Perfection

I don't know about you but I like things to be perfect when I make them.  Is this possible NO... I am human, perfection is just something to strive for.  As a big believer in practice makes perfect I often will make  a dozen or more of one thing just to get the technique down to a science.  I spent today making bezels with copper pipe, brass backs and generic plumbing solder.  These have a look that I just love, it's kind of an old rustic look that can't be accomplished with any other method.  If you are looking to make some of these yourself I can highly recommend Stephanie Lee's Homesteader's Metalsmithing DVD  where she explains all the in's and out's of this type of soldering.  I have these for sale in my etsy store if you are interested in just purchasing them.  If you look at my other posts you will see where I have filled these with resin and other goodies.

Pipe Bezels

Square Pipe Bezel

Diamond Pipe Bezel

Photo Friday part 2

 Bits and pieces of my sewing days have come back in my new necklaces.  Old hook and eye cards were used as the background of a few of these bezels then I used the same shapes in the links for the necklace to carry on the theme.  I am working on putting these up for sale in my Etsy store Tracybell.etsy.com.

Necklace with antique hook and eye card, lace and buttons set in resin bezel

Necklace with antique buttons, lace set in resin bezel

Necklace with antique hook and eye card, lace and buttons set in resin bezel

Resin and paper links set off this flush bezel with antique buttons and lace.

The Learning Hill

Anytime I try something new there is always a learning curve, sometimes it's more like a huge hill that I can't seem to climb, this newest project has been one of them.  I signed up for an online class with Stephanie Lee to learn some of her techniques.  The class is called Homesteaders Metalsmithing and until yesterday I have spent a whole lot of time making a mess but yesterday things started making sense.  To start the we used brass cut into shapes then we were suppose to flood the brass with solder.  After watching the video I thought that doesn't look terribly hard until I tried it over and over and over. I have recorded this painful process for you all as you can see below. 

This is what happens when you try to use what you have on hand and not what the teacher has called for.

Once I got the right stuff it was still no picnic.

Here is what the brass squares and rectangles are suppose to look like this is called flooded solder.

Here are some bezels I made today from the flooded solder pieces. 

The bezels still need to be antiqued sealed and filled with goodies but I am thrilled with my progress.

More to come...