Topic: My current time-sink... (Read 10729 times)

misticloudz · « **on:** 10 Nov 2008, 02:53 »

So, while I realize that I'm still a notably sparse poster, I thought I'd kind of introduce myself a bit better and show all of you dudes here what I do.

I've always been a bit of a crafter; I started sewing when I was young and my mom taught me a few things. I didn't do much until I got into high school, but I sewed three grad dresses during my last two years of high school, and I've made everything from a duvet cover to designing and sewing my daughter's cloth pocket diapers (not your average pair of underoos!). I've tried crocheting and knitting and made a few pieces, but it never really interested me all that much. I used to do design work at one of my old jobs, setting up business cards, wedding invitations, giant advertising posters, etc. I love to play with photos and digital design to come up with intriguing designs that are not your regular cookie cutter cards, flyers, etc. That particular pastime (I did it for fun on the side, to!) came pretty close to something that I wanted to do for a living, but didn't quite cut it. I didn't feel like I had the creativity necessary to really make a mark for myself.

Now, I get into new crafts every few years or so, and I got into my current love because of a bad spell of insomnia. I coudln't sleep, so I needed something quiet to do in the middle of the night when my daughter was sleeping.

My passion is designing handmade jewelry and accessories, and I am currently going through a wire phase. I started out in the autumn of2006 with just basic beads and jewelry findings (headpins, eyepins, earwires, etc.) and branched out around new years when I couldn't get those materials to work the way I wanted them to. I find this medium is really easy to adapt to, and ii'm always learning new techniques and tricks. It's always been a challenge to get the image in my head out and turn it into a tangible piece, but it gets easier all the time!!

I work with silver-filled wire and mostly semiprecious gemstones, as well as fire polished glass, swarovski crystals, and occasionally lucite (a type of acrylic) and natural materials. I don't like working with cheap materials, it makes it seem like my work isn't worth the money to buy quality materials. I would LOVE to work with solid sterling silver and gold-filled materials, but it's just not in the $$$ right now. Someday, I hope.

I'm currently trying to turn this passion of mine into something I can live from, with the help of my partner in crime (a.k.a. my husband) who keeps telling me "DONT GO BACK TO WORK" capital letters and all. So I guess in all technicality I am a bum... but hopefully won't be forever,

I'd love to open up a little shop someday and be able to do consultations for custom designs for brides/grads etc. Hopefully I can work up the inertia to get up off my behind and carve out my niche!! So wish me luck, as I'm a notorious procrastinator and get discouraged easily sometimes. Thankfully I've got a tight crew who usually know when I need a swift kick in the ass with a frozen mukluk!

So, maybe I should post some pictures? I'm going to go with 'yes'.

<--totally one of my favourites!

can you tell i like trees??
I get a bit picture happy sometimes! I love it all, and always want to show it off

I have more pictures at http://www.frozenrosedesign.com and of course, tons more to look at. there's no way I could ever post it all here.. i don't even have pictures of at least 10% of the things I've made! Its hard to keep up sometimes, because the photography can be tedious and the listings take a long time to do unless i've got everything already typed out in a .rtf file or something.
One of the administrative details that I enjoy more is tinkering with the website

it's so much fun to tweak things and make them look the way I want... thankfully zen-cart has been easy enough for me to get the hang of, and I'm slowly learning about CSS and PHP coding. I emphasize 'slowly'.

Anyhow, now that I've written the Great Canadian Novel I think I'll go and get some real work done...

***edited WAY after the fact cause the original image links didn't go anywhere, and the website changed.... it all works now.***

David_Dovey · « **Reply #1 on:** 10 Nov 2008, 02:54 »

Them's real purrrrty

misticloudz · « **Reply #2 on:** 10 Nov 2008, 02:59 »

I hope you know you just made my day.
and damn, you guys are FAST!

ThePQ4 · « **Reply #3 on:** 10 Nov 2008, 06:55 »

I love that tree necklace --is that supposed to be the Tree of Life, or does it just look like it?? Either way, totally awesome. I'd wear it (and I don't wear a heck of a lot of jewelery anymore...)

