Cufflink Season...

This week I finished up a group of cufflinks that will head down to Silver Blue & Gold gallery in Laguna Beach. I was invited to submit work to their upcoming cufflink exhibition in this father's day/graduation/wedding season, and as I've always loved  making cufflinks, I was only too happy to be a part of it! Imagine, a whole show just devoted to cufflinks! 

This batch consists mainly of fossils. 

On the left is Hell's Canyon petrified wood (sequoia) from Oregon, next is fossil coral and the pair on the right is Owyhee jasper, also found in Oregon.

Fossil palm on the left, and on their right is more petrified wood, this time hickory.

I'll still have a good selection of cufflinks in my shop, and I'm sure I'll be adding a few more prior to Father's Day if you're looking for a special gift for your cufflink wearing man!

a trip to the museum

While in Denver this week visiting my daughter, I was introduced to the Denver Museum of Nature and Science.

The museum has a really nice permanent gem and mineral collection with Colorado rocks as well all kinds of other stuff. I was intrigued with the rhodocrosite that is native to the state. Lusting after is probably a more accurate description I think...

This is a huge rock, and the first thing that greets you when you enter the exhibit. Below is a photo from the museum website to show you the scale of these crystals!

I really wanted a specimen to take home with me and thought I might find one in the gift shop, but no. Apparently these beautiful native crystals from the Sweet Home mine are really pretty rare and expensive. Darn!

 the middle photo shows the rhodocrosite along side florite.

Aquamarine is the state gemstone of Colorado... and my birthstone : ) I'd take this specimen any day!

There was crystalized gold and rocks with wide veins of silver running through them...

silver veins

of course, I can't resist the jaspers...


The following day we visited a rock shop where I made a few purchases that helped me get over the fact that I couldn't take any of the museum exhibits home with me.

No rhodocrosite specimen, but I'm not complaining!

new work

After making jewelry for more years than I care to count, I've finally come to the realization that it might be nice to create collections of jewelry as opposed to jumping from one random stone to the next just because I want to bezel every stone I see! So I reigned myself in this past month, and came up with these two collections so far.

Beautiful Willow Creek jasper that was part of this group, and

ended up as earrings, a pendant, and a ring. Most of these went to Imogen Gallery in Astoria, Oregon.

And this pink collection, mostly Mookaite from Australia, and the center pair, fossil palm wood. 

This bunch of cabs I bought most recently with this group and turned out some 

earrings, a tweeter bird pendant and a ring. These will be available in my etsy shop.

Since I'm rather liking the cohesiveness of these two collections, I think I might work through the Sonoran sunrise I bought last month. It's quite stunning! 

And of course, I'll always find time to slip in something totally unrelated...

Sonoran Sunrise

I purchased these Sonoran Sunrise cabs from a fellow jeweler recently. (Thank you, Karen!)  Sonoran Sunrise is the apt name given to the the red mineral, cuprite ( copper bearing) in chrysocolla. It's found in Mexico, and do these colors ever "pop" together! And this batch is probably some of the most intense I've seen! The cut and polish on these stones is excellent. Sized from large pendant/ brooch pieces to statement rings and a pair of earrings. They will be a pleasure to work with! 

  

I can't seem to keep my hands off the stuff...

My philosophy regarding stones has always been that when you see a good thing, you need to jump on it. Even if you just recently bought a slew of pretty rocks. I mean, when you're talking jaspers and agates, each is one of a kind. You just have to keep that in mind. And I don't buy everything I see, I do employ some restraint... well, a little...

This batch of beauties includes Morrisonite at the top, Montana agate, a nice ocean jasper and a bunch of beautiful Willow Creek jasper. See what I mean? How could a sane person pass these up?

And now the fun begins...

betsybensen.etsy.com

My date with the King of Jaspers

In my book, there's no better way to start out the new year then with a whole slew of new cabochons arriving on your doorstep! 

In this case, I stumbled upon a fellow jewelry artist who has a passion for stones, like moi, but she is cutting back her production schedule and needed to clear out some of her collection. I was fortunate enough to purchase some of her Morrisonite, which is one of my favorite stones, and known as "The King of Jaspers". It's also a native of my own state of Oregon.

Morrisonite comes in a gorgeous array of colors, and takes a very high polish. Some of these pieces are quite large as you can see below...

This cab measures 2" x 1" (5cm x 2.5cm). They will make some beautiful statement pieces. Several nice matched pairs will make dynamite earrings! I see a long and productive relationship with the King!

Here's a pendant I made late last year using another super pretty piece of Morrisonite.

And I didn't neglect some of my other favs in this stone purchase. Petrified palm and fern, plus some nice ocean jasper and a pair of bird's eye rhyolite. Earrings, earrings, earrings!

I'm so glad I didn't make a New Year's resolution to curb some of my stone buying and use more of what I already have on hand... well, it wouldn't have mattered, I have a zero success rate at keeping resolutions anyway...

