Missing Deadlines Can Be OK

SWG extended their deadline for the current challenge story until the end of the week, but even with the extension and my having chosen the minimum number of prompts for it, I'm still going to miss the deadline. I know that every year when I focus on Bead & Button Show, my attendance at the show and making items in my various classes and workshops, my creative flames switch. They move from the computer keyboard to the variety of hammers and saws (and flame - lots of flame) that are used in metalsmithing. I'm still creative, but in a different way.

I remember the days when I was a beader and attending classes meant
carrying a task light, bead pad, needles and thread. Now I carry a "portable"
cart of tools because metalsmithing requires a bunch of heavy stuff. I
use a fold-up two-wheeler to pull everything from one place to another. 

My personal schedule also changes with the longer days and warmer weather. I spend more time outdoors away from the keyboard, and my Sundays, which could sometimes be used for catch-up time on stories and plots, end up being "let's take another load or two to the landfill" days. It's not a bad thing - not at all. But it requires a shift in time management and thought and design processes.

I enjoy writing fanfiction, but sometimes life gets in the way. I don't write
for a living, although I've looked into it in the past, because when you write
for profit, you have to write no matter what - every day, inspiration or not. Ick! 

I'm not objecting, even though my goal of a stamp for each of the month's competitions won't happen. Sometimes life moves so quickly and I just have to jump into the stream, find the one that will lead me past the many places I want to visit, and stick with it. I know that stories can be submitted late, and if I pick this one up again, that's what it will be - late. It's not the end of the world, just a small disappointment cocooned in a thick nest of good things that cushion the harsh edges of the bad.

Look at this amazing netted cocoon. I'm totally in love with the netted
structure of it. The pattern on the greenery above it totally blows me
away also. So beautiful! 

I hope all of your bad edges are also thoroughly blanketed with soft, protective cushions. Have a wonderful Thursday and enjoy the day!

New Week - New Month

Yes, the year is now 1/12th over. If you are running deadlines, this might frighten you. It probably should if you're like my friend Chickie - the procrastination Queen of the universe. She's still working on Holiday gifts from 2008!

I decided that I wanted to add some surface decoration to my cloak pins. It will push the finish time back a week, but it will be far more interesting to look at, so it's a good trade-off for me. I don't want to do the final soldering until the decorations are complete. But I do have all of the small pieces ready to solder on, so things will go quickly once I declare the fronts complete. I am looking forward to finishing these though - I would like to progress to the next thing.

And the kit purchase schedule for the 2011 Beading For A Cure kit has been announced. The Board has decided to work things differently this time - not offering a pre-purchase option for previous participants, rather having it run more like the sign-up for Bead & Button classes. I'm not really thrilled with this schedule, but I'll still participate. It is one of the two times I'll bead this year, since I prefer to work with metals and stone these days.

Back Steps

I didn't have much time to work on my pins yesterday, but I did get the backs measured and my rod marked so that I can coil my hinge. It's actually a tube through which the pin will pass, but I decided I would make it from a coil of silver rather than pulling a tube of the appropriate diameter (the lack of a stump and a drawbench made my decision on a coil much easier). I'll use 20 gauge sterling wire for the coil and the two catches, but I'll try and get the top coils turned and fitted this morning and if we're still really slow this afternoon, I might grab an hour at the bench and get the tops and bottoms soldered on. The bottoms will be made in a similar manner, but I'll saw the bottom coils open so that they can be used to catch the pin. But, the bottoms may also be made from sheet - I haven't made up my mind 100% on the bottoms yet.

I want to get the back finished on the pins so that I can solder the bezels onto the front and finish the pins. But I also don't want to hurry and skip a step. Don't you often find yourself rushing to finish something and looking back, realizing that something should have been done between steps 2 and 3? It is one reason why I am careful about what I make and why I try and think things through carefully. (The other reason that I think things through is that I spend a lot of time packaging beads and findings - boring - and that allows me lots of time to think about projects.) Do you visualize your projects before you begin them? People create in different ways, but I always see the completed item before I ever pick up my pencil or my saw. Then my goal is to make that mental image come true - MUCH easier to say than to do!

Progressing and Designing

I am trying to get my scheduling nailed for the year. I know that I will complete an item for Beading For A Cure, the charity against colon cancer that I have been involved with for many years. And if my friend Shruit gets our application in and accepted, I will be participating with her in a second competition piece. But I think those are the only two beading competitions that I will produce beadwork for this year.

