Having a good time with new tools

Signing a pic of my work -




and here's another one where I created a label for honey that my friend's bees made. This is from a photo of them in action at their home in Annandale...

It's almost Christmas and...

here's the western theme Santa I have been working on. His head and hands have been sculpted out of polymer clay. I designed and made his outfit as well. He is ready for the Christmas roundup with his lasso and rusty bucket. He also has his aged lantern ready for those dark nights out on the range getting all of those packages ready for delivery. Go ahead zoom in and take a closer look.

Evidence of another Santa...

Thought I was done making Santas this year but not so. My daughter spotted these cowboy boots I bought and said I should make a cowboy Santa. So in my 'spare time' I started the latest work of art and here's the shirt I have designed and in the process of making. He will even be sporting an embroidery on the back.

A day at the Barn in Herndon

Here's a Wordle of how I spent my Saturday. Very interesting!!

It's November already and those Santas

are out of my house and in their new positions at the Golden Goose. Here is a picture of two of them (the large ones holding teddy bears) available at the Golden Goose Christmas Shop.

Santa's List is available at the Golden Goose

Here he is holding the list of Christmas gifts. This adorable one-of-a-kind Santa is about 17" high. His face and hands have been sculpted with much care here in the US of A. His outfit was designed and handmade by the artist too (me). He even has a pencil behind his ear. His apron is filled with his glasses, scissors, Christmas greens and teddy bear. Check out the tape measure in his back pocket too. Wouldn't he make a lovely addition to your home for the holidays? Check him out at the Christmas Shop the Golden Goose in Occoquan, VA.

The Bearer of Gifts Santa - here are those eyes from the previous post

Here he is 'The Bearer of Gifts' Santa. It was a late start this year on the Santas but happy to see him come to life. In my previous post you can see the beginning of his face as I was sculpting. His hands were also sculpted with care. I designed his outfit as I continued to create him. He is currently available at The Golden Goose in Occoquan, Virginia 'where it's Christmas everyday'. He comes with the bears in his arm as well as the sleigh and the red gift box.

These eyes are looking at you...

I though this was so funny as the mat I use to sculpt my Santa's head and hands is full of cat faces. Doesn't this head look a little scary too? I have been working on a couple of Santas as there is no better time than now to get these projects ready. Before you know it, it will be December. For me this time of year seems to go September - December. Sooooo fast.

Check back as I'll be posting the outcome of this scary head.

Switching Hats

I had to take a short break from my jewelry creations to make some birthday cards. These are September birthdays and I'm thinking Fall now. In the process I created an SVG file for Happy Birthday. You are welcome to download this SVG and if you do I hope you enjoy using it. The fence comes from SVGCuts.com from their Moonlight Garden Party SVG Collection and the background shape comes from their My Moms Attic SVG Collection.



Download File







Here are the cards :)

Let's Keep Wrappin the Ruby

Things seem to be wrappin smoothly so I found another ruby to dress up a little. This natural ruby is 20.5 cts and is accented with tiny white fresh water pearls.

Results from a wrappin fun day yesterday...

This is a natural red ruby at 16.5 cts wire wrapped into a pendant with Swarovski crystals and bead accents.







This pendant will receive a final polish before it makes it to my ETSY shop.

It's been a wrappin fun day

with a ruby, a genuine natural red ruby. This pretty gem is a little over 16.5 cts. I've been looking at my box of gems and have been wanting to get started on a few of them so today it was red ruby day. Haven't had time to take any pics so I hope you will mosey on back for a peak at what I have put together.

Have a truly wonderful day:)

Besides the jewelry...

I found some lime green yarn recently and have been practicing tatted border designs. Green is one of my favorite colors. Then I needed something to add it to so I decided yesterday to embroider this lemon design on a kitchen towel blank in my stash. I went back to the store for the beautiful deep purple yarn too. Maybe a raspberry design next.

Bead Crocheted Necklace

The Green and Gold Delight necklace was posted on ETSY today.

And here it is: Gold and Green Delight - bead crocheted necklace

The bead crocheted necklace was calling me early this morning. All I had to do was finish up the fringes. The necklace is full of fresh water pearls and glass crystals in different sizes and shapes. My model up early too, was gracious enough to show it off for you. This should be going out on ETSY soon.

It's HOT!!!

It has been really hot so far this summer in Northern Virginia and with humidity mixed in it's not much fun to be outside.

I stayed indoors yesterday afternoon and finished the crocheted part of my next creation. Today I'll pick out the remaining pieces of this necklace and hopefully work on getting this project completed.

What's Up

Hope you had a nice 4th of July weekend. It was a busy and fun time for me. I was shopping all day Saturday with my in-laws at the Hagerstown Outlet and on the 4th they came over for smoked pulled pork barbecue sandwiches with coleslaw. Herndon VA did a great job on the fireworks and what made that so nice too was that we really don't have to leave the neighborhood to see them.

I had to re-string the to be crocheted pearl necklace because of a missing crystal!! Have to me more careful in the double checking process. I decided to change one of the crystal shapes and colors so it will look different from the previous picture. I'm all ready to start again and hope to have a picture to upload soon of some crocheted rope.

Talk to you again soon!

Todays progress with bead crochet

Today is such a gorgeous day and with low humidity, who could ask for much more? A great day to be beading!! I started on the crocheted necklace and got a few inches done but decided that I was not happy with the beginning inch so I started over. Here's what's happening:



Hope you're enjoying your day too.

