Artist-made Beads Giveaway at The Writing and Art of Andrew Thornton

The Writing and Art of Andrew Thornton: Thursday Giveaway...

If you like beads, unique one of a kind artist-made beads, head on to Andrew's blog.

He is having an awesome beads give away right now........click on the link above...

All you have to do is leave a comment, and pray hard....hehehe....

Wish you all the best of luck......

I am salivating over these beads right now...just kidding...

The Moonstone Prong Ring my Father Made Me

My father is a welder so he works with metal a lot.
He also makes his own jewelry but almost exclusively ring.
Not sure why I didn't catch the jewelry making bug from him back then but he made quite a number of them.
Maybe because he works with stainless steel block and not wire.
As far as I remember, he never sold any of his handmade rings.
He does take his own sweet time in making them though - few months to finish a piece! including my ring here which I collected when we went for our vacation two weeks ago.

This ring (Moonstone) is a special request from me.
He said it's not that well done but I am very happy with it because with this ring I feel a different kind of connection with him...we actually share the same interest..and I am sure I inherited this talent/skill from him...:)

No soldering. The prongs or claws are cut from the same piece that form the ring.

Now, it stays on my finger! <3

Wire Wrapped Jade Donut Pendant

I have been slack in updating this blog lately but I hope it will pick up soon....mmmm...been saying this for the hundredth times? :) but I hope you don't mind and keep reading or at least look at the pictures posted here to get inspired.....
This is a commissioned jade pendant. Completed just before we went off for our two weeks holidays.

Side view, kind of complicated but not really...just follow the flow.

View of the back...simply a little spiral.

Side view of the back, not as complicated.
Have a great weekend dear readers!

The Two Wire Wrapped Donut Pendants

These two donut pendants are for man.
For all that I remember, I have not done a lot of men jewelry and I hope this two are masculine enough that the owner is comfortable wearing them.
Both donuts are really huge. My first time working with such huge donuts..LOL..
The jade measures about 5cm+ while the rutilated one just slightly smaller.

On my palm and you can see how huge they are.
Maybe I have short fingers :)!

Close up of the weaving and "black needles" within the stone.

......and the other one.

Enjoy your remaining weekend......

Spider Web Wire Wraps and Happy Mother's Day (Belated)

Happy belated Mother's Day to all moms and soon to be moms out there.
As usual, I am always belated lately :) especially in updating this blog.
Anyway, it was a quite Mother's Day for me. Just dinner at one of the boys favorite places.
As mother, I am happy when they are happy. After all, that's what being a mother is about....of course there are other things but HAPPY is a big word for children. I am sure a lot of you would agree...yes! yes! yes!?
There is a saying "We never know the love of the parent until we become parents ourselves".

Enough rambling, here is one wire wrapped pendant I completed recently.
This is a relatively big stone (name and origin not known) that looks like palm oil seed.

It is rounded and has no hole so I spent some time figuring out how to wrap and secure this stone.
I ended up with this "spider web wire wraps" and I am quite happy with the outcome.
Here are more pictures of the pendant. Got the idea?
I wonder how this wrap would work with irregularly shaped stones?

Have a great week!

TAW Ring and Bunch of Sparklies

These ring and earrings were made and shared by Martin whom I mentioned back in February when he made this - Martin's TAW Bracelet. He emailed me these pictures right after that and I totally forgot to share them with you all till now. Erm...very forgetful nowadays!
This ring is his third attempt based on my TAW Ring Tutorial.
What do you think?

Here's two pairs of earrings based on TAW Bracelet tutorial and rose ring tutorial (the pair to the left).
I think it would be nice to wrap a bead to each of the bottom ring.

What have I been up to last weekend besides barbecue?
Yeah! More Sparkly Crystal Rings - all of them pearl though.

Was hoping to finish other projects but unable to.
Till the next piece, have a wonderful week ahead :)