Bead Table Wednesday--Found Objects and UFO's.

What's on the bead table today is a former UnFinished Object: a necklace from my muffin tray that I finally got around to finishing.  




I have a lot of found objects on the bead table too. Last weekend I went to Buchanan's Vintage/Antique Market in Lewisville.  Lewisville is smack up against Dallas, so much so that I can't tell when I leave Dallas and get into Lewisville.  I went with my friend Vanessa on Friday  and tried to help her set up her booth.  She kept shooing me away and telling me to go shop.  


These awesome big buttons came from Vanessa's booth.




I can't resist buttons.  I'm thinking of using these on bracelets or brooches. Vanessa is on Etsy at Salvage Nation.  Check out the cool letters she has. Some of them were originally made for interstate highway signs.  I also got some cool brass dog tags and other tags from her.







I spent a lot of time in a booth that had things I'd never seen for sale before. It's Mylissa's Garden from Arkansas City, Kansas. Alas, they are not online. 





First I found this...a crown?  No, a container.  




Inside I put something else I found:




Okay, maybe I'm weird but I think the doll eyeballs are the coolest thing, especially the big ones without lashes.  They don't open and close like the others but they do wiggle from side to side. 




More finds, vintage cards and scrabble letters.




The small letters are from license plates. The gears and machine parts were in a box labeled typewriter parts.  And I got a few odd pieces of jewelry and a couple of keys. 


I asked the owner how they cut up the plates and I found that they use a shear and Texas plates damaged their shear. Texas plates are made of steel unlike many other states that use aluminum.   I also decided after asking her how she cut the tags up that I'd rather she cut them up than me.  I did save my old Texas plate with the space shuttle on it and plan on using my jewelry saw to cut out the shuttle and put it in a piece of personal jewelry. I'm a space fanatic.  I blame Andre Norton, Gene Roddenberry,  Robert Heinlein and mostly my Dad, who is  a NASA fanatic.  


In another booth, the Red Barn, I found this beautiful blue suitcase (shown as the background in many of the photos), plus a couple of items for the studio.  The block will hold my stamps, and a chicken feeder (not shown) will hold my pliers.  I also got this wonderful 50 foot tape from a tape measure.  It came wrapped around the book.




Now that I'm amassing a collection of found objects I need to start creating with them. 


Take a look at what's on more bead tables:

Bead Table Wednesday--New Hammer

There isn't much on the bead table today. I do have this new Fretz hammer that I can't wait to use. It's the bigger one on the bottom.  It's exactly what I was looking for and is perfect--except for one thing.  The hammer head is a little loose.  I'm going to call the company I got it from and see if there's something I can do or if I should trade it in.  






I found out I needed this hammer when I was doing the foldforming. Remember this pod from a previous Bead Table Wednesday?  




In order to make the curve along the folded edged and thus the pod shape the hammer blows have to move the metal.  This requires a cross pein shaped hammer head.  The little hammer on top was the closest I had, and I have used it quite a bit for texturing the edges of pendants.  It does work for texturing folds, but it will not move the metal enough to form the pod shape. It's just too lightweight. I even tried using a lot of force and hit really hard.  Mostly this hurt my wrist.  I broke out the smaller Fretz hammer in the middle above.  It is a raising hammer and has faces like a cross pein, but several times wider.  It did move the metal.  It tends to smooth the metal at the same time so I didn't get as much texture as I'd hoped for.  I used this hammer to finish out the curve.  


The new Fretz hammer is the Michael Good cross pein and it has a nice weight.  I think it will move the metal without me using any great force.  That's pretty much what I want.  That's what tools are for--they allow us to do work without using a lot of force. 


In addition to Kim St. Jean's excellent DVD on "Metal Fold Forming" I have been studying Charles Lewton-Brain's book "Foldforming."  This is a fantastic book metal workers.  Charles Lewton-Brain is credited with inventing an entirely new form of metal work when he developed foldforming.  Next I want to study the info he has on his site.


I do still have the remaining items in my muffin tin that I didn't get finished for the challenge.  I spent four days at my parents over 4th of July weekend after my Dad had a little health scare (he's okay.) And Friday I'm going to Houston for a weekend business meeting for some volunteer work I do. I probably won't be able to touch the bead table until next week.


