Art Elements Theme of the Month :: All Things Christmas

 

It's been a while since I have made enough for one of the Art Elements themed challenges to warrant a blog post, but I've actually been fairly busy with holiday themed items lately for a series of online shows I've been a part of over in my friend Anna Pierson's Sagahus Components Facebook Group.  Yay!  

I made a little collection of earrings using upcycled tins pairing them with snowflake charms and really fun Italian glitter resin.  I think my favorites are the ones with the embossed silver snowflakes that I cut from some small storage/gift tins that I snatched up last year at Michael's after the holidays.  

I also made a few more wintery versions of my etched copper earrings that use the leftovers from my Christmas ornaments.  I like the combination of the copper evergreen patterns with pewter charms and luckily I had the perfect niobium ear wires in grey with copper accents.  

I don't always buy a ton of holiday specific artisan beads, but this year maybe I just felt the need for a little extra Christmas cheer.  I snagged some fun enameled charms from Lindy's Designs (left and right below) that I paired with more of the Italian glitter resin.  The middle pair of earrings below are some adorable, slightly mismatched poinsettia ceramic charms by Golem Design Studio paired with vintage German marbled resin and Czech glass.

Necklaces featuring artisan beads with some holiday flair were also on my creative docket.  I bought a set of partridge and pear ceramic lentils from Golem Design Studio at Bead & Button last year and I knew I wanted to make a tree for the little bird!  I used the general idea from one of Heather Power's tutorials to shape the tree out of copper wire and then hammered the whole frame to work harden it.  I then filled in the tree with a mix of seed beads, Czech glass, and Swarovski crystal pearls in colors to coordinate with the ceramic bead.  The middle necklace features a whimsical reindeer enameled pendant by Lindy's Designs strung with tons of Czech glass and some lavender candy jade.  The necklace on the right is a stack of polymer clay goodies from Humblebeads.  Love the the little red bird, it's sweet nest, and the snow kissed pinecone she made.  I added a few elements including some copper plated branches and Czech glass beads.    

If you've been following my creative journey on Instagram or Facebook you know that I've been having lots of fun with beer bottle caps and bead embroidery.  Bell's Brewery has some of the best bottle caps around for their seasonal beers.  They had a holiday ale with a cute Christmas tree on it that has become a couple of pins so far... and I'm still hoping to make one more as a gift but it will probably be late.  The middle pin below is the Fulton Brewing logo but it kind of made me think snowflake surrounded by silver.

Last but not least, I made another batch of saltwater etched Christmas ornaments this year.  It's a fun but sometimes frustrating process as you don't always get a clean or deep etch.  I only had one true failure this year... so that's good!  I really should do some non holiday, non ornament etching at some point... or at least start using some of those things I've done in the past.  New Year's resolution maybe??  

I hope you've enjoyed my little tour through this year's holiday makes!  Wishing you all a joyful holiday season!