At Work in the Jewelry Studio

I'll be spending longer hours at the bench these days ... so I'll be away for a while....


Take Care .... and Cheerio!
.

Good Work, Max!

My youngest son, Max .... 15 ... Grade 10...




Practicing guitar... he especially likes the beginning of a particular ACDC song...



Beachcombing at Quaco Beach... not another soul in sight.....as often is the case




Spending time with the dogs, after bringing Gabi, the blonde one, to live with us... this was introduction day..



Tearing off across seaweed covered sandstone chasing the dogs near Anvil Rock at low tide... just a bike ride down the road...



Why do kids always make faces when we want to take their pictures....



Beginning the cedar shingling on the front of his camp... it originally was a tumbledown chicken house on the property when we bought it... but we didn't have the heart to tear it down.. we moved it up to the far side of the garden and it's transformation began taking place there...



Making progress... eventually this job was finished and Max and his friends camped out there and generally did things boys like to do when they have a getaway...



Seventeen minutes past a spider...



Making jewelry in the studio... for a couple summers when Max was 11 and 12 he tended his own booth and sold his own jewelry at the St. Martins harbor.... any that he sold of ours he could keep a percentage...




...we wanted him to learn responsibility, the effort required to earn a living and how to deal with the public... to learn entrepreneurship...



The hockey gear robot man... I don't know how anyone can skate with all that stuff on..



Playing hockey at the rink ... one of his most favourite things... he's #11




His latest surprise ... made me so pleased...

Max was presented with this Award of Excellence by the Principal of his school... Not bad for his first year back in the school system after being unschooled for 4-5 years (well actually, he mainly taught himself, we just encouraged him)... ... I was thrilled for him...

You did it, Max!!! .... Keep it up!

...to Max's Blog...

The Book and the Mug

Read any good books lately? or possibly written... made... or altered any good books lately?

.....Such a tantalizing object... a Book...... so many emotions can be coaxed out of us ... from a book... and so many emotions can be placed into a book... by us...




John and I have wanted to make a little book for a while now...  especially after chatting with faithful customers and receiving requests at Craft Fairs for a pair of earrings with a Book and a Mug combination......






... well, finally after much thought... Sterling wire twisted and looped... textured copper... drawing many tiny pictures... cutting metal... shaping ... hammering... applying heat... then doing this from scratch, time and time again ... it took some figuring to simplify the design and finally get to the finish line... but at long last, we have a pair we really like...






The "Book and Mug" is now one of the new designs in our Whimsical Collection......





Lately we have been working in the studio many long hours... so I'm going to sit here a bit with a steaming mug of hot coffee and a good book... oh, make that a few good books...




... more of our whimsical DESIDERATUM Art Jewelry is pictured here...


.

Spring

Dawn broke...

Rose and blue...

We awoke...

They did too...

The Ravens....
they waited... as did we...

They called....

and cried... with outright glee....

The air was peach... They knew the day.......

"A Celebration's called for"... I heard them say...

"We'll dance with the starfish...  A song we'll Sing ....

We've waited all winter.... for the first day of SPRING !!!!!!!! "




photos taken by Gwen Buchanan, from the top of the bluff at our home in St. Martins, New Brunswick, looking to the east and out over the Bay of Fundy.

Aristotle once said...

"There is nothing in the Intellect...
that was not first...
in the Senses"

It Felt Wonderful

In my other life I kept a few sheep and goats and with them came an abundance of fleece...Oh I loved that fleece... I use to spin All the time... or at least I tried to... I dyed the fleece too, using all manner of things natural... sumac, onions skins, tree bark, golden rod, tea.... whatever I could find enough of...
but I must admit I wasn't always a purest ... I had been known to use a lovely prepared dye that came from Australia, I can't think of the name of it right now but the colors were very subtle and muted....... I even used Kool-Aid a few times..... smelled good...

Sometimes I would spin the fleece into skeins first before dying... and then sometimes I would just dye the fleece first and blend the colors when I carded the wool to get a particular shade...





On this occasion, as I had quite a lot of fleece, dyed in various colors, on hand, it was a perfect time to use some of it to make a felted vest...

front lapel

....I thought a mohair fringed collar might be kind of fun... I felted only an inch or two of the long angora goat hair into the entire neck-edge of the vest so the locks hung freely... I liked that the locks kept their form... and moved when you walked and when the wind blew.... and that it was so soft... I wanted to bury my face in it...

back of neck

The strange thing was........ that whenever I wore it.... I felt like King Henry the Eighth... Don't know why.....

I never feasted on giant drumsticks and I never had 6 wives.......


...although when I looked around the house at the chores that needed done.... an extra wife/husband or two wouldn't have hurt!

When Is A Rose Not Beautiful?

The Wolf Spider

My son Max has a great fondness for Spiders... I believe he could identify almost any spider that was put in front of him and if not, I know he would soon find out..... One of his favourite species are the Wolf Spiders... He likes their habits and has taught me all I know about them... things like, they don't spin webs.... or make a nest or shelter.... they hide out in leaf litter by day... and are active hunters at night....

They have 8 eyes... 4 large and 4 small... and have excellent eyesight... their markings are varied containing stripes, bands, dots.... they have lots of hairs ... coloring is in the range of gray, brown, and khaki... ¼" to 1½" long... habitat is widespread... worldwide...

...the males perform a courtship dance of leg-lifting for the females... she only accepts him if she likes his dancing... now there is an amusing way of selecting a partner.........

hey, when I come to think about it, maybe we are not that different......... Bet you never knew we had something in common with a spider...

anyway, back to the story...





Max is forever lugging one of these spiders around ... watching one closely... or playing with one.. in the summer that is... of course, I'm dreaming of summer 'round about now...

When Max was learning at home, I let him learn about whatever he wanted... I had no classes... he set his own learning style... I let him indulge his interests as long as he wanted... he would spend hour after hour out in the fields, and he got to know nature close up... he was constantly showing me the things he would discover... It is such a great way for children to learn...






I must admit, I like Spiders too... I would never purposely kill a spider... they are so little and delicate.....

Spiders are beneficial insects... eating many pests such as aphids and flies.

If you have ever seen a spider carrying around its large egg sac attached to its rear spinnerets, that was a Mother Wolf Spider.... They don't bite humans... They are shy and prefer to run away if disturbed...

One thing I can never figure out is... why are people frightened of spiders?.... of course I do not live in a part of the world that has poisonous spiders or I would probably be of a different opinion... around here there is no need to worry about them at all... so why????

... and also... why are people afraid of spiders webs? they are amazing structures...... I mean why in the world would anyone be scared of webs?...................ahhh, the mysteries of Fear....






...can you imagine if you had 8 eyes and 8 arms, what you could accomplish...


...remember when you wished you had eyes in the back of your head.......... I do...






...Wolf Spider watercolors from my sketch book... approx. 4"x 4" each... pen and ink and watercolor wash...

Almost Monochrome

From the back room

out to the back field

where the partridges sat 2 days ago...

No need to go to the woodshed... the wood-rack is full...

No sunrise today

a snowstorm is blowing through...

From the trees, to the steeple, to the shore, to the sea...

...Max and Gabi

make their way...

nothing to do in the garden yet...

Good day to stay in

unless you're a boy or a dog....

...if you look really close you can see a seagull sitting on the top of the steeple, it is one of there favorite perches...

.