Check out the other bead tables at:

Vintage Finds and Muffin Tins

There's been some interest in my muffin tin so I thought I'd supply some info about it.  It's a vintage Ecko brand Ovenex Starburst pattern.  Hubby bought it for two dollars at a garage sale and I got a second one for a similar price at a flea market.  They were both very black.  After Hubby used the one he bought to mold homemade lye soap  it came out looking much nicer and brighter.  I immediately confiscated it.  It's the one I used for the challenge.


Saturday I felt the need for retail therapy so I went by a couple of my favorite stores.  I found a matching starburst cookie sheet.  I thought it would be cool for laying out necklaces until I saw the price--$27.00.  Yikes!  I like it, but not that much. They also had some commercial pans:

This one would be a tight fit in a standard oven.

This is a loaf pan.  No way will it fit in a standard oven. This is what Marcy and I need for our big necklaces!  Just kidding, Marcy.  It is too big. 


Here are a couple of the starburst  tins on Etsy: here and here.


I did find some treasures. Here's a hint:




I picked up these two lovely necklaces--so small, just 15 inches. 




And these three pair of earrings wanted to go home with me.


There were a few odds and ends:





And I got really excited over this:




It's very dirty, but it works.  There's a cover that I didn't show in the photo.  It's an Underwood Standard Portable Typewriter.  I have to research to find out more.  I love antique typewriters.  




I don't know yet if the wooden spacer bar is original, or a repair.  


Besides being in working condition one of the best things about it is that is weighs almost nothing.  This means I can display it just about anywhere.  I have a couple of very beautiful full size ones, plus several in not such good shape, and they all are quite heavy.  I have to be careful where I put them. 


Replacement ribbons are available and I will someday use this to type words for collage.  I will probably also have to replace the patten; that's the rubber roller that the paper goes around.  They tend to get very hard with age, so hard they can damage the keys. 


What are your favorite vintage items?

Best Laid Plans... Things Happen

Usually I try to keep things upbeat on the blog.  I can't always do this though, because sometimes the bumpy parts impact the parts I like to blog about. There were some bumps and potholes in the road of life this week. Things did not go quite as I had planned.


Wednesday I had to have my cat Maizie put to sleep.   She went into kidney failure. I knew it was coming but it is still excruciating.   I'm glad that she had a good long life--she was seventeen years old. Here's a photo of a younger Maizie checking out the water garden. She was hiding in the bushes by the bank's ATM when I found her 16 years ago.  When I drove up she stuck her head out and I knew she was waiting for me. I opened the car door and she jumped in.  






Thursday evening my husband helped me load the heavy things in the car.  We found this lady hanging out in the garage.

black widow spider

Note the nicely shaped hourglass.  She got a web going right away.  

black widow spider

This is a variety I had not seen before.  On her topside she had a row of red rectangles. If you click the photos you can go to Flickr and see the photos in more detail.  She has a little white with the red too. 


Since the things we were removing from the garage go into my car we gave everything a complete inspection after we found the spider.


Hubby took her to work and gave her to one of the insane intelligent guys he works with. 


A really big pothole was our son had his apartment burglarized on Friday. He has a lot of anxiety around this situation and we didn't feel like we should go out of town right then when he wasn't feeling safe.  It took a long while with the police report and getting the window fingerprinted and such. Plus by the time things wound down it was quite late on Friday. 


I didn't get to the show I had planned to do on Saturday.  I've never skipped a show before so I feel weird about that but I'm glad we stayed home. 

The Muffin Tin Challenge

Heather Powers posted a "Muffin Tin Challenge" at the Art Bead Scene blog and I've been rather taken by it.  Usually I bag up projects in snack bags and put them in a shoe box until I get to them.  A couple of days ago I found a shoe box that I had forgotten about.  I think that's why I like the muffin tin idea--it's out where you can see it and be inspired.


Things did not go quite as I planned over the weekend (that's another post) but I did have a little time to work on the challenge.  