In metal clay, I will be making charms for the charm swap at the PMC Conference in July, and I will be making some Art Clay Copper pieces to enamel and test out because it's a new product that I actually have owned for a while now and just haven't had the time to play with yet. I may or may not do more with metal clay this year - it's still very much in the air. I love the product, but I also need to work on my fabrication skills which have fallen by the wayside.
For fabrication, I will be setting enamel pieces. I need to finish my cloak pins. Then I would still like to do the center heron for my heron and chrysanthamums piece that I started more than a year ago. And I want to make more enamel. Lots more. I really love playing with enamel.

And I'll be drawing. Because my fingers are itching to pick up a piece of graphite and a sketchpad and draw. And many of those drawings may make their way into color and finally into glass because the projects that I have in the works are into sketch mode now.

And finally I'll be sewing - I'll be hand embroidering the borders of cloaks and machine sewing the cloaks themselves. I still want to do a new corset for Renaissance Faire, and I want a new skirt also. I have had the fabric for that for a couple of years, I just need to actually make the items.

Well - it looks like I'll have a busy year. Guess I'd better get going on my art front!

Time and Courage

I'm lazing about here (yeah - right....lazing - LOL). OK, starting again - I'm sitting here in front of my computer screen at 5:30 am with 1-1/2 hours left until I need to leave for the shop. Ideally I will get to the shop, turn on my laptop, do some more work on that equipment, go to the post office and the bank, return to the laptop and finish up the work, and open the shop close to 10:00 am. But the schedule above doesn't seem to leave any time for working on my silver bench, and I want to continue working on the background settings for my Two Trees enamel pieces. I really wanted to have them already set by tomorrow so that I could drop by Ho's and show him my latest project. But I won't have them ready and I refuse to rush them and do a job that I'm not happy with. So when I do finish, I'll just take a special trip out to Minneapolis to show him the final item. It'll be OK, and I'll be happier with the result and under a bit less pressure.

Yesterday I got a "wonderful" phone call from one of my major vendors. It appears that their bank lost several checks that had been received, but had never been deposited into their account. One of our checks for several thousand dollars was one of the missing, but they needed to know from us whether or not it had ever been cashed. And the kicker...the check was from April! April! Nothing like being current :-) In the old days I would have been able to answer them quickly. But I found out that my financial dude hasn't balanced the books since March. So the last two hours of yesterday were spent with him at his desk, balancing each statement. He still has one month to go this morning, but it's looking as though the check was never cashed and we will probably have to issue a replacement. Oh well, it will save us a bit of work for our year-end since the books will at least be up-to-date as of the end of October. Still looking for that mithril lining :-)

Ups and Downs

The road to creativity has some of the most elegant pot holes in the world. I keep making and applying for books and contests. Something things are accepted, other times they are not. My latest disappointment was my necklace for the "30-Minute Necklaces" book to be published by Lark Books. I thought my design was strong and very visual, but it didn't make the final cut. I'll be curious to see what did when the book is published, but I'll show put a picture of my entry below - you can judge for yourself.

Tomorrow is my last Sunday off until Christmas . I remember that I used to really love the holiday season - getting or making gifts for people and enjoying the lights and music. It might not be my diety, but I could enjoy the concepts of "peace on earth" and "goodwill towards mankind/womankind". However, since I have owned the shop, we've been open for extended hours for the holidays and that includes four hours of work on Sundays. That will leave me with my studio day during the week, so at least I will have one day off. So I'll enjoy tomorrow as much as possible because it will be the last for a while. I think I'll sketch and maybe play with my watercolors. Happy Halloween to all of you, and good All Souls and All Saints Days. Good Samhain to my pagan friends who follow that path, and be safe to all of you!

Miracles Needed

I have a project ready to send out. But I'm supposed to also send photographs of it and one of my lights for camera shots just burned out. So I'm stuck pulling in a substitute and that will change my white balance and total composition. Growl. I had hoped to mail this out express mail today. I think I'll phone the book company and find out if the photo is essential since I'm sending the actual project and if it is not, I'll get the whole thing in the mail super fast.

I've decided that I really need to get a micro-stamp of my logo. I had no way to mark the piece that I just finished and that's disturbing. But I'm very poor right now and don't see that changing for the next few months. So I'm not really sure how I can order this. But I need to, so I'll have to buckle down and save everywhere that I can to accumulate the money to get this ordered. I know that I can order one for metal clay from Babette, but I need one for my metals work also. Well, one more thing to get done :-)

And what do you do when you create something that just doesn't work? My mockup of a piece really worked well. But when I made the piece in real life - it just sucked. It was ugly. The flow - didn't. The colors - didn't. The concept - didn't. I'll end up saving whatever components can be reasonably reused, retire the concept and rework it, and I'll try again, later, with a different twist and make lemonade from these lemons. But I consider this project - as it was originally designed - completely dead. Ick!

