In case anyone is wondering, I've never actually shown M my blog until recently and my sole criterion for adding that new "humor" tag is whether a post makes her laugh.
So if you don't find it funny, blame her! :D *end PSA*
Friday, May 28, 2010
HydraDog
M has a long-haired German shepherd. And by "long-haired," I mean "three inches of fluff at the best of times."
I've been pulling off her winter coat. And by "pulling," I mean "taking great handfuls and taking them off and stuffing them in a grocery bag," and by "winter coat," I mean "the top layer of the entire dog."
She's been patiently allowing this for 20 minutes at a time all week. And by "patiently," I mean "with much fleeing and needing to be tackled."
Soon we will have a dog instead of a great lump of clumpy hair. And by "soon," I mean "when I eventually break down and vaccuum her."
Does anyone spin dog fur? She does have nice long fiber. Who'd like to trade for some exquisite, labor-intensive hand-gathered winter German Shephard hair in lovely mixed shades of forest brown, charcoal and sable? I'll throw in some of those damn overstock bracelets too.
I've been pulling off her winter coat. And by "pulling," I mean "taking great handfuls and taking them off and stuffing them in a grocery bag," and by "winter coat," I mean "the top layer of the entire dog."
She's been patiently allowing this for 20 minutes at a time all week. And by "patiently," I mean "with much fleeing and needing to be tackled."
Soon we will have a dog instead of a great lump of clumpy hair. And by "soon," I mean "when I eventually break down and vaccuum her."
Does anyone spin dog fur? She does have nice long fiber. Who'd like to trade for some exquisite, labor-intensive hand-gathered winter German Shephard hair in lovely mixed shades of forest brown, charcoal and sable? I'll throw in some of those damn overstock bracelets too.
Monday, May 24, 2010
This is how I spend my Friday nights
So ... I'm a dork gamer chick.
M and I, my cousin and his girlfriend, two English grad students and the husband of one of them, are playing this Castle Falkenstein-based GURPS campaign. As should surprise no one, it's steampunk-themed.
One of the grads plays a hyper-curious amateur lady archaeologist with Annie Oakley shooting skills. My cousins play a white-bearded Famous Explorer type who shoots what needs shooting, and an impoverished Southern ex-Civil War officer who pilots what needs piloting, respectively. We also have a mortician/secret zombie master who is searching for the secret of immortality with his fame, fortune and offensive smell. M plays a busty-but-modest illegitimate child of the British peerage who has lately been applying her skills as a clockwork toymaker to saving the world. And I play her bodyguard, an embittered one-handed Algerian assassin, not too bright, who has been disowned by his nomadic tribe and generally dislikes humanity.
So currently we're in Edinburgh trying to persuade two people who might possibly be vampires that they don't want to cause rampant poltergeist activity in the city. Previously, we negotiated a peaceful ceasefire between a memory-mashing wizard, a bunch of marine biologists and a bevy of street urchins and stopped an ancient Egyptian mummy from taking over Cairo with a flying pyramid.
I give all of this background for the purpose of sharing some of our better exchanges of dialogue:
*
"It's like a pinata! Only it hits back! With lasers!"
*
"So we've made it to London?"
"We left London. Remember the whole part where we told Rigo and Tavi goodbye?"
"Oh. No."
"While Desmond is kissing the ground and thanking God that he's back in Merry Olde England, a man in a kilt playing bagpipes while sharing a haggis with a Highland Coo is staring at your suspiciously ambulatory mining equipment and contemplating contacting the police."
*
"Pleasantries are the new hotel."
*
"I use Sex Appeal on the Chambers."
"It's a government building. It doesn't want in your pants."
...
Also to explain why we made this. See, my character has the one hand and the other one is mechanical. My dad gave us a bunch of old industrial parts which he got from the neighbors after their parents died and left aforementioned parts in the garage, and our free run of the drawer turned up some very convenient numbers of these things ...
... no, you're right. There's no excuse.
A collaborative effort between M and me involving a large connector from Blue Moon Beads' current Orient Express collection, some fun industrial bits, a decorative chain, and more wire-wrapped rings than I've ever made in one sitting. More info and a second view on my Flickr.