Here's my revised muffin tin:






I had way more than 12 projects in it so I trimmed it down and added the findings to it.  I still couldn't fit everything in the cups so the stringing wire and wrapping wire isn't shown.  


Here are six projects that I've done so far.  I did the work on the projects all Sunday afternoon and evening. This was only possible because I had two UFO's that I finished up.  I managed to snap a purchased "S" hook in half and ended up making a heavy gauge brass wire one to replace it. 






I did the wrapping on the two donuts.  The heart focal is a charm from Martha of Menagerie Studio. 


I think I'll get something else done before the deadline, but I'm not sure with my Monday schedule if I'll be able to post it so this is it for now.

Bead Table Wednesday--Show Prep

I was invited to a show at the grand opening of the Whiskey River Harley Davidson in Texarkana this Saturday.  My usual venue is arts and crafts shows so I've tried to make some unisex jewelry for this one.  My husband's cousin and aunt were also invited to vend their jewelry.  We're combining a family visit with a show so it should be fun.  (They even "bribed" my husband with Aunt Ethel's famous family cake.) 


I'm relieved that it's only supposed to be 93 degrees on Saturday. I was worried it would be 103. After the weather we've been having, 93 is quite comfortable.





Here are some finished cuffs that I learned to do with Kim St. Jean's Metal Fold Forming DVD.  They're awaiting a final finish coat to protect the antiquing.  The pod will have some beads put in it. 








This is a necklace I just finished using a house charm from Martha Eason of Menagerie Studio on Etsy.  She does some terrific polymer clay charms and I have several pieces I'm going to be using. I used Czech glass, a couple of vintage fake pearls, apatite roundels and antiqued brass wire.






Here are two of the etched pieces I wrote about in an earlier post.  The top one is from text written by Leonardo da Vinci.  I plan on putting these on leather cuffs but probably won't get them done in time for the show.  The leather neck cords just need a clasp and they'll be ready for a pendant.







Here's my preliminary muffin tin for the Muffin Tin Challenge over at the Art Bead Scene Blog.  I am really excited about this challenge, even though I won't be able to finish it in time to enter because of the show.  I'm still going to do it even if I finish late.  Let me tell you, there is no way I can get everything for most of my necklaces into a single muffin cup, but at least I got a lot of it. I have parts for more than 12 things in here. The planes and accompanying pieces will be earrings. I have a request for this show for cross jewelry, so I have a lot of crosses and hope to get a few more made up. I've got to dig out some turquoise to go with the coral crosses.  And I'm not sure about the blue beads with the heart and key.  I think I need smaller beads to go with Martha's heart charm. 


For a long time I've done a version of this by bagging things for necklaces in snack bags.  It's much more exciting to put it in the muffin tin. I think it's inspiring to see it there on the bead table. If you click on the photo I made a few notes on Etsy. 


Check out the other Bead Table Wednesday photos and posts.

Vintage Finds--A Truckload of Silver Plate

Last weekend I went to a little flea market.  It's held outside one of my favorite antique places.





There was a lady there with a pile of silver plate silverware.  I inquired about the price and she quoted me a price far below the usual per piece for the lot. Then she said the silver plate trays were included (4). I paid her and she bagged my plate up, including the sugar, creamers, baby cup and candle snuffer.  I hadn't realized any of that was included. 






One of the platters sticks to a magnet so I guess it is plated over iron or something.  The sugar and creamer set has a mark, as does the baby cup.  The silver ware is marked as well. There are a couple of knives that are stainless steel and have non-serrated blades.  I plan on using them to open the folds in my fold formed pieces.  There's a lot one design--the pointy ended one with the rose on the right and left--that isn't my favorite design but I think I can do something with it. 


I guess I better get busy with my silverware benders since I now have lots of pieces to practice on.  I'm not sure what I'm going to do with the platters.  I'm thinking of cutting them up and using the pieces as backing for copper and brass pendants.  Given the price of silver now I think this will sell.  The engraving on the platters is quite attractive. 

Big Bead Giveaway at Pretty Things

Lori at Pretty Things has a big giveaway going too. She's just back from Bead and Button.  I'd like to go there someday.  There are nine winners in her giveaway!