Beannacht

Alden Smith had this poem on his Stream Of Consciousness Blog and I had to share it. Nobody can make you see the beauty in misery like the Irish.

My Magic Hook & Eye

Is anybody else as clasp challenged as I am? It doesn't matter whether it's a hook, a lobster clasp or a toggle, I have trouble doing them up on myself, especially on a bracelet, where you only have one hand to work with. For every hour of wearing, I usually have ten minutes of cursing, as I try to do them up.
BUT!!! I have discovered a magic clasp! Dunno if it'll work on anything other than my cuff because of the placement of the loop, but I'm sure a loop can be worked into most designs.

Looks simple, doesn't it? Aha, but the secret is the little whorls on each side of the clasp. Just perfect for big clumsy thumbs to press. By pressing on the whorls with your thumb, you hold the hook in place and provide leverage while you slide it into the eye. It's like a hook with v-i-a-g r a. (I have spelled that out so my blog doesn't get ads for the same. Hope it works). Nice stiff hook that you don't have to embed in your arm trying to get it into the eye. Tres simple, n'est pas? I'd like to take credit for inventing it, but I'm sure someone has used the same principle somewhere, somehow. I forgot to mention the magic hook and eye with the Oh Be Joyful cuff, but this way I get to do two blog posts. Bonus.

Oh Be Joyful Argentium Cuff

I don't often make jewelry for myself because I don't wear it often. This cuff was an idea I had in my head and I thought it was a little too different to be saleable but it was crazy and funky enough that it really suited me, so I made it from copper and made it big for a big wrist. When it was finished, I liked it so much that it begged to be made in silver.
It's the embodiment of jewelry making for me. Fun to make, just go where the wire and the beads take you, it wiggles and jiggles so that it's never perfectly aligned, but when the sun shines on the silver, the garnets and the prehnite, to me, it's beautiful. Here's my version in silver of the Oh Be Joyful Cuff.

Byzantine Necklace with Agate Cross

Just in time for Easter. And just because I figured some jewellery pictures should balance all of the dog pictures lately.
Copper chain maille, Byzantine weave, with a 2" blue agate cross. Bold, strong and definitely a statement.

Right now I'm cheating and working on some aluminum rings from the Ring Lord in different colours. Aluminum seemed a little hard on my Koil Kutter and I wanted to try coloured rings so ordering them ready-cut was a good option. Click on the Artfire button if you want to see more pictures of the Byzantine, with either the cross or the opals.

Housework Be Darned!

Saturday is my "day off" in quotation marks because it's actually the day I have scheduled to do my laundry, my accounting and my housework. So the laundry got done, I did my books as far as I could until the next bank statement comes and came downstairs to do some housecleaning.
So the dogs and I went to the beach.
Great progress today. Corky jumped right in the truck; He was as excited as Dewey to be going for a ride. Much nicer than having to hoist him in. And Dewey, once he realized I had a pocket full of wieners, stayed right with us, except when I pulled the camera out. I had to take my pictures quickly and then let him see that the camera was put away and a wiener was in my hand before he'd come back. Darned dog!
The first picture is my thumb accidentally hitting the shutter button but I like the tilted ocean and bridge. The rest are of Corky learning about waves, hunting, playing and relaxing after his walk. Except for the one with Dewey leaving quickly in the background. Weird little dog!
Now I have to decide between dusting and napping...