The first one I did was using borax, liquid white enamel, and salt, with some ground copper tossed in. I started off with a 1" copper disk and painted it with a thick coat of liquid white enamel. I covered it with borax and spread a strip of ground copper across the middle, then covered the lower half with salt. Then torch-fired it. I finished it with a layer of clear flux.

The next set was done by first enameling orient red onto a domed copper disk. Then I put a layer of liquid white on top of the red and crumpled some foil to lay on top of it. Then painted the foil with liquid white and fired it.

This set was done again, starting with red enamel, then sinking part of a copper chore boy into the red by firing it again and then painting some liquid white enamel on top of half of it and of course, firing again.

Apparently I used the same paper that I used for the foil ones above – these are not domed or have aluminum on them!

This hammer was made with a small nylon rod. I drilled a hole through the middle and stuck a chop stick through it. I haven't done anything else to secure it, I haven't tried it yet; maybe I won't need anything else. 

These pictures were taken on my phone and edited on my phone with an app called PhotoStudio. There are waaay too many things to play with and learn out there!!! It's 2am, I gotta go to bed!!

I love enameling because it is so wide open for being able to experiment. That’s what makes art exciting and fun for me. There is ALWAYS something new to try, it makes me feel like a scientist. Today’s lab study was enameling with Borax. I’d add a layer onto a piece of copper, then heat it up - best part! It bubbles up and moves all over the place. Then I sift some transparent enamels on top and heat it up again – bubbles and moves again… I could do this all night!

6. What art movements do you relate to?
Indigenous Art, Folk Art, Land Art, Installation Art, Steam Punk, Art Deco,
and Contemporary Art.

7. Most significant project or accomplishment.
 Everything I've done so far is significant in one way or another. I look forward to new and exciting projects.

11. What are your favorite movies/ tv shows?
I do not have cable, so no favorite tv shows.
My favorite movies are: The Sapphires
                                      Lady in the Water
                                      12 Monkeys
                                       Waitress
                                       Donnie Darko
                                       Strictly Ballroom
                                       Across The Universe
                                       The Fall
                                       Flight of the Conchords
                                       Edward Scissorhands
                                       The Piano
Just to name a few! The list changes all the time.

Hyperbolic Paraboloid. I think most of all I just like saying this. Hyperbolic Paraboloid.
Secondly, I am becoming obsessed with having to make this form. When we were doing a Ring A Day, I made my first attempt and attached my hyperbolic paraboloid to a ring. It really was a sorry excuse for a hyperbolic paraboloid, but I still liked it. I tried following the instructions in Form Emphasis for Metalsmiths by Heikki Seppa, but there weren't a lot of directional photos, and I really didn't get how it worked.

In the meantime, I bought Creative Metal Forming by Betty Helen Longhi and Cynthia Eid who have taken Heikki Seppa's techniques and added some great directional photos and instructions. So the first thing I attempt, of course, is the hyperbolic paraboloid. Even with good pictures and instructions, it was still way harder to grasp than I thought it would be. The directions still make my brain hurt. I drew the diagram on my square of copper with lines and letters and numbers and started hammering away. It reminded me of my attempts to do origami - fold it like this, then this, then fold fold fold twist turn hop on one foot and you have a crane. Huh?! 

So after the first 2 pages of following directions, I got tired and figured I understood what was happening and I could just hammer. Still not quite that simple. I just didn't seem to be getting anywhere. I did finally figure out that I was hammering in the wrong direction and that helped. I think the other part of it was that I had been working all day and I was just tired. I'll have to read through the directions again and make another attempt tomorrow.

Here is my attempt, not a terrible form, just a little bit lumpy. I enameled it.

I have a strong attraction to medieval jewelry, I like the regal and solid heavy feel, the marks of handcrafted work, and the creativity of set stones. You could tell a lot about a person by the jewelry they wore... their social significance and wealth, their faith and superstitions, allegiances and even literacy. It was worn by men and children, just as much as women, in all levels of society. People with money usually wore silver and gold, while those with less cash-aroony wore base metals, copper or pewter, sometimes set with imitation gems, like colored glass. I really like that gems were usually just polished and not cut.

 I am strongly inspired by the book "Medieval Jewelry" by Marian Campbell. This book focuses on an important collection at the Victoria & Albert museum in London. It's an amazing collection and has a lot of great pictures and descriptions of the jewelry. It's not really a how-to book, but it's great for inspiration. If you have some jewelry making-experience, it's not a far reach to look at the pictures and figure out how to make a lot of the pieces. 

Ring brooches were quite popular and were used to fasten tunics up until the late 14th century, when clothing became more tailored and buttons came into use.

These two brooches are part of a series on romance. Romance comes from the French 'roman' meaning a tale, and were stories about lovers or heroes and courtly love read by people of the court, and by townspeople, as well. A major theme was gift giving, where men and women exchanged love tokens. Affection was commonly expressed with inscriptions, usually in Latin or French. The round brooch is stamped with the words 'pense de moy' or 'think of me.'

I guess I resolved last year to participate in the Brooch A Day (BAD) group. Looking back to see how many I made, I was actually surprised to see that I made 107. In my memory, it felt like I had only made about 10. I just couldn't keep up with it this time.

I also resolved to quit eating sugar. Actually, I resolved to cut back on sugar. When I told that to a friend of mine, she said you can't do that, you're addicted to sugar, you shouldn't eat it at all. She was right, so I opted to cut it out completely and I did. Hmmm, seems like I started eating sugar again in June, about the same time I stopped making brooches... Seems like you could say eating sugar reduces productivity.

Those are the only resolutions that I can remember from last year. How long do you have to keep a resolution for it to be considered a resolution? Was I successful? I guess if I had said I wasn't going to eat sugar for 6 months my resolution would have been successful?

My biggest problem in achieving these goals is I am easily distracted. I had to go on FaceBook to get a link that I wanted for this blog, took me about a half an hour. I started looking at everyone's posts and ended up watching 3 videos... they were good ones, but still... During that process, I looked up a few times with a blank feeling on my face thinking 'what was I looking for?' That is also tied in with procrastination, after all they both end with the same 4 letters (procrastination - distraction). Here is a really good blog on the 'Procrastination Monkey.' I swear they followed me around one day and took notes.

Welcome to National Bird Month! National Bird Month was established by bird activists to recognize the plight of captive birds and to draw attention to their exploitation in the US.

The only birds we've ever had as pets were 3 successive parakeets all named Shim by one of my sons. We couldn't tell if they were male or female so he combined 'she' + 'him' = Shim. It was shortly after that with our last caged pets, guinea pigs, that we realized maybe having caged animals wasn't such a good idea. It seemed like most of their existence was spent trying to get out of the cage.

Now the only birds in my house are the ones I make out of metal or the one tattooed on my shoulder.

I do enjoy watching the hawks flying around my neighborhood and I watch Alfred Hitchcock's 'The Birds' frequently.