Jewelry Making at the lake

Play Date - Button Bracelets

Another beautiful Sunday afternoon in San Francisco.  Another fun filled play date at D's house!
Our play date buddy S. showed us all how to make these amazing finger weaving button bracelets that she learned from a workshop at Art Unraveled last year.  Here you can see three samples that S. has made since she took the class, she has certainly mastered the technique!   She told us what to bring, explained the steps and got us started creating our own. 

 Here is the assortment of buttons i chose to work with.  I used a lot of blue-green shell buttons mixed in with cream and gold.  I left the bottom assortment of neutrals for another project.

After creating a loop out of the c-lon micro cord, i started weaving under and over and then added beads and buttings.  Pins stuck into foam core help organize things.

 Here is a clearer picture after i had done about two inches.

 And here it is almost done!  I just need to add a couple of little buttons to the end and add the "closure" button - which will fit through the loop we created at the beginning.

 Here is Z's bracelet with a pretty assortment of neutrals on sepia coloured micro cord. She included seed pod buttons from South America.

 Here is K's colourful bracelet - pretty much done!  She used bright green and hot pink  buttons and beads to make a fun bracelet.

 Here is S's grey green project - she spent so much time coaching the rest of us - she didn't get much done.  She brought buckets of buttons to share!

And finally here is D's ambitious project - soon to be a necklace! much more spaced out and delicate.  It is fun to see the variety of what you can create with this cool technique.
Thanks S. for teaching us how to do it!

fun with alcohol ink

I had another play date on Sunday with two friends.  We spent the day experimenting with Ranger Industries Alcohol ink - known as Adirondak ink. The pice above is is a transparency.

If you have never used them - they come in packages of three and are sold at places like Michaels.
I first learned about them when i took a class with Tim Holtz.  He showed us how to use the rubber stamp type handle to hold a piece of felt, how to apply the ink and "pounce" it on paper.

The blending solution is used to thin or help move the colour around.  They say plain old rubbing alcohol does the same thing - but honestly i have never tried it!

This piece was glossy photo paper.  Some paper is glossier than others - you can experiment to find what works best.  You essentially need something that does not absorb the ink right away - so you have time to work it to create the granite-y effects you are after.

This piece was stamped onto to clear matte sticker paper - so i can cut in into shapes and apply it like a sticker onto a project.

Here is another glossy photo paper - it sort of faded into a very muted effect.  But has some nice depth.

Here is some glossy paper with the addition of metallic paint - i used lumiere - but you could use paint pens or acrylic paint.

 And finally we have some actual THINGS made using this cool effect! The top three are dominoes - with alcohol ink as a background. The images all came from postage stamps.  As you can see they will be made into cool conversaion starting pendants!
The small squares are "style stones". They were a bit too absorbant - the ink was sucked into the stones - so they did not create the cool stone effects that you can get on dominoes. But i applied some birds and butterflies - and i'll make it into a bracelet.

Speaking of bracelets - here's one i made with 5 dominoes that came pre-drilled in a kit.  I applied ink in blues and greens and stamped a script stamp with Stazon ink.  I strung them together with elastic cord and beads and spacers.  I may or may not apply some collage elements.