20 PM  
Blogger judy said...

how wonderful! I need to find out more about this stuff.

5:03 PM  
Blogger LauraJ said...

You love the danglies. You knew what you NEED. You make wonderful ones.

So are you getting a tiny kiln? When you get a bigger one, can I have your old one?

Thank you for coming home.

5:31 AM  
Blogger Charleen said...

Cool bits! Good to see(?) you again.

2:35 PM  
Blogger Spindlers2 said...

Oh, that's something I have been dying to try! Love the little bits as danglies.
Glad you had a good time.

12:27 PM  
Blogger Freyalyn said...

You've done it again - something else I'm going to have to have a go at. Lovely things - and very much a 'you' sort of thing.

3:46 AM  
Blogger mira said...

Neat, neat, neat. These tiny bits could make fabulous stich marker too. And the rings look lovely. What a cool thing to be able to wear jewelry you have made on your own.

2:43 PM  

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