Liz · « **Reply #4 on:** 10 Nov 2008, 07:11 »

Awww jeez I wish I could do that kind of thing. I really love all the tree necklaces, they are gorgeous!

Katherine · « **Reply #5 on:** 10 Nov 2008, 07:21 »

You have created some really beautiful pieces of jewelry there. Have you thought about going to local craft fairs to try and sell some?

JD · « **Reply #6 on:** 10 Nov 2008, 12:56 »

How long does it take you to make each one? (more or less)

They look great regardless

misticloudz · « **Reply #7 on:** 10 Nov 2008, 19:37 »

Thanks you guys for your awesome compliments!

The barrettes take me about an hour each, although the ones with wrapping around the beads take about two, two and a half hours sometimes. The trees take about an hour, but sometimes i can be a perfectionist and I spend a bit more time... The collar-style pieces (torcs) took me over eight hours apiece, probably closer to ten or twelve including fiddling and all of the little bits that add up. The stranded necklaces took about 3-4 hours apiece including design time... but doesn't include the time it takes to fix my mistakes when I do something stupid and have to redo the whole thing... yeah. that happened. and it sucked.

I kind of missed the craft fair bandwagon this year, I quit my job last month so I could work on this full time but there have been a few expenses that ate up my buffer! and now I can't pay to build my displays yet (I need to put it all on something, right?? ) My plans may be a bit grand but I'm one of those people who I want things done right, and customized, so I have to build it all myself.... I recently redesigned my packaging and branding so it's more streamlined but it also cost some money and I've gotta hoard what I've got until more comes in! So, no craft fairs for me this year. Next year, definitely though.

I left everything to the last minute and my procrastination has bit me in the behind, yet again! Go figure, eh??

Lines · « **Reply #8 on:** 11 Nov 2008, 13:43 »

Your wire-work is really nice! I love the tree pendants and the bird in the one torc. I've never seen wire jewelry as nice as this. Do you sell it anywhere?

misticloudz · « **Reply #9 on:** 11 Nov 2008, 14:14 »

yep, I have an online website at http://www.tiffstrinkets.com. I've also got an etsy site, http://tiffstrinkets.etsy.com, although there's only a couple of items on there because I just opened it up a few days ago and haven't listed much yet. I've also got a facebook group, Tiff's Trinkets, and a deviantart page at http://misticloudz.deviantart.com. Yep, can you tell where I spend a lot of my time?

There's actual descriptions on the shops... can't believe I didn't think of putting ones in the original post... must have been real early when I posted

I love making the trees; I find it therapeutic. Turning metal wire into something that resembles nature kind of intrigues me, I guess. Gets hard on the fingers though!

JD · « **Reply #10 on:** 11 Nov 2008, 14:54 »

Would do you use to make them? I am curious.

misticloudz · « **Reply #11 on:** 11 Nov 2008, 18:32 »

I mostly work with sterling silver-filled wire, which is sterling silver bonded to a copper core (about 100x thicker than plating, and MUCH more durable) although I also work with copper, and have been known to use sterling and gold-filled wire on occasion.

And ThePQ4, I don't think I answered your question! They are based off of the Tree of Life, yes, my original idea was to do a tree for every season, and I'm pretty much almost there.. I just need one for early spring and spring. I've done a bunch of ones outside of that theme, too, and do some in birthstone colours too

ThePQ4 · « **Reply #12 on:** 11 Nov 2008, 18:55 »

Haha, my question was actually answered once I looked at your website...
I like the black one actually, although the green one really caught my eye.

OneoftheLost · « **Reply #13 on:** 13 Nov 2008, 19:37 »

A bit late to the party, but I really like your work. Very good stuff. Take that with a grain of salt, I know next to nothing about jewelry of any kind. However, I really do like the creativity put into the designs. For instance, I specifically admire the work using a more organic theme. (Leaves of Konoha, Lilac Slumber, Dreams of the Forest, Ocean Jasper Drops etc.) Very Nice. Also, good work with the site! Ive done a bit with CSS and the like, and I must admit website's can be a pain. Yours is nice, and shows off the product well.

