For Joy With Love

I had a piece up on Etsy.com. I didn't realize I'd misplaced it (for all I know it's gone forever). Unfortunately, (or Fortunately depending on how you look at it...) before I could 'take it off the market,' my unofficial appropriated Mom #2 (aka Joy), had purchased it. Whoopsy!
So I told her I'd make her a custom piece instead, in a vaguely similar vein.
I had only recently gotten the idea to use Shrinky Dink Paper to incorporate my own drawings instead of, say, a sticker/photo collage like the one pictured here in '21st Century Stroll.' I hope I find her someday...






So, I am so immensely proud of what I made today. Shrinky Dink paper is my new best friend! Okay, so here are the raw materials (some not so 'raw'- you can see the finished S.D. in the corner) that went into this project. Well, minus the findings and the pink cord. Above the S.D. is the left over bit of copper after I sawed my shape out. Copper tubing for the rivets, pencils, two jars of green enamel (opaque 'pea' and transparent 'gem'), and my drawing (pre-shrunk size) on tracing paper.

The resultant piece is my new favorite. Hope you don't mind, Joy, but I'm going to wear it a few times before I hand it over!


So here she is, the finished piece in all her Glory. I think I may call her 'Joy Adrift' for various reasons...
I'm wearing it right now...

The Assignment....

The North Coast Metal Arts Guild has assigned a project. Make a hollow form reliquary using two different metals/materials and one 'new-to-you' technique. Which means yes indeed, we're returning to *actual* metal work. Yay. really. Yay all over the place. Okay, so I'm not exactly feeling the "yay" yet, but it'll come...

Maybe my lack of Super Enthusiasm is due to my lack of decision as to what exactly I'm putting *in* the reliquary. I had thought to honor my recently deceased friend/ex-boyfriend/honorary family member in this project, but I haven't collected anything from him that would work for this... If his house weren't 700 miles away, down in L.A. county (where I grew up) I could maybe pop on over and steal some hair from his brush or something, but, alas this is not an option.

There's also the problem of one vital component that I do not have the equipment to make myself... so I'll have to *find* something, which, you know, that's kinda hard to do.... Unless my vacuum cleaner is powerful enough to vacu-form Plexiglas. I kinda doubt it.

Basically, I want a smaller, perfectly round, deeper version of this one I made a few years ago:

On a less soul sucking-feeling subject, I sent off the drawings for Plant Matters, the May issue of my coloring books. Ahhh yeeaaah. Here, have a taste:


The scary part is that I think this is one of the *less* weird ones. I named it Floating Isle of the Mutant Joshua Tree. Yeah, I know it doesn't look much like a true Joshua Tree, but you *did* see the 'Mutant' part, yes? Hopefully I'll get some metal work done soon and put up the results. Wait till you see what I do with pennies.... (if you haven't already...)