Marika's handcrafted jewellery

I've been eyeing these kinds of free-form styles for a while now, and Nicole Hanna's tutorials were the first that really brought me insight into how to even start doing something free-form. After having practiced for a while, I went on my own instead, so here is my first pendant that I made without any tutorial at all. Here I  simply wrapped around until I ran out of wire.

Just joined a blogging event called The Artists Synchroblog where various medium artists can participate and post on their blogs or sites about the monthly topics offered. The first month's topic is 'Words have meaning', so I have to write something about this phrase, whether somehow related to jewelry making in one way or another, or not really, it really doesn't matter, as long as it relates to us, the actual bloggers.

The thing is, for me words definitely have meaning, and they touch me more than many other people with 'thick skin'. Words can heal, but they can equally hurt, especially if you are a more sensitive person, like I am. In some of the spiritual groups I am called an 'empath' because I can sense moods of people faster than they even realize how they feel. I go to a room that is currently empty, and I know if there was a verbal fight going on there just before. It is not always good to be an empath because it's extremely difficult to develop that so-called 'thick skin' if you're overly sensitive to others, even if what is going on around you has nothing to do with you at all.

It's the same with words, I am always looking for hidden meanings and even when something is said with the lightest of words used, my interpretation of the words might be completely different from the intention of delivery by the other person.

Many things get lost in communication, especially online, and I think the words have the meaning of the person who receives them, and not of the person who sends these words. You might have wanted to say something, but from some cues or others the other party might have taken something completely different from your words.

For example a person saying 'she is a marketing genius' about a well known jewelry designer might mean that 'way to go, great that she learned marketing and she can apply it to her art to sustain herself and no longer be a  'starving artist', but this could also be taken as 'yeah she's good at catching flies who buy everything she has to offer', as if it were a bad thing.

So yes, words have meaning and it's not always what was meant to be said - but what was instead understood by the recipient.

If you're interested to see what others have written on the topic of Words have meaning, check out these other participant blogs. I'm curious if I'm the only one who rambled away this time :)


http://amyestellemetalworks.blogspot.com
http://www.islandgirlsinsights.blogspot.ca/
http://www.wrapturewirejewellery.on.ca/blog
www.elenorbuffington.blogspot.com
http://doxallodesigns.blogspot.com
http://lesliervillarreal.blogspot.com
http://www.journeyinjewelry.com/blog/My-Journey-in-Jewelry
http://simpledesignjewelry.blogspot.com
http://designsbylynnea.blogspot.com/
http://marikach.blogspot.com/ - oh yeah, this is me :)
www.createrecklessly.com
http://design.kcjewelbox.com
www.allwiredupjewelrydesigns.blogspot.com
http://shaktipajdesigns.com/blog/
http://silversmithblog.com/
http://stonezjewelry.com/blog/

I made this pair of silver earrings last night. I've been having conversations with friends who are rather fond of tiny earrings instead of the longer dangling ones, so I've decided to play around with a few ideas. This is really the tiniest I've ever made, with the length not much more than 1.5 cm. To really keep them very small I used earring post backs with a little silver nut to keep them from slipping from the ear.

The design is based on the popular moebius chainmaille weave, where I've doubled up all the rings for this little rosette design. The last picture is not very sharp, I just wanted to show how tiny they are in my hand.

Just woke up this morning and checked Nicole's Facebook page and yes, she already posted the entries and the voting has started - it's up until May 15. The voting is by simply leaving a comment with the name of the piece you like.

Here is the link to view all the gorgeous pieces and to vote for your favorite one: Nicole Hanna competition voting

If anyone happens to like my piece... :-)

A few weeks ago Nicole Hanna started a challenge to spark our creativity by starting a tutorial that she never finished, letting us do our own think after the last step written in the tute. Today is the last day to enter, so in the morning I made my piece with copper wire and a bead (not sure what the bead actually is). She did have a day extension, for which I'm grateful since we had a long Easter holiday and I didn't have time to finish my in time without it.

I've already seen some entries that were posted in various Facebook group, and they are all different and beautiful. I know I won't win anything with my entry, it's not that great, but personally I'm happy I made the piece as it was a bit outside of my comfort zone. Every person who entered with a piece of which a photo was sent by email to Nicole will get the finished tutorial, for which I'm quite happy. I really want to see what the initial piece was. And it was really interesting to see how many different ways the wire can go after a few initial steps.

So here is my little piece. Hubby was quite surprised as to how light it is, he thought it would be quite heavy based on looks.

For this week's theme at the Year Of Wire Jewelry Project I chose a Nicole Hanna design. I bought several of her tutorials over the last year and only now I'm slowly slowly daring to get to them. It took me a few months to get back to making jewelry again and become more confident to tackle these.

The actual tutorial calls for earrings, but I made it into a pendant. The bead is something I bought in Czech Republic several years ago. The whole piece is so tiny, about 2.5 cm without the bail.

Here are some pics I took of it this morning after taking it out from the tumbler.

It is up on my Dawanda shop ready to buy.

My entry for this YOJ week - 17 is based on a tutorial by Iza Malczyk based on her popular Gemini earrings. I took the tutorial and made my own version, a mix of sterling silver and copper.

The earrings are quite tiny, about 4.5cm with the earwires. (less than 2"). Very cute and easy to wear.