Thanks for showing us your work!

misticloudz · « **Reply #14 on:** 13 Nov 2008, 20:40 »

Thanks so much! I've sunk a lot of time into tinkering with it and learning how to customize.. I'm currently trying my hand at learning databases, which may help in my pipe dream of learning PHP coding someday

the CSS has had a lot of hacking done to it.. I don't know code and I"m not going to pretend that I do! But I haven't managed to botch it up irreparably yet so I must be on the right track.

It's nice to know that somebody who's dipped their feet before thinks it's nice; especially since I jumped in at the deep end as usual and had to fight my way back up again LOL.

I didn't know anything about jewelry until two and a half years ago.. and I'm still learning. I'm always finding out things I didn't know or learning a different way to do something, etc. It's amazing how many different things people can do with the medium.

clockworkjames · « **Reply #15 on:** 13 Nov 2008, 21:52 »

Those trees are fantastic

And to think all I do with making wires pretty is cable management in my pc

misticloudz · « **Reply #16 on:** 15 Nov 2008, 02:04 »

S'all good, I don't have the balls to play with the cables in my computer. I seem to @^$# computers up when I play with the insides... thank goodness I have a laptop and nothing is exposed LOL

pretty wires are fun you should try it! although i warn you it's addictive. it's crack in a very stealthy form...

dudepope · « **Reply #17 on:** 23 Nov 2008, 20:27 »

Everything is very nice, do you have a local source for your wires? or do you buy online? Ive been making freestanding trees and sculptures of people dancing for a while, but so far ive just been using copper plated welding wires or black chimney wire.

misticloudz · « **Reply #18 on:** 24 Nov 2008, 00:27 »

i buy my wire online, at an etsy seller's shop i found through ebay. i'd love to find something local but havent had a lot of time to look...
and thank you!!
*please excuse the lack of caps, i have wet nail polish

*

StreetSpirit · « **Reply #19 on:** 24 Nov 2008, 11:30 »

This really is one of the craftiest forums on the interwebs - I am always so overwhelmed (often inspired) by the amount of quality artists that have collected under the QC flag. Aye yi yi.

sandysmilinstrange · « **Reply #20 on:** 24 Nov 2008, 21:01 »

Not time sunk, time well spent! Those are beautiful! The trees are gorgeous, but the tenth or eleventh ones down are amazing! What is that in the whole, a choker?

Just beautiful.

misticloudz · « **Reply #21 on:** 25 Nov 2008, 00:05 »

the one with the woman and the bird is a torc-style collar piece, it sits around the base of your your neck with the top roughly at your collarbone bump and lays flat . It doesn't have a clasp, it's stiff enough to stay in shape but also pliable enough to get around your neck without breaking it... those pieces take a LONG time to do, and a lot of planning... but they're lots of fun and quite a challenge sometimes

I thought I had put it up for sale on my website already, but apparently I'm a bit forgetful! Once that's up there will be more pictures there...

thanks again for the compliments, everybody... I really appreciate it

gives me warm fuzzies

Metope · « **Reply #22 on:** 25 Nov 2008, 10:19 »

Your work is absolutely gorgeous and stunningly beautiful. I never really wear jewelry, but if I owned one of those I'd probably wear it every day. Good job!

mishy · « **Reply #23 on:** 27 Nov 2008, 10:35 »

i am going to go right now and check out your website, but i have to say, your work is fantastic.
i, too, am plagued by an addiction to fiddly crafts and arts (web programmer by trade) and have missed out on producing much of anything since i started playing world of warcrack. but THIS, this makes me want to pull out my tray o' beads and buy some wire and things to put it on. PERFECT for christmas gifts, not that i'd be anywhere near as talented as you (you've obviously put some time into perfecting your techniques, and i know there's always more to it than there seems.)

anyway, just beautiful. <3 the tree of life ones. those always get my attention. and the chokers are works of art!
cheers!

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Author Topic: My current time-sink... (Read 10729 times)

mishy