February 9, 2012: Jammin'... well not quite

Last year I had the wonderful idea to learn how to play the guitar. I still REALLY want to learn but I realize that it will take some serious work and dedication... and that means time... which is hard to come by. I asked a very talented young lady, a student, to teach me how to play. She was enthusiastic about it and we got started... we were able to get a couple of lessons in after school but then both of our schedules seemed impossible. Regardless, I truly do thank her for her time and willingness to attempt to help me. I think we will resume again... we shall see...
I made her this bracelet. When I hear the word "jammin'" I think of musicians... so I thought it was a cool word to punch on her bracelet. Check it out :)

This bracelet is made from an old belt (the buckle is still on it - that's what closes the bracelet). Then I punched the word into a pieces of sterling silver. To help the letters stand out more, I used the liver of sulfur again to oxidize the metal. Then I buffed the surface of the metal and the letters stayed oxidized (to learn more about the oxidation and liver of sulfur, click the label's below to jump to previous posts). I used rivets to attach the silver to the leather.

January 2, 2012: Leather Cuff

I have always admired cool leather cuff bracelets. After scouting Etsy and some funky street markets in NYC I started buying used leather belts at thrift stores and rummage sales. Now I have a beastly collection! This past summer I played around with making a couple of cuffs. My father works with tons of leather for work and also has a snap fastener and hole punchers, etc. Naturally, having tools available made my dreams of creating leather cuffs more realistic. So the crafting began :). However, I had seen all types of bracelets that had different types of fabric, metal, other leather pieces, etc. attached to the leather cuff with metal fasteners. Well, this 2012 endevor inspired me to see what I could do. I learned the difference between rivets, grommets and eyelets. Not an easy task! Rivets are solid on top and are used to fasten two pieces of fabric together. Grommets (larger) and eyelets (smaller) have holes in them, creating a reinforced hole in the fabric. Anyway... I found rivets at A.C. Moore and used them to stick two pieces of leather (from repurposed leather belts) together. I stamped the word "live." in the top piece. Check it out!