The Great Ring Project

I have made a lot of rings ... big rings, little rings, light rings, dark rings, rings of every color and bling bling rings. They are totally addicting to make and I can whip one up fairly quickly now, due to all the practice. The fact is, I love making them. The first one or two were confusing but now I can play with the pattern in my head to mentally visualize color changes, and that speeds things up considerably. They seem to be a popular item. All the ladies who've seen them thus far, have been impressed. I've had a nice batch of orders and I've run out of some of the colors so put in another order last night. I've also noted that all the orders are coming from people who have seen them in person, so obviously the photography is lacking and this item is just poorly represented in pictures. It just means I have to get them out to more places where folks can see them. I haven't sold too many of the ones I have already completed but have made lots of similar ones in custom sizes. Rings are so size specific and there is a wide range of possibilities, but I suppose that is to be expected, however frustrating it might be. In any case, it's a quite extensive sample display. 


It's another dreary, cold day. I have a few errands to run later on, and I'm hoping to make a run to the bead supplier, either today or tomorrow morning. Then I have to make an appointment to get our taxes done. The deadline is sneaking up and I have all the documents ready so just need to commit to a time to do it. 

Cheryl Reid and the After Hours Band

     I enjoyed a very special evening on  Saturday. My good friend, Cheryl Reid was booked at the Oasis, on Spring Garden Rd, in Halfax for a special performance and very little was going to prevent me from attending. 


     Oh my goodness, how that part of the city has changed! The grand entrance to the Lord Nelson Hotel is on South Park St, and I naturally assumed that since Oasis is really the old LBR (Lord's Beverage Room) the entrance would be on the same street. With this in mind, I found an empty parking space on South Park, close to Citadel Hill. Great .. free parking .. except the entrance to the bar was on Spring Garden, so a bit more of a walk. I really didn't mind as it was a nice crisp night and the fresh air was rather invigorating. 


     Having located the entrance, I had to wait for a mass exodus of medical students ... I'm sure there were over a hundred. Most appeared to have enjoyed their visit to the Oasis and I waited patiently until the boisterous mob moved on down the street. Good timing too, as just then a bunch of friends arrived by taxi and we all went down the numerous stairs to the tavern that lurks under the grand hotel. It hadn't changed a whole lot in the twenty eight or so years since I'd last darkened it's cavernous spaces. The floor and ceiling looked exactly the same as they had 'back in the day'. 


     The stage section had obviously just been recently vacated by the students, as evidenced by unbussed glassware and plastic, paper lined food baskets all over the tables. The harried staff was scrambling like mad trying to clean up before the entertainment started for the evening. We, of course, chose seating very close to the stage, most of us feeling entitlement as we were friends of the lead singer. I felt a bit sorry for our waiter. He did great the first couple rounds but as the place quickly filled up, he fell far behind. MInd you, this was in no way his fault. He was the only waiter assigned to this very large and very busy section. His job was impossible. My sympathy began to turn to disappointment in the management for assigning only one waiter. On my long trek to the washroom at the other side of expansive tavern, I noticed several portly male employees keeping the stools warm and very little else. It became easier and almost a necessity to go to the bar to get your own refreshment. 


     So, lets get back to the band, Really, really good! They are a new band so you can't expect them to be polished at this point, but I thought they did very well. Cheryl was amazing .. her voice strong and clear, she moved with energy and grace in a very small space, and is so beautiful to watch. It didn't hurt that she was sporting one of my crystal bracelets and a very glittery cocktail ring. Her voice is somewhere between Janis Joplin and Stevie Nicks, in my mind.  and the selection of songs they chose was  crowd pleasing. This band certainly knows their audience. The sound was fairly acoustically balanced, if the instrumental a bit loud. I found the drums at times a bit over the top of the singer's vocals so some adjustment is necessary there, but the vocals were clear and strong. The backup harmonies worked and added a lot to Cheryl's lead. I highly recommend these professional entertainers as excellent entertainment and worth every cent of the measly cover charge. Really guys ...  you're worth a bit more than $3. It was a job well done and I'm so happy to have been there at their professional debut. 