M and I, my cousin and his girlfriend, two English grad students and the husband of one of them, are playing this Castle Falkenstein-based GURPS campaign. As should surprise no one, it's steampunk-themed.
One of the grads plays a hyper-curious amateur lady archaeologist with Annie Oakley shooting skills. My cousins play a white-bearded Famous Explorer type who shoots what needs shooting, and an impoverished Southern ex-Civil War officer who pilots what needs piloting, respectively. We also have a mortician/secret zombie master who is searching for the secret of immortality with his fame, fortune and offensive smell. M plays a busty-but-modest illegitimate child of the British peerage who has lately been applying her skills as a clockwork toymaker to saving the world. And I play her bodyguard, an embittered one-handed Algerian assassin, not too bright, who has been disowned by his nomadic tribe and generally dislikes humanity.
So currently we're in Edinburgh trying to persuade two people who might possibly be vampires that they don't want to cause rampant poltergeist activity in the city. Previously, we negotiated a peaceful ceasefire between a memory-mashing wizard, a bunch of marine biologists and a bevy of street urchins and stopped an ancient Egyptian mummy from taking over Cairo with a flying pyramid.
I give all of this background for the purpose of sharing some of our better exchanges of dialogue:
*
"It's like a pinata! Only it hits back! With lasers!"
*
"So we've made it to London?"
"We left London. Remember the whole part where we told Rigo and Tavi goodbye?"
"Oh. No."
"While Desmond is kissing the ground and thanking God that he's back in Merry Olde England, a man in a kilt playing bagpipes while sharing a haggis with a Highland Coo is staring at your suspiciously ambulatory mining equipment and contemplating contacting the police."
*
"Pleasantries are the new hotel."
*
"I use Sex Appeal on the Chambers."
"It's a government building. It doesn't want in your pants."
...
Also to explain why we made this. See, my character has the one hand and the other one is mechanical. My dad gave us a bunch of old industrial parts which he got from the neighbors after their parents died and left aforementioned parts in the garage, and our free run of the drawer turned up some very convenient numbers of these things ...
... no, you're right. There's no excuse.
A collaborative effort between M and me involving a large connector from Blue Moon Beads' current Orient Express collection, some fun industrial bits, a decorative chain, and more wire-wrapped rings than I've ever made in one sitting. More info and a second view on my Flickr.
Sunday, May 16, 2010
A gem show
So M and I went yesterday to my hometown's annual Gem and Mineral Show.
Most of the jewelry wasn't terribly impressive -- it all loses some effect when you're going "... yeah, I know where you get those, and I know your markup" through half the table. And yes, I saw and recognized all of those items. Next time I'm tempted to add some of that kind of thing to my table to grab the not-inconsiderable potential profit margin, I'll remember how cheap it looks. As a beader, who constantly gets the dismissive comments, I need all the help I can get.
On the other hand -- some of the stuff was incredible. I saw some of the most beautiful ways to set druzies! And geode slices! One artist had actually put tiny twists in the wire to follow every single wave in the material. I bought some rocks -- some sized for wire wrapping will be turning up as pendants in the shop soon, one piece of Utah jasper had such an amazingly dramatic design on one face that I'm currently working on building a wirework necklace around it, and there was this slice of jasper, about 4x4, that I just had to have ...
And then a member of the [name of hometown excised to protect the irritating] Gem and Mineral Society approached us. "You girls need to join our club!" she informed M and I as we waited for the person behind the booth to notice our existence (further note to self: if you make people wait too long for you to come give them prices, they'll put most of the stuff back. I almost bought twelve Utah jaspers and flourites). She gave us a brochure. She told us about the resources in their workshop. Then it all went sour. "We can teach you to make your own jewelry!" she told us in a one-day-you'll-be-big-and-tall tone of overenthusiasm, then conspiratorially added, gesturing at my palmful of minerals: "That's what these are really for, you know."
Five minutes further into her spiel (it seems "make your own jewelry" means "make a cabochon" -- guess what, I know how) M attempted to head her off by pointing out that I'm a jewelry designer (which should not have been difficult to detect; we both make a point of wearing my work and we'd been discussing which face of our rocks would best support a wrapped bail when she interrupted us). It didn't work.
