Thursday, March 1, 2012

Leather Stacking Bracelets

Handmade leather stacking bracelets - a quick how-to

 Measure the leather cord length to another bracelet for the correct size.

 Wind embroidery thread around the leather cord so it fills up the extra space between the tube bead and peeks out for a pop of color.

Use epoxy to hold it all together, a dab under the thread and a dollop in the tube bead. The leather cord, metal tubes, and epoxy are from my wonderful local bead shop.

Stamps



 Carving has been a love of mine for years, I'm finally getting back into it. Starting small with these stamps, done for my mother-in-law to use on shop tags - she has a booth at the local antique shop. I'm itching to go larger, but the material is expensive, and the process time consuming. Neither of which I have much of. I love the graphic quality, and how you can see the marks from the material, the rawness of it.

Jewelrymaking


Over the past few months I've been incredibly inspired by the all the handmade jewelry on Etsy and jumped into creating some myself. I began with this feather earring - I have a large collection of feathers I've found that beg to be used. This is a simple (slightly haphazard) design that works well with long hair.

Christmas was the perfect opportunity to make jewelry for all the girls in my family - it was really fun thinking about what would suit each person. I made small cards to go with each piece for a little insight on what they mean, which I printed on a paper bag. I didn't buy very much, I combed thrift stores for jewelery to re-purpose and used other materials I have at home (a big bag of deer scrap leather is always useful).

 When you feel a little wild and graceful, put these earrings on.
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Found grouse & goose feathers accompanied by copper wrapped glass beads, on recycled gold hardware.

A modern, minimal, no-frills necklace with a dash of soul.
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Made with quills from a Wisconsin Porcupine, capped and strung on a recycled brass chain.

A bone talisman to protect against the dead things that haunt you. To give you strength and memory.
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Found bone shard cradled by deer leather accompanied by a cooper wrapped glass bead. Made with recycled hardware.