Initial Necklace

I don't have a lot of name related jewellery.

Given the choice I'd rather have a random word than my name on a necklace.

But I'd seen some cute little block letter necklaces around and thought I would try making my own. 

I started by making an L shape out of Sculpey, with a hole through the top, and once it had been baked I sanded the edges to make them super flat.

It's a good job my name doesn't start with an S.

Curves.

Then I painted the letter with silver acrylic paint. It took a couple of coats.

I covered the front side in PVA glue and sprinkled on fine silver glitter.

Once it had dried I shook off the excess and gave it a coat of clear nail varnish to seal the glitter.

I've tried varnishing with PVA glue before but it just dulls the shinyness of the glitter.

Then I put some wire through the hole with loops on each end and attached jump rings, then attached a chain.

And now I have a simple little, very shiny, initial necklace.

Fimo Pendant

When I was mixing the Fimo for these shell hairslides I noticed that all the bright colours mixed in with the black looked pretty cool.

So I took some of the Fimo and rolled it out, making an awesome looking pattern.

I shaped it and put in a hole, and made myself a pendant.

After I baked the Fimo the colours weren't as bright, but a coat of clear varnish fixed that.

I love the swirly, marbled colours.

I also made a long, thin pendant where the colours twist around it.

Oh Fimo, what did I do without you?

Bright Beads

Here's a new necklace I made for fun.

I love the bright colours and the pink chain. I need more pink chain!

The blue beads came from an old necklace that was my Grandmas. Some of the beads were flaking but I picked out the good ones.

I think they look like candy...

The star of it is this bead covered bead.

I got the idea from this blog but ended up doing it slightly differently.

I started by making to rings of beads for either end and then connecting them with strings of each colour bead.

The necklace isn't exactly my style, so I might try to sell it.

But it was fun to try out a new technique.

Matchstick Pendants

When I was at uni I bought a bag of these wooden matchsticks one weekend thinking they would be useful for my model making, only to find that my friend Natalie had bought me the same thing.

I thought it was about time I did something with my abundance of matchsticks.

Ok, this project only used 18 of them, but it's a start.

I started experimenting with shapes that I could make using the sticks, and UHU'd them together.

I also added some E6000 to make sure they didn't fall apart.

I painted them black, added a jump ring, and hey presto; geometric pendant.

I think they look pretty cool.

I picked black because my outfits tend to be black + another colour, so I figured they pendants would go with most things I wear.

I don't know how long they'll last, because they are just glued together, but they're doing all right for now.

New necklace

When I was making the tiny furniture for my set model I had a little bit of Sculpey leftover so I thought I would make a little pendant with it.

My thought process of what to make went;

flower > heart > strawberry > fox head

Once the Sculpey had baked I painted it, attached a jump ring and hung it from a chain.

And now it's in my Etsy shop.

Check it out

And you might as well have a look at the rest of my shop while you're there.

Geometric beads

I've seen a few things around the internet about making geometric beads from polymer clay, so I decided to make some myself.

I started by rolling small pieces of Sculpey into balls, and then flattening the edges against a ruler.

Once I'd baked them I made the sides flatter and more angular with sand paper.

I painted the beads with silver acrylic paint and used some of them to make this bar necklace.

I can't decided if I like it better as a short or long necklace.

Thoughts?

With some of the other beads, after I'd painted them silver, I then painted them with nail varnish for a metallic look.

Oh Sculpey, you're so full of possibilities.

Paua to the people

At Easter my parents went to New Zealand for a few weeks and bought me back a little bag of these Paua shells.

When my parents came back from their holiday they told me they'd bought me a present and that it was poisonous.

And I was like, 'err...what?!'

What they really meant was the lady in the shop had told them to be careful when drilling into the shells as the dust isn't very good for you.

But that's like you shouldn't breath in the dust when cutting wood.   

So when I drilled the holes for these two necklaces I wore a mask just to be on the safe side.

I made one for me and one for my friend Natalie whose Mum lives in New Zealand and she got a Paua ring the last time she went to visit her.

I guess they're kinda friendship necklaces, since we both have one.

Natalie has been [unsuccessfully] trying to convince me that a friendship Rolex is a thing.

No, I won't be buying her a Rolex. This necklace will have to do.

Jewellery display

I'm at home at the moment and I bought some of my things back from uni so I don't have to move out in one big go.

It turns out I have a lot of stuff.

This resulted in my desk looking like this.

But now it looks like this.

Aw yeah.

As much as I like my branch that I painted white and hung my jewellery on, it was time for a change.

Cue the pile of guitar bits I got from my friend last year.

You can see what I did with the whole guitar here.

I got one of the broken guitar necks and drilled holes into the fret board, along the front and on the bottom edge.

My Dad helped a lot. Thanks Papi!

Then I screwed little hooks into the holes.

To attach the guitar neck to the wall I needed to add a piece of wood to the head of the guitar so it was equal with the other end.

Then we (mostly my Dad) used those hook platey things to put it on the wall, which was not easy but we (...my Dad) got there eventually.

It's a good job I'm short because the necklaces hang just above my head.

Perfect.

And for those of you who are slightly newer to my blog, you can see more of my bedroom, in miniature form, here.

Etsy update

Hi guys. Being done with my uni work means that I've had time to make some new things for my Etsy shop.

Yay!

I've listed some cute little bow necklaces.

And some new wire word necklaces.

Boom!

Take a look.

And while I'm promoting myself, here is the link to my art website (or you can just click the Art button above).

There you will find my miniatures and my paintings all in one place.

I got my business cards yesterday ready for the degree show.

I'm like a legit artist now.

Pink bows

 I really like my black bow necklace but everyone always refers to it as a bow tie when I wear it.

So I thought I'd make one in a different colour to make it less bow tie like.

So I picked pink of course.

This stripy fabric is from an old pillow case.

I also made the bow smaller than the black one.

I think it's dainty.

I actually made seven little pink bows in one sitting so I put these three block colour ones together and added a long chain.

I like it.

Now, what to do with the other three bows...

Yay

Yesterday, during my post-assessment-deadline Dawson's Creek fest (*cough* 11 episodes *cough*) I made these wire necklaces like the ones I've made before and are in my Etsy shop.

This time we've got a gold 'yay'.

And a cute little silver bow.

They're made by wrapping shiny thread around garden wire and glueing along the way.

These two should be in my Etsy shop in the next couple of weeks.

So shiny!

I made a new necklace and it's super sparkly!

I used the same wooden disc as in this necklace along with a wooden ring which I painted with nail varnish to match the glitter.

I drilled small holes in the discs and then covered them in PVA glue and glitter. Lots of glitter! 

Bow necklace

I got this load of leather looking PVC type material from The Range the other day for £2.70.

It's another cheap shop but it has a really great art and craft section.

To test out how well I can sew the material I made a little bow.

Because bows are awesome.

I thought it would've been to obvious to make the successful bow into a hairclip so I made it into a necklace instead.

I put eyelets into two of the corners then attached jump rings and a chain.

Eyelets are my new favourite thing and I want to put them in everything. 

It's kinda like a bow-tie!