Spring is here!

What a strange month March was. In addition to not having particularly lovely weather, it was a time of changes for me. After seeing my neurologist at the end of February, and, thankfully, receiving the news that I have essential tremor and not Parkinson’s, it was time for an adjustment of my pain meds. After some to-ing and fro-ing that made me feel a bit manic, we have settled down with morphine tablets. They are handling the pain pretty well, but, oh my, between them and the beta blockers for my tremor, I couldn’t be more relaxed. And that’s not always good! I’ve produced far less this month than I had hoped, and my anticipated new collection for Ailleas Designs hasn’t even been started.  But I’ve been very busy with my bronze and copper jewellery. With two events this month, and then increasing numbers of events until December, I need to be sure to have a substantial amount of stock available for those events, and have some available for my stockists as well (I am anticipating one new stockist to be announced fairly soon). And I’m still working on that. I’m finishing up my first brooch, to be followed by more. I’ve opted against making rings in bronze and copper because, unlike silver and gold, the solder does not precisely match the metal in colour and I don’t like the visible seams. While that is more acceptable in general pieces, I don’t feel that rings would benefit from that look. I will continue to try to see if I can get a technique perfected that will not give me visible seams, but I am not going to concentrate on rings for now. Instead, I will be doing more with pendants, some bangles, and more detailed metalsmithing and designing.

If you follow my Facebook page, you will have seen the photograph of this pendant that I created using copper and a beautiful 4.5mm rhodalite garnet. I love the look, but didn’t feel the finish was as perfect as I wanted it to be. It became, instead, a gift for a friend. She loves it and, as another friend said, my not quite perfect is probably perfect by anyone else’s estimation; but still, I have my standards for making things to sell. I will be using this technique on other pieces, including its use with the precious metals and faceted stones. I am looking forward to exploring the designs that appear in my mind. This particular design reminds me of far eastern/medieval textiles. What other amazing looks can I create? I am limited only by my imagination and how far I can manipulate the metal. But I do love the process.

In addition to the markets in which I will be taking part, I will spend part of April preparing pieces for the Dornoch Summer Exhibition. The exhibition runs for two weeks from May 21 until June 4. I am so happy to be taking part again this year. I will be providing some innovative work for the exhibition and hope to sell well.

I am looking forward to working with larger and differently shaped cabochons as I expand my offerings for The Selkie’s Haunt. Keep your eyes on my Facebook page and my website to see new pieces as they are added. It’s going to be an exciting time.