We moved on to the display case section, where there were several more varieties of awesome, including a handmade cab setting that looked like an angelfish, and these absolutely amazing cuff bracelets in beads, wire, stone and polymer clay ... but the experience was slightly soured by being subjected to a monologue from their chainmaille demonstrator who apparently really wanted us to sit and watch her, prompted by M's trying to politely disengage by saying we didn't really have the patience for chainmaille. "Do you know how you learn patience?" she said didactically, apparently seeing a chance to Instruct the Youth of Today. And it went dramatically downhill from there. Because she insisted on telling us. And then telling us that if we weren't patient enough for chainmaille we could skip the wirework demonstration: "That takes patience too!"
So ... yeah. Cool stuff. Incredibly condescending people. I have no conclusions.
Most of the jewelry wasn't terribly impressive -- it all loses some effect when you're going "... yeah, I know where you get those, and I know your markup" through half the table. And yes, I saw and recognized all of those items. Next time I'm tempted to add some of that kind of thing to my table to grab the not-inconsiderable potential profit margin, I'll remember how cheap it looks. As a beader, who constantly gets the dismissive comments, I need all the help I can get.
On the other hand -- some of the stuff was incredible. I saw some of the most beautiful ways to set druzies! And geode slices! One artist had actually put tiny twists in the wire to follow every single wave in the material. I bought some rocks -- some sized for wire wrapping will be turning up as pendants in the shop soon, one piece of Utah jasper had such an amazingly dramatic design on one face that I'm currently working on building a wirework necklace around it, and there was this slice of jasper, about 4x4, that I just had to have ...
And then a member of the [name of hometown excised to protect the irritating] Gem and Mineral Society approached us. "You girls need to join our club!" she informed M and I as we waited for the person behind the booth to notice our existence (further note to self: if you make people wait too long for you to come give them prices, they'll put most of the stuff back. I almost bought twelve Utah jaspers and flourites). She gave us a brochure. She told us about the resources in their workshop. Then it all went sour. "We can teach you to make your own jewelry!" she told us in a one-day-you'll-be-big-and-tall tone of overenthusiasm, then conspiratorially added, gesturing at my palmful of minerals: "That's what these are really for, you know."
Five minutes further into her spiel (it seems "make your own jewelry" means "make a cabochon" -- guess what, I know how) M attempted to head her off by pointing out that I'm a jewelry designer (which should not have been difficult to detect; we both make a point of wearing my work and we'd been discussing which face of our rocks would best support a wrapped bail when she interrupted us). It didn't work.
We moved on to the display case section, where there were several more varieties of awesome, including a handmade cab setting that looked like an angelfish, and these absolutely amazing cuff bracelets in beads, wire, stone and polymer clay ... but the experience was slightly soured by being subjected to a monologue from their chainmaille demonstrator who apparently really wanted us to sit and watch her, prompted by M's trying to politely disengage by saying we didn't really have the patience for chainmaille. "Do you know how you learn patience?" she said didactically, apparently seeing a chance to Instruct the Youth of Today. And it went dramatically downhill from there. Because she insisted on telling us. And then telling us that if we weren't patient enough for chainmaille we could skip the wirework demonstration: "That takes patience too!"
So ... yeah. Cool stuff. Incredibly condescending people. I have no conclusions.
Thursday, May 13, 2010
Statement necklaces done well
I have a love-hate relationship with bib necklaces and other pieces usually marked "statement." I think they can very easily be done badly ... and often are. The exceptions, though, can be really fantastic. I've favorited a few around Etsy and Flickr and thought I'd share them today:
Wonderful details. This is a great piece of sculpture that also functions as jewelry. See how the color blending reflects the story as you follow the sculpted figures across the necklace? Gorgeous.
Well-used brights. Yellow is a hard color to use well. This is the lemon-lime palette done right.
Perfect lines. This one manages to get a wonderfully organic look because all the components are arranged so they flow into each other. No odd breaks. No staring stand-out objects. No garish work-ins. Just a fluid composition.
Perfect balance. This one proves that a symmetrical piece can still be interesting and eye-catching.
