New Pendants and what's on your worktable?

Hi, I said in my last post that I would show some of the new pendants that I have been working on, so here they are. I used quite a few different techniques on these babies. I used regular polymer clay, liquid polymer clay, I used shapes that I punched out from sheets of clay, I even silkscreened on the clay. But I'm pleased with the way that they came out. Now I have to figure out how I'm going to use them. String them on some cord with some glass beads? I'm not sure yet. But when I get them done, I will post pics of the final result. So what's on your worktable? Anything new and exciting? Hope so. Talk soon & thanks for checking in!

It's been awhile...

Well hey there! It's been awhile hasn't it? It's been almost a month since I last posted. It's just so hard to get motivated with this blog thing, you know? So the best I can do is to promise that my posts will be sporadic at best! First of all, you don't even know if anyone out there is reading your blog, then you think, well why would they? I mean why would anyone care to read about what I think? So then I think, well I shouldn't really be writing for anyone else anyway. I should write because I want to, and just do it for myself. I don't know, then sometime's I just get so darn busy, that I quite simply don't have the time. So - there it is - for whatever it's worth! So I finally went and got my business license -- yeah!! Which means that I've got to get serious now, and start running this thing as if it's a legitimate business. No more half-assing it! Time to put my nose to the old grindstone! And I'm really ready! I've been sort of floating in this limbo state for far too long. Guess you could say that I took a good hard look in the mirror, and I wasn't very thrilled at what was looking back. So I took some time out for some much needed self evaluation, and decided to make some changes in my life. I suppose that this has all come about because it's my birthday this weekend. I'll be 49 years old!!! Yeah I said it! Almost 1/2 a century old!! Whew - getting old sucks! Don't let anyone tell you differently. Your body just pretty much quits cooperating with you and starts to fail you at the strangest times and in the strangest ways. You get new pain in new places and for no apparent reason. It's weird. The up side to it is, that you start to feel much wiser in the ways of life. By now, I'm also very comfortable with who I am, and overall, I generally like myself and who I have turned out to be. I just need to remember to check in with myself from time to time, and always remember to keep up with the preventative measures in all respects. Aging, health, etc. Well anyway, I believe I'm babbling now, (another sign of aging) so I will leave you now, but not before I show you a few pictures of some new bracelets that I have been working on. Both the beads and the bracelet design are new for me. Overall I'm very happy with them. And I have a ton of other ideas rolling around in my head, that I just need to find the time to try. My other bracelets were okay, but generally I must admit, they were very boring. But I needed that time to develop my skills in bead making. Now that I have, I think my beading skills were ready for something new. So the pictures in this post are of the new bracelets. I've also got some new pendants that I wanted to show you, but I'll save those for next time. Enjoy your weekend, I know I will! Till next time America -- lol. c-ya!

First attempt at a butterfly cane!

Here are some pictures of the butterfly canes that I promised to show you yesterday. I made both of the canes over this past weekend. This was my first attempt at a butterfly cane. Not my first attempt at caning, mind you, just caning of butterflies! I think that they came out alright. The larger yellowish one looks a tad distorted. But I think it's because the new formula of the Premo brand of clay. It's very squishy stuff. Almost too soft. I'm hoping that if I let them "rest-up", that they will firm up a little bit. Otherwise slicing them, without distorting them further will be rather difficult. Guess I'll have to wait and see. I'm also not quite sure what I'm going to do with all of it. I mean I don't really need that much. Guess I'll have butterfly cane for the next few years!

Oh yeah, and before I forget, here are a few pictures of the necklaces that I made with the faux ceramic beads that I showed you yesterday. I realize that they are very simple and plain looking, but there is something about that faux ceramic look that just lends itself to a more natural and simple design. I like them, and they look great around your neck! Okay take it easy, and I'll be back in a few days. Thanks for stopping by!

Hope you had a nice holiday!

Hope you had a great 4th of July! I know I did. It's always been one of my favorite holidays. I just love fireworks! Anyway, otherwise it just gave me a whole extra day to work on some new clay ideas and beads that I have been wanting to try. They are made using a faux ceramic bead technique, and I think that I like the way that they came out. I'll be making some more of these because I like the look. Oh yeah, and I'd been wanting to try to make a butterfly cane for some time now, so I did that as well. Actually I made 2 of them, but I haven't taken any pictures yet. So I will post those pics tomorrow. But in the meantime....here are the pics of the beads. I'm not even sure what I'm going to do with these butterfly canes. I mean that I'm sure that I will use some of it on some clay things, but I have quite a bit of it, too much for me to use. Maybe I'll sell some chunks of it. I have never really tried to sell any of my cane work, I will have to look into that. Okay then, until tomorrow....

My entry into the PCAGOE July challenge

This is my entry into the PCAGOE July challenge. The theme for this month is to make something that represents your personal hero or heroes. Since most of the people that I have truly admired in my life are strong beautiful women, I made this pendant to represent them. My mother is one of those women. She raised 6 children virtually on her own. She is a beautiful, intelligent, and strong woman and I made this pendant with her in mind. There are a lot of great entries this month, and it's fun to see what everyone came up with. So go to http://www.pcagoe.com/ and vote for your favorite, you have until July 3rd at midnight. Thanks for stopping by!

A Place for my stuff

Don't know if you are familiar with George Carlin's stand up routine called "A place for my stuff" or not, but if not you should be, it's very funny. He was a gifted and talented comic genius in my opinion, and he will be missed.
I just got some new storage cabinets for my studio, which is what made me think of the routine mentioned above. I love them and it gives me more room for my stuff! It also then makes you start to reorganize and clean things up. Which is always a good thing. When you clean up your environment, you also clear out the extra clutter in your brain. It's great! I had mentioned in a previous post about how I had managed to work myself right off of my desk and how I had moved over to my partners desk. Well after cleaning things up and getting more storage space, I am now back to my desk, and it is all clean and has some open space on it. Sometimes it's good to take a break and just get things together. Regroup and then you can come back refreshed and ready to try some new things. I spent the whole day yesterday just reorganizing and cleaning, and thanks to some assistance from my sister, I finished. So I am now ready to go tackle some new things that have been rolling around in my head. When I have some finished work to show you, I will post pistures. Thanks for stopping by, talk later.......

Tutorials

I have posted Part 2 of my Tutorial here on my blog. Part One is at the PCAGOE website or newsletter. But I will be posting it here soon as well. I will be adding more tutorials in the near future, so stay tuned.

Tutorial: Painted Hollow Beads Tutorial is at:
http://sallysotelo.blogspot.com/2008/06/my-other-painted-hollow-bead-tutorial.html