     The other really exciting thing was the amount of old buddies who showed up for this show. The fact that so many of us knew each other made for a great party. I would have loved to have had a couple drinks, but with the distance I had to travel, that would not have been a wise move. Unfortunately, I couldn't stay until the end, but I did take some folks back to Dartmouth on my way out of the cities, and I was home at a reasonable time, feeling very happy to have taken in this show. 


    Today I've worked on some ring orders. I've picked up a few custom requests through the ring give away post and Cheryl's modelling. I need some beads right away so hopefully will be able to pick them up tomorrow. It's time for another wool piece but I'm not sure what just yet. I have two projects in mind: a dragon surrounding a large cluster of amethyst crystals  or another mask; the third in the series of an unknown number. Yes, my hands are usually busy, and when they're not, my mind is generally going full tilt. I wish I'd been this creative at a younger age ... I'd have so much more polish to my work by now. The learning curve can be steep at times.

Congratulations Theresa

The winner of the cocktail ring giveaway is Theresa. Congratulations and I'll be in touch with you very soon. There were 6 entries in all .... I managed to pick up a couple new followers and I have an order for some rings, so the whole idea was a success. 

Amiryha: Spirit Mask Wall Art

     
     This is the second Spirit Mask work. I've called this one Amiryha and she is a sister to Zharyha. The story is the same. After much consideration, I decided to leave the tails off this one ... I don't find they add much to the work and only serve to lengthen the piece for display purposes. I think she is busy enough without more embellishment. This one has blue sand dollars, dyed in my kitchen sink with vegetable dye. They are very interesting to make once the main mask is shaped. That is where all the work comes into play as it's done over a form I fashioned out of large styrofoam balls. I have some new felting pads coming soon, so I'll make a new form from my two old pads and I think that will make my life easier for the third mask. How many of these I make will depend on sand dollar supply, which is getting dangerously low. Time to hit the beach again. I'll also be searching for small crab shells .. the smaller the better. I'd like to use them on one of these masks as well. 


I'm keeping pretty busy with my art these days, but I must admit, I'm getting a bit shack whacky, so I think it's time for a mini vacation. I'm looking at sometime in May for a trip to the South Shore, where I'll spend one night with a dear old friend who lives in an inspiring place beside the ocean, and one night with my cousin Deb, artist and owner of The Wardroom Gallery. Really looking forward to that. 
Last weekend one of my higher ranking relatives spent the weekend with me here. We got out for a nice dinner and had some leisure time to catch up. This coming weekend I have a social event to attend on Saturday night in Halifax at the Lord Nelson Hotel. I'm not sure what time I'll be returning here, or if I'm spending the night in the city, so have made arrangements for a dog sitter. 


Having done all that spring cleaning awhile back, I managed to find a place for everything in my studio, and promptly forgot where some of those places were. Some of my tools are now a bit hard to find and I was disgusted to realize I'd put my felting needles away and couldn't find them anywhere. Frustration set in! I ordered more and they should be here soon, and of course, found the old ones in the meantime in a little drawer labelled "needles". Duh! Anyway ... it's a good thing as I ordered smaller needles this time. I've stopped breaking them so I should be good to go with the smaller gauge.  That's a lot of felting needles, but I've fashioned tools to hold multiple needles (my favorite tool takes four) so I'll use many of them that way. Needle felting has become slightly more popular down this way, so perhaps I can also sell some of them in smaller quantities, but in any case, you can't really have too many needles. I'll likely have to go through a learning curve with the smaller ones too, so some will get broken at first. I have a ring to finish this afternoon for a customer but that's all the creating I plan to do today. It's dreary, chilly and looks like rain so I'm going to treat myself to a "no" day. Just relax and watch the tube, read or nap. I deserve it. 