Here is my entry for the week 15 at the YOJ project group for 2013. The bracelet is a mix of chain maille and soldering. All sterling silver and all rings hand cut with the jeweler's saw. The bracelet measures 18 cm (7") and the chain maille weave is called Orbital Vipera Berus. Very light bracelet and fun to wear.

I named the bracelet Oriana as it reminds me of a highschool colleague of mine from way back - back at home.

Here is my piece for the YOJ week 15 project, with the theme Fibonacci sequence. Well, for this week I chose to honor Leonardo Fibonacci, who as the son of a merchant had free access to the whole Byzantine empire, so he could go to established centers around Europe to study. So this week's theme is for him.

The necklace is quite dense, it is a graduated Byzantine in sterling silver. All jump rings have been cut by hand with a jeweler's saw. The rings range from gauges 14 to 19 (1.2mm to 0.9mm) in various sizes and aspect ratios to get the graduated effect. I love this one, but boy it's expensive to create something major like this in sterling silver...it eats rings like a hungry pet!

Meaasures 18.5 inches (46 cm) including the sterling silver clasp. Simply beautiful!

This chain maille bracelet was made as part of the April challenge in the Chain Maille Facebook group. The theme was a Byzantine weave/variation that was not posted for this challenge by anyone else. I found the Megara weave at the Maille Artisans site and it had a tutorial as well, all made by Corvus. A very easy to do bracelet, and it's awesome on the wrist, so lush, fluffy and light.

Here are two pieces in sterling silver as a result of my attempts to solder. For week 13 the theme was Talisman, so I made this piece as a small talisman - for me it looked like peace on earth, however somebody told me they can see a rose within the pendant.


For week 14 the theme was egg-citing, however I didn't do anything related to Easter eggs or the celebration itself. For once I was off topic and I made one of the pieces from Melissa's course. Argh why do the pictures always show the mistakes so clearly...

Something new I made a few days ago is based on something I wanted to do for a few years now. I always wanted to wrap a donut without having to fiddle with making a wire wrapped bail, it's just a pain to do it right.

I got some tutorials from Eni Oken several years ago when she was still selling her tutes, and one of them is a wrapped donut. So I've decided to do something similar, but not quite the same. So I ended up with this piece which has seemingly random wraps around the donut and a silver frame - frame which I soldered. I then soldered the jump ring as the bail to the frame, and did a bit more soldering work - basically all jump rings are soldered, including at the end of the cord, right between the endings - now that was fun to do without burning any other nearby piece.

It's a simple piece, but I'm happy about how I slowly develop my soldering skills. Anyway, here are a few photos of it. The donut is quite heavy actually, it's made of hematite and measures 4.5 cm (a bit over 1.5").

I'm a tool junkie and I admit it. Is there an AA style group for it? The more I learn, the more tools I need, afterll how can I make those cool designs without it? (at least that's my reasoning behind it).

So here are my latest tools, all came yesterday through the post (shown from left to right).













I got a round sandbag, because hammering around here is quite tricky with me living in a flat. I hope I can dampen a bit of the sounds and also make it easier on my table. I was using a thicker cloth and a mouse pad, but I think it was still not enough.

Next I got the heavy Euro Power Punch which can punch out various size rounds from a sheet of copper or sterling silver. It's heavy, just like the sandbag (the shipping cost me quite a lot as well, as it was sent via UPS due to the weight). I can't wait to start using this tool, I have so many ideas already!

Then I got myself a texture hammer with two different texturing styles (dimples and narrow lines) - you can see it here. Having recently bought a huge copper sheet of 0.7mm, I can't wait to start hammering on it and making some fun textures.

Finally I got the smaller Euro Punch plier which makes one type of hole only, of 1.8mm. Perfect for adding a jump ring to a pendant through the hole. It's this one that I got, with the round hole. There are 2 more styles (with square and oval holes) which are on my wishlist, will get them eventually. For now I really needed this as I was struggling to drill a hole with a Dremel, I just couldn't keep the tool steady for it. I guess I do need a flex shaft, or I don't know how to use the drilling part of the Dremel (or I don't have the right drill bits), but anyway, I've already tried this small tool and it's perfect for my needs. It also comes with a replaceable tip, which is a great thought by the developers.

Can't wait this weekend to start using my new fun metalsmithing tools!

Here is my entry in the week 11 for the Year of Jewelry Project of this year. It's my second project from Melissa Muir's soldering course. I am proud of it because I could never solder before, but now I made two separate projects already, including the previously shown first ever soldered chain.

It also fit well the week's theme because all the wire pieces and jump rings are literally taken from the scrap bin, from older projects that didn't go anywhere and had to be dismantled.

I love soldering and I know I'll get good at it once I practice enough.

I'm learning to solder using two beginner metalsmithing courses - one by Melissa Muir (workshop here), and one at Craftsy (Metalsmithing at home - link here) and Melissa's first project is a soldered chain. She uses 3 different jump ring sizes, and I used only two because I already had these cut, but overall I like it for a first piece. I stretched the larger rings into ovals a bit with the round nose pliers, and the rings didn't come apart, so the solder seems to hold.

There are tons of possibilities opened with soldering, imagine soldered frames without having to fiddle with wire wrapped bails, or soldering silver wire to a silver sheet cut to a particular design...I'm really excited about it. I know there are still flaws with this piece, have to remove some extra solder from the joints, some rings need a bit of adjusting (the ovals are not quite the same size everywhere), but I'm getting there with practice.

Here are a few pics taken of this first piece, one that I will keep, afterall it's my first :)