Metals - Color, Texture

I am a visual artist - I am not a composer of music, an interpreter in movement, or a maven of words. I am a visual artist. My chosen media for many years has been metal and glass. It occurred to me as I drove to work yesterday, that I really love working with metal. It always amazes me how malleable metal can be. The things that I can do to change the surface of metal, and what I can then do to color or embellish it, just makes playing so much fun! And I love the colors of metal, unadorned: the bright white gleam of silver, the wink at the sun that gold boldly does, and the mellow warmth of copper. I love them all. I tend to work most with copper, not only because of the color but also because it is a more affordable option for me. But copper fulfills much of what I want in a metal. It can be cut, hammered and shaped. It can be etched. It can be enameled and patinated. It can be soldered or cold connected. It's a happy metal and I really enjoy it.

Even as I work with the metal, however, I still have a deep desire to be better with pencil, ink, paint and paper. There is something so portable about being able to produce art on the fly. I have at least one sketchbook with me at all times - in my jacket pocket, in my car, in my work room, next to my bed. I love being able to grab a pencil and jot down a design or a scene on the fly. But expertise in this, like in most things, requires regular practice and I won't be able to truly devote myself to all of the aspects of my art until I have retired from my "day" job. Therefore, let's all think optimistically about the economy and our place in it. We will be able to pull ourselves out of this economic downturn, recover our funds and financial stability and our personal confidence. Then I can retire and play with my art. After all (as my good friend likes to say)...."It's all about ME" - LOL.

Create happiness by sharing beauty with another person today.

Let It Snow....

Winter has finally arrived. We've been getting snow - not large snowfalls, but several 1 inch-3 inch snowfalls. The kind that aren't a pain to shovel but that make the area look clean, pristine, and absolutely sparkling. Now I just need a few days of blue sky and sunshine to really pull off this "winter" thing :-) But I think we'll have a few more days of grey skies, clouds and more snow first. I suspect that the wonder of the new season will get old rather quickly.

I picked up some Linseed Oil at the art supply store yesterday. I have hopes that this will allow me to handle the enamel oil paints with more ease. There is a series that I've wanted to do in a combination of painting and cloisonne for a while, I don't know if the oil or the watercolor paints will work better for this use. I only know that the oils, as they currently are, simply don't work well for my current applications.

And I've been dreaming enamel. Not a specific project, but the actions of enamelling. Standing close to the fire with a disk in my hand ready to be put into the heat. I guess I love the action of enamel as well as the metalworking necessary to make something wonderful. I only hope the current project turns out wonderful - I'm running out of time for this Holiday!

Studio Productivity

Today I am basically transferring my enamel studio from one location to another hoping that in the new location I will be able to get more work accomplished. I don't know if this will actually work out, and I have no idea if I will remember all of the variety of items that I need to make sure come over with me, but I have to try. If I am going to be successful with oil painting enamel pieces, I have to be able to work for longer periods of time than the one hour that I get in an average morning session. So, today I will put my kiln and all of my enamels into the car trunk (that's the boot for all of my British friends) and bring them home to my smaller and very secondary studio. I only hope this won't be a disasterous move, and I don't anticipate that this will be the location for longer than the month of December because I simply don't have the space to set up my enamel studio in my home at this time. - there is never enough room. Maybe I should quit some of my craft/hobbies?

Currently the crafts that I practice regularly are:

Goldsmith/metalsmith - this is not at home - no room in my house for the equipment. I will include Metal Clay and Bronze Clay in this category, even though the area I work on the clays is actually the home studio space

Enamelwork - combines with the metalsmithing, but a bit more portable

Etching/electroforming/resin enamelwork - this is a home studio item

Miniature painting - I love doing it, have enough backlog for many years, and have found that this particular hobby has helped me out in my other artistic endeavors more than I would ever have believed. This is a home hobby, but since I have an 8-level stand for my paints, it doesn't take up a lot of space except for the actually miniatures that I paint (I focus on 28mm cast pewter miniatures and pewter dragons)

Beading - one of my oldest crafts since I've been doing this on and off for more than 45 years. I'm good at it. I've taught it, I've written articles on it, and I still usually have the ability to push out a quick project if necessary. But I've been there - I've done it, and I don't feel that I need to continue to be 100% productive in this hobby any more. I have a lot of supplies and it takes up a lot of space, but my DH's wonderful design allows me to maximize the utilization of the space that I have. Since this is portable, I can carry it with me to work on in any convenient location.

I think I'll continue this list tomorrow - seems that I do more than I originally thought - LOL. (The pictures of my home studio are old - it is arranged a bit differently right now. But it still will give you an idea of the wonderful set-up that my DH built for my birthday several years ago. It's an awesome storage/work system.)