assessing progress . . .

I got to a stopping place yesterday.  Last night before bed, I laid out what I've made thus far.  Seeing some gaps in the range of work, I pulled out a few more components that were hiding in my little bins.  While I was originally thinking I'd dive right in this morning, the morning has gone a bit differently than envisioned.  I have yet to park myself behind the worktable and will soon head that way, but first here's the fruits of my efforts . . .

Nothing has been soldered so it all looks like a crazy mish mash.  I want to add at least 3 or 4 very minimal necklaces and then I think I'll be done.  Then it will be on to earrings.  Not sure if I'm going to include bracelets in this first incarnation - a couple of pieces are long enough to wrap, so I may just leave it at that.  Also, I've nixed the base metals for now.  Keeping things simple and less confusing.  Also, will probably wait on the nylon cord versions, maybe . . . we'll see.  

Keeping things simple is always the challenge.  In planning pieces I want to replicate, I try to limit the number of elements.  It's just way to confusing to fill orders for pieces when there's a whole slew of different components for each piece.  It requires spread sheets and I refuse to learn Excel.  Also, too many variables is just flat out confusing to buyers.  It's hard enough when you're at a show or in the gallery/boutique and working in person, but long distance can be crazy making . . . believe me, I know!

There's a few pieces that need to be tweaked before everything gets soldered together, but on the whole, I'm quite pleased!

So that's it for my jewelry update, but in other news . . .

One of my morning distractions was getting ready to start my own kombucha scoby.  I've read so much on making kombucha, checked out books from the library, printed out whole e-books from online and on and on.  Lots say do not try to grow your own scoby.  Over the weekend, I found this site that made it look pretty easy.  So what the heck, I'm going for it.  Lord knows it will save me a ton of money if it works.  My starter black tea is cooling and I'll be mixing it all up and crossing my fingers soon.

There's more going on that I want to talk about and I'm wanting to give it a proper post.  For now to pique your curiosity, here's a link to an old blog post from April 2011 . . . feedback and thoughts very much encouraged.

Okay, off to mix up my starter kombucha and then get to work!

with deep gratitude - kvk