Efforts in creativity

Things have been a bit mad recently. I'll explain later. The long and short of it is I've needed to find ways to silence my brain, and to focus on one small task at a time. Otherwise the deluge of information and ideas is rather overwhelming.

I spent quite a bit of time over the Christmas period crafting jewellery, and I've picked it up again in the last few days. There's something rather zen about picking apart a piece of unloved jewellery and piecing something new together.



I was given a whole bunch of beaded jewellery by an old housemate before she moved out, which has bulked out my collection of materials considerably, but I've also made a few purchases here and there.



These interesting coloured chip beads came from Fishtail, Montana. The shop had strings and strings of locally sourced mineral beads. I had to limit myself to just the two colours.





I love them, and I want to make use of them, but the holes drilled in them are a little small for the metal findings I use. I'll either have to attempt to learn about using thread or wire, or find myself a drill.



Some of my creations are simpler than others. I have a few different colours to work with, and gold is not something I would usually wear. I'm quite tempted to try now that I've been playing with it a bit.

But these are probably my favourites...



I'm in the process of opening up a shop on Etsy, but being the sort of person who agonises over these things, it'll take me a while before I can summon the courage to get it up and running properly.

Upcycling

I'm a bit of a hippy at heart, and have a deep-rooted love of composting, recycling and reusing things. I hate to throw things away that still have life in them.

The other day I decided to go through my overflowing jewellery box and clear out all the old bits and pieces that I never wear any longer, and which are just gathering dust. I had quite a pile by the end of it, and had streamlined my jewellery into just a few key pieces. I must be getting old.

Amongst my discard pile, I had several necklaces with beads, shells, and other dangly things on them. I've recently discovered how to make my own simple earrings, and might branch out into bracelets and necklaces too, so with this in mind, I set to work with my pliers and removed as many beads and dangly things from the chains as I could. I accumulated a (reused, previously houmous) pot of various beads that I could reconstruct at some point into something I might wear.

Here are two of my upcycled creations - two pairs of earrings. I use silver plate, because my ears are sensitive to cheap metals, but I can't afford sterling silver. Life is hard.

My craftsmanship is a little rough around the edges, but I'm getting better. I'm rather pleased with these two pairs. I have plenty more materials from the old jewellery to create some more pieces.

I'm considering selling on Etsy or similar, but I'm not sure how successful I'd be.