Working on Metalsmithing

I've had a little slice of quartz druzy for over a year (probably over two years!) that I'd haul out and stare at, trying to figure out the best way to mount and showcase it. In my mind, a bezel setting would detract from the lovely flower-like aspect but I didn't know if I had the skill to do anything else.
It was out being stared at again this week, sitting on a piece of paper on my workbench, and I started to draw settings around it. And thus was born the idea for my most challenging soldering experiment yet.
The diamond-shaped part of the frame and the inner circle are 16 gauge round wire and were fused together.

I'm using argentium and like soldering, if you have a good join, you see a flash and the metal fuses easily. You just have to be careful not to move the torch flame back on the wires because you'll move molten metal the wrong direction and leave you with a lump where you don't want it. The crosspieces had to be sanded down in a notch where they met so there wouldn't be one teetering wire sitting on top of another. It was kind of like doing logs for a cabin, with a notch on the top of one wire and a notch on the  bottom of the one crossing.  I used hard solder to attach them to the frame and then hard again to set the circle on top

of them. In the process, I lost my fear of hard solder. I didn't think my torch was hot enough to melt the solder before it melt the wires. There again, using argentium made a difference and fine silver would have the same properties. You don't need to heat the whole piece to cherry. I just gently heated the whole piece and then concentrated the flame on the join.
The trickiest part was adding the wires for the prongs. I filed one end into points to fit into the four angles but I'd get three sitting properly and when I'd try to place the fourth, they'd all fall out. Many, many times. I was quite amazed when they all soldered (with easy!) in the correct position. Then I cut them, filed the ends, and filed a little notch near the top of each wire. When they were bent enough that the druzy snapped firmly into place, I gently pushed the prongs over the druzy.

Because it's argentium, it didn't get firescale during the soldering and only needed two quick baths in my pickle. I had polished it to a beautiful shine and because I can't leave well enough alone, I decided to try out my new liver of sulphur gel to make the druzy really stand out on the pendant. It worked beautifully and I got amazing blues, greens and rusts that were perfect. And then I put a thin coat of Renaissance Wax over it to seal in the colour. Unfortunately, the wax removed all of the good colours and left the pendant looking like it had been left out in the rain for years.  Unfortunately, I had set the druzy before I applied the wax, so now I just have to figure out how to take it back to my original shiny silver, hopefully without having to remove that delicate druzy.

Playing With Copper & Acrylics

I really have to stop experimenting with stuff and get down to what I really want to do, which is enamelling, metal clay and making bezels. Of course, that is all experimental too, since I have no idea what I'm doing.  Oh well, I'm retired and allowed to play.
Not sure what lead me to try this, and I'm not even sure what to call it. Maybe it was the box of acrylics I just got for a community school painting class. The lighthouse is a no-brainer; it's 10 minutes down the road and one of my favourite places and favourite inspirations. Maybe it was a photo of an amazing piece someone else did with a two-dimensional look, bears over a landscape or something. It might have been wolves or that might have been another one. And maybe it's because I have a nice piece of balsa wood that I've been eyeing for months and trying to decide what to do with it.

Anyway, it started with a quick sunset seascape with acrylics on the balsa. And it was VERY quick - I didn't prep the wood and I forgot to use water with the acrylics. Then I traced the outline of the little painting onto a piece of 20 gauge copper. Drew the lighthouse and cut it out with my saw. * It looked okay so I tried to put liver of sulphur on the copper and managed to just turn it into dirty looking copper. Then I had to figure out how to put it together and how to string it. I don't know why I didn't just use the wood as the backing but I decided to use a piece

of 26 gauge copper, making it a three-layer sandwich.
Can you tell I don't do a lot of planning? Or measuring, for that matter.
Actually, the 26 gauge copper folded very nicely over the painting, although it took a fair bit of trimming so the fold wouldn't show in front.
Riveting was the only option for putting the sandwich together, since trying to solder it would turn the painting into a little piece of charcoal. The way I solder, anyway. I have two hole cutters, one a handheld one which does about an 18 gauge hole and one a workhorse, which does big, bigger and biggest. The workhorse was too big and the handheld was too small to fit my rivets. I felt like Goldilocks.  So I set everything aside for a few days. A few days later, I was in the hardware store for something and being a hardware junkie, I was cruising the shelves and saw the cutest little drills ever. I had no idea if they would fit a Dremel. Which they didn't, by the way, the Dremel chuck is too big for the weensy drill shanks. One of the little drills was exactly the size I needed for my rivets so I wrapped the shank with painters tape and that worked perfectly in the Dremel.  Of course I didn't measure.

I hate doing anything the same twice, but if I do, here is what I would change:
I would have a plan.
I would measure.
I would make the border of the front copper piece thicker, so less chance of rivets touching top and bottom.
I would prep the board before painting and use water with my acrylics.
All the pieces would be cut out at the same time and ready for painting/assembly. And they would actually be rectangular.
The holes would be cut in advance and then the dimples/eruptions could

be hammered out.
Liver of sulphur expires. Even the powdered stuff. I found this out. I would use fresh stuff.
It's fun having the time to play around and maybe some day I'll actually make something so totally unique and beautiful, people will be begging me for a tutorial. Or maybe I'll just have a room full of things that I don't ever want to repeat.  I don't care, I'm having fun!

* The jewellers' saw - just a funny anecdote. I use a #2 saw blade on everything and have been using the same blade for a couple of years now, with a fair bit of cutting. I was getting a little vain about my cutting skills. I used it so long that it was losing its edge and the blade was getting dull. So I changed it. And then changed the pieces of the new one. And again. Apparently I'm going to have to hire someone to take the edge off my blades before i use them. The jewellery gods make sure I will never have a swelled head.