Happy 2016!

Dear readers, Happy New Year to you all. 2016 is going to be a fabulous year, I can feel it in my waters! Statement necklaces are going to become bigger, more tribal and multi layered and more 'Capriliciousy', and you and I are going to have a great time together. 

Apparently, tattoos are competing with jewellery to make a statement, but I would only have a tattoo if I could change my skin to suit my mood - imagine what fun that would be! One could always come out in zebra stripes if not entirely sure of themselves, zebras are cute too. In the absence of that possibility, I'm afraid I shall stick with jewellery. Besides, tattoos involve a bit (a lot) of pain and I couldn't be doing with that. 

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Earrings are set to be larger, longer shoulder dusters, and asymmetrical earrings are very, very in, with long, single earrings even more fashionable, perhaps with a little stud in the other ear. 
Tassels, fringes, and geometric shapes are all in this year- Oh, there's more than enough to keep me busy​ and happy.

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The choker necklace is still in - what a non surprise! I've loved torque choker necklaces and have been winding and weaving wire into these shapes all of this year, so we are well before the rest of the crowd at Caprilicious. 
Jewellery with writing on it - names, slogans, and poetry is set to become popular - probably for the same people who have 'mum' written into heart shaped tattoos, or LOVE and HATE on their knuckles in ink.
​Slogan jewellery will also appeal to those who constantly post other people's wisdom and memes on their Facebook pages, possibly because they firmly believe that if  there's no such thing as an original thought, why bother to use their brain cell?
​ Buddha/Einstein/Groucho Marx - they've said it already, so why not just repeat it? Oh and look, they've even put a pretty drawing with it! How clever! And tons of people press the 'like' button, fingers rushing to follow each other with an unerring herd instinct.

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For Hands That do Dishes

The Fairy liquid advertisement is part of the psyche of everyone living in the UK from the 70's onwards, until dishwashers became standard issue in most kitchens. 

However, there is still a need to wash the occasional dish (damn and blast!) and for those moments, I made these little ring trays so that delicate rings can be taken off while you do them and then cream your hands - yes, creaming your hands is important, readers - even though they have been trying to hoax women into believing it since the 60's, no amount of Fairy liquid will keep your hands soft. For those of you who are lucky enough to have a human dishwasher - perhaps a well trained child or husband, the ring trays will come in handy while you cream your hands. Just be nice, and supply your human dishwasher with some cream too.
​It was great fun making them - I set myself a challenge to finish as many as possible of the old polymer clay canes in my stash, so that I could eventually  make new ones to replace them, I'm sick of the same ones popping  up all the time.
I took pictures of the process, more to remind me of how to do it should I wish to repeat the exercise some day.  

 When I finished for the day, my table resembled the site of a minor explosion. It was so hard to resist the temptation to clean up, but resist I did - the task I set myself was to devise a way not to waste a single scrap - after all, those canes were a result of a lot of hard work.

Unfortunately two of the trays I made fell apart and I threw them away after a long repair job that just wouldn't go right ( oh well, some waste is inevitable). I ended up with seven trays, as well as buying a new tutorial from Melanie West for ring bowls which I will use on another occasion.
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I put another thicker layer of clay over the previously made backs and embellished them with slices of cane to my heart's content. One more session in the oven and I added bun feet, using a spirit level to make sure the trays stood completely flat and put them back in for a third session in the oven. Left over scraps of cane were collected up to make swirly feet for some of the trays. I think they came out real pretty, don't you?

My sweet friend Bernadette collects bits and pieces for me to use with polymer clay on her travels. The last time she came up she brought me a bag of box clasps set with misshapen Mabe pearls, which I extracted and then inlaid with polymer clay canes. 

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This time it was a set of six wooden napkin rings and I decided that the remnants of a loaf of rainbow cane would be just right to prettify them.

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I used a guillotine called the Lucy Slicer to cut the slices of veneer really thin so that it would go further. In the end, I had used every scrap of cane and even had to put in a flower from another cane to make up the shortfall - you can see that in the picture on the left, above.
​As described by Ginger Davis Allman of the Blue Bottle Tree, I used three acrylic blocks behind the slab of cane so that every scrap could be cut really thin. Of course, if only I had read her article properly (or used my common sense), I'd have been saved the grazing of the knuckles and the slicing of the finger which ensured that my ring bowls were liberally anointed with blood - it does wash out, though. What's a bit of blood spilled in the pursuit of one's art form, eh?

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Exotica

This necklace was made on Christmas day, once the meal had been eaten and we had taken a walk in the park to help the meal go down a bit. Charlie and Wilfred loved the beef I had roasted, under instruction from Delia Smith and they collapsed in a heap. I pulled out a spool of wire and wove me a torque necklace.

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Embellished with Swarovski squares and daisy beads, curls, swirls and weaves it is a very exotic piece of jewellery.  Wouldn't it look fabulous with a low cut floaty outfit?

It remains for me to wish all of you a very very happy New Year. I hope 2016 will bring us all peace, prosperity and happiness. Catch you next week, same time, same place. Until then, enjoy yourself, while you're still in the pink!!
​xx