The Keshi Bracelet from earlier posts is on ETSY

The Keshi pearls have transformed into Luscious Lemon Delight on ETSY.

I have just finished stringing another bead crocheted necklace in green. I'll be keeping you posted on my progress.

Hope you are having a great day.

Designer Flip Flops?

Last Thursday I took a class at Sew Special Studio on using a button machine to make buttons and we made bows too. I decided to add mine to a pair of flip flops. I embroidered the dragonfly on the buttons using my Brother sewing machine. These should go nicely with one of my handmade wire dragonflies (check my earlier posts). What do you think?

Silver & Gold Wire Wrapped Bracelet

I just posted this bracelet on ETSY It has a sterling silver herringbone wrapped edge with gold filled wire center. A really nice piece.

Yea!! I finished the Keshi Pearl Bracelet today.

These keshi pearls are sewn together with silver wire onto a silver wire frame that I made.

The wire arrived and...

my daughter wanted a silver dragonfly and here it is:





and now I'm ready to make some for my shop on ETSY.

Still working on the Keshi Bracelet but...

I just posted this chainmaille beauty below on ETSY.

New Items being posted to ETSY soon

These are a pair of chainmaille dangles that I will be posting to ETSY tonight. The Swarovski crystals are jet black AB. I have others that will be posted over the next several days along with a chainmaille necklace that has Swarovski crystals encased in the rings.

The Dragonflys Continue to Fly

Here's another picture of the dragonflys I'm creating with wire and beads. This is a dragonfly pendant.

Keshi Pearl Bracelet in the works

One of the projects I've got started is another keshi pearl bracelet. The pearls in this bracelet are a soft yellow fresh water pearl and I'm adding Swarovski crystals in different shapes and sizes to this piece. Here are a couple of pictures of my progress. Click on the pic to take a better look. (This is in competition with the dragonfly below. I'm having fun making them too.)

Sure feels like summer around here

and this weekend I've been working with wire and creating dragonfly pendants. Here's one of them with the heat of summer in his eyes. The plan is to have a dragonfly or two on ETSY. Hope you'll check back.

Summers Warmth Bracelet now posted

The Summers Warmth can be found on my ETSY shop using this link.

Summers Warmth Bracelet

Yesterday was a hot one, high humidity but that didn't seem to stop the creative juices. Here's the finished bracelet. This one should be out on my ETSY shop shortly.
Update -- This one sold quickly!!

Bracelet Beginnings

Here's a couple of pics of the bracelet I mentioned yesterday that I'm working on.

Summers Beauty Bracelet

Here are a few pictures of a recently completed bracelet that I have designed and beaded. I'm calling this one Summers Beauty. I'm now working on another bracelet similar to this one but I've done the new bracelet in champagne rose and citrine/amber seed beads. I'm having fun now choosing the embellishments to create the finished work of art.

more on 'the Blues'

I'm really happy to say that my husband came back home last Saturday morning after a little over a month of being in the hospital. Now there are the follow-up appointments that are keeping us pretty busy. Hopefully things will return more like normal soon.

I just finished posting a necklace called 'Sensational Blues' on ETSY. Hope you will take a look. It is a bead crocheted necklace of fresh water pearls and crystals.

Miracles do happen

Just wanted to let you know that I have been unable to post as my husband has been in the hospital. After being rushed to the hospital he was admitted into the critical care unit and I was told that he was a very sick man, he had an infection sepsis. He needed surgery to repair his bowel. The surgeon did not expect him to make it through surgery as we were told to say our goodbyes. I prayed over him and we gave him our love. He made it through surgery and the critical 24 hour period after surgery. He remains in the hospital but hoping to have him home in a few days. This happened after he had surgery for stents a few days earlier.

God is good!!

Excited to see

that my card (the Sunflower) was chosen to be included in the SVGCUTS newsletter that I received in my email when they sent it out to all subscribers! As I mentioned in my previous post that this card is entered in their 3D challenge.

The Sunflower Birthday Card

I enjoy card making too and here's a picture of a card that I made for my daughter's birthday last November. SVGCUTS is having a 3D challenge and I just had to enter my card into the challenge. SVGCUTS is a source for designer SVG files and that's where I found what I needed to cut/create my sunflower. They have several 3D flower design collections that are super.

Here it is in blue

This is the bead crocheted necklace in shades of blue. I completed this piece yesterday as I was thinking of all the other projects I want to get started on. This should be in my shop on ETSY soon. Be sure and double click on the picture to get a closer look.

Green not your favorite color?

Ok. I have started another bead crochet necklace in blue. I really liked how the Gorgeous in Green necklace turned out so now I'm working with shades of blue. Thankfully I was at a gem show recently and picked up all of the lovely pearls and sparkling crystals for a version in blues.

Stay tuned!!

The Final Results - A bead crochet necklace

and here it is and it's posted on my shop ShoeboxSensations as Gorgeous in Green.

The next phase of the beaded project

These are those beads in the previous picture yesterday that have been bead crocheted into this rope. Pretty neat.

The Start of a new project

Here is a picture of the beginning of one of my projects. This is going to be a bead crochet necklace when completed. This is how is looks when it's in the beginning stages.

Still Wrapping - the gems

Wire is on the brain right now and I have been focusing on some of the my gems. The first pendant below is a lab red ruby corundum and is 13.80 cts. Below the corundum are a front and back picture of a wrapped natural lemon quartz gemstone this one is 41.20 cts. I hope to post some wrapped pieces on ETSY soon! Both of these pendants have Swarovski crystal accents.