ScrapHappy October

I try to blog only when in the mood, but like all things – I find that it’s easier if I keep with it, and I haven’t, have I!

So, here’s a little something for Scraphappy

These little triangle chandeliers are made from scraps of chain (I buy it by the metre, and always have odd pieces left over at the end of my purchase because everyone likes a different length necklace / bracelet), odd pieces of silver sheet from my scrap box and occasionally new sheet for the large, backings – although I have rolled my own sheet for some of them. These triangles were the voids left between the shapes I sawed out for these Bladerunner inspired earrings.

All my wire and sheet has also already been recycled before I buy it, so these are double scrappy 🙂

First I select my scrap, then I anneal (to make it soft enough to work)

 

1. Draw on a triangle and saw it. Repeat, with two different sizes, to get two pairs
2. Anneal
3. Then I stamp a texture onto the small pieces
4. File and sand the edges of the small pieces
5. Pickle all 4 pieces (to ensure they are clean enough for the solder to flow evenly)
6. Sweat solder the reverse of the tiny bits
7. Flip them over and place on top of the larger ones, taking care to position them perfectly
8. Solder
9. Quench, pickle, dry, file and sand to ensure I have a matching pair and that they won’t open a vein if brushing a neck ! If lots of filing, anneal (taking care not to remelt the solder)
10. Mark for the hanging holes
11. Drill / punch holes
12. More sanding to remove burr
13. Tumble polish
    • NB If adding patination, I like to do so prior to tumbling, and then I polish back and apply Renaissance Wax as a protection. This jar is the sodium bicarbonate I use to neutralise the liver of sulphur
14. Add the chain with teensy jumprings
15. Add the earwires (from the stock I made earlier)

Complete – wear with enjoyment

(Better photos here in my Etsy shop!) – and thanks to Kate  for spotting I’d missed my finished photo – Doh!

ScrapHappy is open to anyone using up scraps of anything – no new materials. It can be a quilt block, pincushion, bag or hat, socks or a sculpture. Anything made of scraps is eligible. If your scrap collection is out of control and you’d like to turn them into something beautiful or useful instead of leaving them to collect dust in the cupboard, why not join in on the 15th of each month? Either email Kate at the address on her Contact Me page, or leave a comment below. You can also contact Gun via her blog to join.

Here are the links for everyone who joins ScrapHappy from time to time (they may not post every time, but their blogs are still worth looking at).

Kate (who runs it!), Gun, Titti, Heléne, Eva, Sue, Nanette, Lynn, Lynda,
Birthe, Turid, Susan, Cathy, Debbierose, Tracy, Jill, Claire, Jan, Karen,
Moira, Sandra, Linda, Chris, Nancy, Alys, Kerry, Claire, Jean, Johanna,
Joanne, Jon, Hayley, Dawn (me!), Gwen and Connie

See you again, same time next month!

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Sewing with depression (16 practical tricks and tips) — Kraken Kreations

I love reading the blog from Kraken Kreations.

We all know someone who suffers from / lives with / experiences depression (and everyone I know doing so chooses to label the experience differently) so I never cease to be grateful that I’ve dodged that particular chemical imbalance and I try to read as much as I can understand about the condition so I can do my best to support my chums – even when sometimes it’s only by NOT saying or doing something to compound their situation.

Have a read of this. It’s bang on. I learned some new stuff and I laughed. Go Kraken

 

Look, we’ve all read about how activities such as sewing ease depression, right? Well that’s all delightful apart from one shrieking klaxon of a problem: no one ever tells us how to sew when we actually have depression. In fact, telling us to cross stitch when we can barely wash is like telling Boris Johnson…

via Sewing with depression (16 practical tricks and tips) — Kraken Kreations

Winner of the Giveaway

We have a winner- Thank you to everyone who commented on my celebratory giveaway post, back in June and huge thanks to those of you who shared the post – I was amazed how many people visited the WordPress / Twitter / Instagram and Facebook pages. As it happens the winner placed her comment on Facebook…

Also thanks to LovelySue and #MrG for conducting the draw this afternoon at the allotment, whilst I wire wrapped gemstones for Sunday (did I mention the fair yet 😂)

I got them to draw 1 winner and 2 emergency back ups, in case the first doesn’t contact me to claim her prize, but I think it might be a little cruel to share those names at the moment.

So…..drum roll…..

Tina Valentine – has been asked to contact me to claim her prize.

If you are very disappointed, I’ll have all the other items (currently listed on Etsy) plus lots more new stuff on Sunday at Forde House Summer Fayre, Newton Abbot between 10am – 4pm and after that I’ll be uploading all the new items to my Etsy shop.

***** Draw Closed ****

                   ***** DRAW CLOSED ****

I’ve had a total of 69 entries for my Celebratory Giveaway, via Facebook / Twitter / Instagram or WordPress.

I’ve written all your names down, and I’ll get LovelySue to pick a winner, with a couple of back ups (in case of a no-show) when I next see her at #HamlinLaneAllotments

In the meantime – thank you all very much for your fun comments – I’ve enjoyed this….now I’m off to complete the items I’ll be taking to my fair!

A milestone – my jewellery has been Hallmarked!

Here in the UK, it’s the law that any item sold as silver, with a weight of over 7.78grams* has to be formally hallmarked by an Assay office. (legislation) **

I registered my sponsor mark in 2014, and I’ve stamped many of my pieces with this myself, but that’s only good for gifts and things that are less than the assay weight.

Much as I like to work within a boundary constraint – be it the brief from a customer, the limitations of my skill or tools or indeed the requirement to send items for hallmarking, the time had come for me to boldly go where I’d not been before. (if you want to see how I went about this, I wrote this for someone who asked for details. It’s very dull )  In part because I’m facing my fear again and attempting another fair. This time it’s a REAL fair – I’ve hired a stall, and invested in an iZettle (that’s a Point Of Sale device to enable contactless and chip and pin payments) and made a whole load of display options.

I want to treat this as a bit of a chance to try some new and larger designs and also as a bit of advertising. So, I invested all my profits in some more bullion, and made the stuff I’d like to buy myself. Let’s hope that other people feel the same way 🙂

I’m pricing it at a little less than on Etsy, to reflect the lack of commission and packing etc and I’ll be offering some special deals to anyone who’s a repeat customer or multi-buys.

I’ll let you know how it turns out!

*7.78 grams is less than the weight of three UK pennies, less than the weight of a prosecco cork, and about the weight of 16.5 long matches. 🙂

Many people ignore this piece of legislation, but like many laws it’s there for our protection. Do consider this when you are shopping, online or at fairs – if it’s heavy and not hallmarked, you are buying the item on trust alone.

**When the Assay office receives a bundle of metal to mark, they test it for it’s ‘fineness’ – ie the percentage and quality of the metal type – in my situation that is for them to check that my pieces are a minimum quality of 92.5% silver. If an item doesn’t pass, they have the power to seize it.

London has the bonus of including the traditional lion mark for sterling and a date letter for the year of manufacture and offers a laser option – all are at no extra charge.

These additional marks, plus the fact that I’m more likely to visit London than Birmingham, Sheffield or Edinburgh are what made me choose London Assay office over the others.

Here’s my hallmark on a real bit of silver, and a little video of (a selection of!) the bangles I’ve made for the fair