If you're so inclined, you keep an eye on my etsy shop where some of these finished pieces will be popping up, or my facebook page where you'll get a peek at completed work before it heads off to The Real Mother Goose and Imogen Gallery.

brooch finale...

 The final two brooches in the 2013 challenge. Boy, has this year gone by fast!

 #51 is  slice of Montana agate topped with an Oregon sunstone. Not sure I want to part with this one... but it'll most likely end up in my shop before too long as there are bills to pay... plus, I'm not sure my sweatshirt will do it justice.  ; )

For the year end finale, the Blue Bird of Happiness in labradorite perched on a stick pearl to wish you all a happy, healthy, and creative 2014!

phew!

more temptation

There was another mineral and gem show at the Canby fairgrounds this weekend...

My friend Linley and I moseyed on over. Well, Linley moseyed, I approached with long, purposeful strides, my antennae twitching...

The first thing we spotted, was a table about 15 feet long FILLED with hand cut beads. There were gemstone beads, jaspers and agates, just about every cool stone in the world cut into beads. About a bazilloion of them at least... and this was day 2 of the show. What must day 1 have looked like??

Each and every bead was cut, shaped, drilled and polished by a very nice retired gentleman who obviously delights in his work! Not cheap, but definitely worth every penny. 

I chose Hidden valley jasper, bird's eye rhyolite, Morrisonite, holley blue agate, Montana agate.

I have no idea at the moment what I'll do with them, maybe just keep them around as playthings...

I found some really nice Montana agate cabs...

 

...and some Cherry Creek jasper. the top stone is already in process of becoming this week's brooch.

In an earlier post about my trip to central Oregon to dig for polkadot jasper, I mentioned that thousands of years ago the area drew Native Americans who used the jasper for tool making. To remove the material, they would build hot fires next to the rock to cause it to split off. The heat caused the jasper to turn pink. This cab is a remnant of that activity. The two small pieces I found I decided to hang on to as artifacts so I was delighted to find this cab, cut by the mine owner who was also at the show selling.

Of course I also bought a few slabs to add to my collection of those from which I'll do my own cutting one of these days, but I had to share this one. An old timer told me it was fossil algae! I'm sure there are cooler things in the world... but what??

All in all, it was a very good day... as well as a business expense...

a new fossil... and 4 more brooches

I had a nice drive out into the country this morning on a picture perfect Fall day. My goal, to pick up the rock slabs my stone cutting friend Greta had cut for me from some of the rough I had picked up during last month's rock hounding expedition. She has an awesome rock saw that can cut through the big chunks.

While I was there waiting on the last cut I, of course, started poking my nose into all her boxes of rocks. You wouldn't believe how much stuff that is...

I saw this slab of fossil fern wood and asked if she'd sell it to me. Lovely Greta, I'm sure she realized that she has about 3 lifetimes worth of rock to work with so into my goodie bag it went... I never leave Greta's without many things I had no idea I needed until I saw them...

The thing that really caught my eye were the layers along the edge. A lovely blush along with taupe, a darker stripe, and cream. I can see a few pair of drop earrings as well as some very cool cufflinks in that edge.

Something not noticeable in the photos, is that in all of those voids, there's the sparkle of tiny druzy quartz crystals. I'm really looking forward to cutting into this!

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And since it's been a month since my last post, here are the four latest brooches in the etsymetal brooch a week challenge.

Brooch #38

A beauty of a lace agate, semi transparent so you can see into it and the botryoidal formation, those very organic looking globular forms. I've designed it so that it can been worn as a pendant as well as a brooch.

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Brooch #39

This is a piece of ocean jasper with a small pinkish rhodolite garnet.

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Brooch #40 

I think this one can hardly be called a brooch, more of a pin, it's a teeny little thing, 

and is a piece of Picasso jasper.

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Last week's brooch, #41

 is a large piece of mookaite from Australia, paired with a little yellow citrine.

Right now I'm working on this week's design, but I'm not quite sure how it's going to all come together yet, so I won't say more... not yet

Last of the summer roses, another batch of brooches

In Portland, summer is tip toeing into Fall. Days of rain interspersed with hot sun. The tomatoes are about done and the cooler, wetter, weather is causing them to split. I just cut the few remaining blooms from my Evelyn rose. they are sending off the most wonderful fragrance...

I've finished 3 new brooches since my last post 3 weeks ago. 

Week #35's brooch is a sterling silver and glass combination modeled by a lovely little kudu gazelle.

Week 36 features a narrow turquoise... daintily supported by one of the hardest working members of my crew.

And week #37 focuses on another piece of turquoise, this one from Broken Arrow mine in Nevada. This frisky zebra colt was constantly in motion and hard to keep still for the photo shoot...

Bye! I'm off to smell the roses...