Monthly Archives: January 2010

new photos on the website

sterling silver box ring

sterling silver box ring

sterling silver box ring

I made this a while ago but only now got around to photographing it. I got the pebbles from Pebble Beach, near Ano Nuevo on the California coast. There is a sign that says “Please do not take the pebbles,” but seriously how could you not? The whole beach is filled with these tiny perfect colorful pebbles that would pretty much turn anyone into an obsessive compulsive. As soon as we got there, I fell to my knees and spent the entire time sifting through them, running them through my fingers, putting them in my pocket…

roses are silver, roses are gold

carved rose ring in sterling silver

I’ve been on a rose carving kick lately. This is the most recent one I’ve done. It’s my current favorite. My newest ring is always my favorite. This one I carved freehand (i.e., no sketch beforehand, no measuring, no plans, etc.), which worked just fine since it’s not exactly a complicated design.

carved climbing rose vine ring in 18K gold

This is another recent one I did freehand—just started hacking away at a scrap of ring blank. I think I started on the actual wax a couple of years ago but never got farther than blocking out a size and width; I don’t even remember what I intended to carve.

carved chain of roses ring in sterling silver

So dainty!

carved rosebush ring, boulder opal in 18K gold

So not! This is a massive, honking, behemoth of a ring. It took me so long to carve that I felt like casting it into silver would have been ridiculous; $5 worth of silver in a ring that took me 20 hours to carve. Just how do you price stuff like that? So I had it cast into 18K gold (happily back when it was around $400/ounce). It’s really over-the-top but I love it. A big snarly rosebush for your finger.

carved rosebush ring, boulder opal in 18K gold

The stone in it is a boulder opal that I bought from a couple of dudes (brothers) who own and work their own mine in Queensland, Australia. While I was admiring his stones, one of the brothers entertained me with bawdy miner stories. He joked about how his brother (who was off getting lunch) was a total wuss when it came to snakes and spiders (seriously, who wouldn’t be; the number of deadly poisonous beasties that creep and crawl across the continent of Australia is staggering) and every night, having passed out after drinking his weight in warm canned beer, the wuss brother would find himself desperately needing to get up in the night to pee. After lying in agony in his cot until he couldn’t take it anymore, he would proceed to wake everyone in the tent with his swearing and flashlight flashing and banging of his boots against the ground manically attempting to dislodge any deadly scorpions or spiders. Then, lightning quick, he would dash outside to the nearest tuft of grass to relieve himself and fly back to his cot and be in his sleeping bag like his ass was on fire. The other brother laughed himself hoarse telling the story until finally the wuss brother returned to the booth with a couple of Indian tacos, eyebrows raised wondering what was so funny.

I’m thinking it would also be totally awesome to have little 3-5 point diamonds set around some of these bands. Maybe 5 or 6 stones bezel set. Course I need to learn how to set (faceted) stones…

Actually learning to set stones is totally my goal for the next few months. Except using the word ‘goal’ makes me feel like I’m on a job interview for an entry level position at some massive financial firm being asked by a doughy middle manager in an ill-fitting Structure suit, “What personal goals have you set for yourself?” or “Where do you see yourself in five years?” Those are the two lamest questions ever and I always hated them. Probably because my answers were always along the lines of: “Goals? I don’t need no stinking goals,” and “As a rule I do not plan more than a week in advance, but I can tell you now that I sure as shit don’t see myself HERE.” Sadly I never did answer honestly to those questions and I always got hired in the end.

Anyway. The point of my post? Not a team player. Also: likes roses.

frustration

I must stop forgetting my pieces in the pickle overnight. It eats up all my neat little solders, which then turn brittle and snap apart. Maybe my pickle is too strong? Maybe I am just an idiot.

A per usual, my lameness makes my life harder: I had to resolder the same points no less than three different times after leaving this pair of earrings in the pickle overnight (and each pair has four different solder points).

falling leaf earrings in sterling silver

[Nice dead plant, by the way. Go me!]

My point: TWELVE SOLDER POINTS. The pain.

Good thing I have such a kick-ass torch or else I might have had to kill myself.