Beaded Cocktail Ring Giveaway

I thought it might be fun to feature a giveaway on my blog, to help promote my work. This contest is open to all my blog followers as well as my Facebook community. Every person who leaves a comment to this post will go into a hat for a draw this weekend (April 17th). You must leave your email address so I can contact the winner, then I will send you this adorable cocktail ring in the mail, free of charge, just for participating and being the drawn name. I will contact the winner for your mailing address and get this off to you at the beginning of next week. This ring is size 5 and the picture does it no justice at all. It's so much prettier up close. Good luck to all. 

Zharyha and Easter Sunday

     A couple more small details have been given to the Spirit Mask. She has tails on either side of her head now, with some crystal and small glass beads added, the idea being that the wall where it will eventually live is lit in the evenings often only by the warm glow of the fireplace. I was hoping to catch some of that light in the crystals and have it reflect and glitter occasionally. I've been making more sketches, so she will have family. I've started working on a second one already. She now has a name and a story to go along with her. 

     Zharyha       She and her sisters are spirits who live and play in that mystical place where surf and sand or rock collide. They dance in the sea foam, playing on the crests of the crashing waves. They watch over this home of theirs and make sure the ocean and shoreline are always in harmony when they meet, as the friction erodes the rock away to form substrate for the beginnings of new life. These spirits are more visible now, in our lifetime. This is due to the increased density of the sea foam, from pollutants and chemical changes in the water. This makes the spirits' job much more difficult, and they often weep with the howling gales over the slow, but inevitable loss of their environment. Please help them survive and respect the symbiotic relationships of nature. 

     So, besides that, yesterday was a fun day. Being Easter Sunday, most folks have family commitments, but there's still a bunch of us old single birds out there, so we got together at the home of a couple of old friends and had a big feed. We started with appetizers of crackers with black pepper goat cheese, burn yer lips off guacamole, and smoked Genoa sausage. Then we moved on to the main meal which was a big ham dinner with several choices of vegetables, hot cross buns, home made pickles and beets, three kinds of mustard, oh my! Everything was so good and it looked like everyone had a pretty good appetite. Dessert was fresh made lemon cake and pumpkin pie. This is where I gave up ... I had no room left for dessert. None ... nada ... not the barest crack or crevice.

      I had brought Daisy along with me to play with their husky. Both the dogs were tied outside all afternoon and played each other out. They both enjoyed a portion of leftovers from our dinner. I took her home in early evening. She was played out and getting cranky and I had overeaten so just wanted to have a nap. That is exactly what we did as soon as I got home. I had lots of sleep and felt rather chipper today. Managed to get several hours worth of mundane chores accomplished and actually enjoyed doing it. I'm going to cook a nice pork tenderloin supper with fresh broccoli ... healthy and lean, watch a little tv, do a little felting and go to bed early in hopes I feel this good again tomorrow. 

Wool and Sand Dollars

This is the completed mask which will be a gift for a dear friend, to add to her collection. As I worked with this, and the face evolved, a female persona developed. I believe she is a guardian of marine shorelines; places where salty surf collides with rock and sand, eroding and providing new substrate for new life. I also think she is the first of a series of these masks. 


I learned a lot about the wool with this project, as it was full of challenges. No wet felting techniques were used so it had to be needle felted to a very stiff stage, in order for it to hold it's form. I fashioned a mold to work on, using styrofoam and masking tape, which I wrapped in plastic food wrap in order to keep the bits of styrofoam from getting into the wool. When it was stiff enough, I sewed a wire frame to the inside, which I made by using the same mold. The end result is worth the frustration. I'm very pleased with it and I'm anxious to begin another very soon. The amount of felting required has created a sore shoulder, so I'm going to catch up on some other things for a day or two. I'm also fighting a stubborn cold. Being Easter weekend, I have no other plans so will rest as much as I can and try to get well.