Imbalance done well. And this one shows that it doesn't have to be symmetrical ... and also, it's a great example of that whimsical rarity, colorful steampunk.
Framing the face. A beautiful example of large style that flatters instead of overpowering.
Just chunky enough. This one's definitely big and bold, but there's a sensible restraint in the color palette that keeps it bright without being too-too-much.
Wearable art. This puts paper collage and handmade beads into the necklace and makes it contribute to the harmony, not take away from it. A personal favorite.
Artistic assemblage. And this one shows that a found-object creation doesn't have to look like a collection of afterthoughts: it can be eclectic and exquisite at the same time.
And what qualifies me to judge whether someone has interpreted a style well? Why, absolutely nothing! ... except that I've been doing this a long time, and I know the good stuff when I see it. Those are the good stuff.
Wonderful details. This is a great piece of sculpture that also functions as jewelry. See how the color blending reflects the story as you follow the sculpted figures across the necklace? Gorgeous.
Well-used brights. Yellow is a hard color to use well. This is the lemon-lime palette done right.
Perfect lines. This one manages to get a wonderfully organic look because all the components are arranged so they flow into each other. No odd breaks. No staring stand-out objects. No garish work-ins. Just a fluid composition.
Perfect balance. This one proves that a symmetrical piece can still be interesting and eye-catching.
Imbalance done well. And this one shows that it doesn't have to be symmetrical ... and also, it's a great example of that whimsical rarity, colorful steampunk.
Framing the face. A beautiful example of large style that flatters instead of overpowering.
Just chunky enough. This one's definitely big and bold, but there's a sensible restraint in the color palette that keeps it bright without being too-too-much.
Wearable art. This puts paper collage and handmade beads into the necklace and makes it contribute to the harmony, not take away from it. A personal favorite.
Artistic assemblage. And this one shows that a found-object creation doesn't have to look like a collection of afterthoughts: it can be eclectic and exquisite at the same time.
And what qualifies me to judge whether someone has interpreted a style well? Why, absolutely nothing! ... except that I've been doing this a long time, and I know the good stuff when I see it. Those are the good stuff.
New Special Offer through May 26
Friday's show was less profitable than previous ones at that venue ... which is a pity, but I know exactly why: UCR claims to limit the number of non-handmade vendors and they don't, so the people who make it an art fair have been slowly trickling away over the years and the people selling sweatshop crap have been surging in two at a time for their spots.
I sold a total of nine pieces ... cringe. Still, though, it's nine pieces I wouldn't have sold otherwise, and I also got a custom order for wire-wrapping some raw diamonds, which is incredibly flattering.
Surprisingly, sales were slowest of bracelets. I have a lot of them in inventory that I've made -- more than I can actually display -- hence the next couple weeks' special offer.
Available here.
Through May 26, when you place an order of $15 or more (not including shipping), get a free adjustable beaded bracelet with every item you order! This can quickly add up to quite a few pieces that make great little birthday or client gifts, and are also awesome for layering.
TO claim your bracelets, use the code "inventory" when you order!
I sold a total of nine pieces ... cringe. Still, though, it's nine pieces I wouldn't have sold otherwise, and I also got a custom order for wire-wrapping some raw diamonds, which is incredibly flattering.
Surprisingly, sales were slowest of bracelets. I have a lot of them in inventory that I've made -- more than I can actually display -- hence the next couple weeks' special offer.
Available here. Through May 26, when you place an order of $15 or more (not including shipping), get a free adjustable beaded bracelet with every item you order! This can quickly add up to quite a few pieces that make great little birthday or client gifts, and are also awesome for layering.
TO claim your bracelets, use the code "inventory" when you order!
Thursday, May 6, 2010
Live designers! Tips accepted!
Quick post this week just to let everyone know that I'll be at UC Riverside's Market Day this Friday, May 7.
Everything is eligible for the sales table, so if you've had your eye on a piece in the shop, now is the time to save it from being snatched up in person. And otherwise, Riverside residents, hope to see you there!
Everything is eligible for the sales table, so if you've had your eye on a piece in the shop, now is the time to save it from being snatched up in person. And otherwise, Riverside residents, hope to see you there!
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