Midnight musing

Ok, took a bit of a break from the flower ring & tried putting together this little unicycle dude that's been bouncing around my desk. Well, mostly figuring out the cycle part, as the unicyclist has been chilling on my desk for a while.

One side of the wheel says "dream" & is decorated with silver flakes.

The other side has a pattern with the silver flakes.

The unicyclist is a paste person with a fine silver skeleton (armature) & he's still nekked, but I haven't quite figured out how I want to dress him.

Fire = Gratification & Focus

Today I'm going to go with 1 small win. Very small.

The flower focal for the ring is fired.

Yeah, that's it.

At least the flower won't have any accidents sitting on my desk! ><

The coiled swirls for the shanks has proven to be a bit more challenging than expected. Or at gravity's effect on them, as they tend to slide of the mandrel. Between the open design of swirls for the shank & the rather top heavy focal, I guess it was a good thing that they broke before the flower could be attached. Assembling the whole piece then firing would be ideal, though this ring is larger than the neuron ring & making sure the piece is heated evenly for full scintering would be a challenge with a torch.

Could this have been finished hours ago? Yeah, most likely. Thinking about this project over & over is causing more second guessing about the design, which at the moment is a frustrating challenge, but not impossible!

There's always tomorrow to try again.

Challenge pieces for July

Ah, that title sounds so much more productive than it really is! "Challenge pieces" = the pieces for my challenge project. It is almost July, & once again not much seems to have come from my sketchbook. But, the purpose of having a journal is to record the journey, up or down, right?

The challenge theme for for July's Art Clay Society meeting is "Holes." Most of the pieces for the ring are there pic, they just aren't put together yet (gotta love gravity!).


Playing with the fat coiled filigree look of the Neuron ring's shank, I'd like this one to wrap around 2 fingers like a W with the flower in the center. Each finger's shank is being constructed individually, & hopefully I'll be able to mold the coil ends to curve around the base of the flower.

One thing that has distracted me from sitting down to work on the 2nd finger's shank & assembling everything is the urge to scrap the whole project as a silly waste of clay because this sucka is gonna be huuge!

Do you doodle?

Poor old sketchbook stuffed full of notes & doodles waiting for their turn to hop out & try to make it in the 3D world.

So it's been a bit quiet on the blog-front, but doesn't mean my sketchbook hasn't been getting a workout! I admit I'm a planner & draw to try to work technicalities out on paper before reaching for clay, wire, or pliers. I'm also trying to get into the habit of taking notes while working on projects to make it easier to create/recreate variations of something & organize my tangential thoughts.

Last night I just needed paper to write some notes on for a project & found only the back cover of my sketchbook was left, whoops! As I'd picked up a replacement earlier (I like the size & how it has spiral binding) this sketchbook sadly has a rather flimsy cover. The plan was to quickly reinforce it with scrapbooking paper & go back to my clay. As with many of my "simple" sounding ideas, this one became a doozie!

Cover with ribbon tie closure - Oh So Girly, I don't know whether to cringe or giggle at the excessively pink & fluffy-ness!

The front cover is a pocket & has a "If lost please return" tag.

Why is the back always considered the dark side?

Happy Birthday Sketchbook!
A couple hours of paper, ink, & glue - crazy makeover is complete & waiting for more doodles to be added!