Thanksgiving Vacation Art -- Viking Knit and Sketching

The good news and bad news about Thanksgiving is the break from the regular routine. It's not possible to work on metal clay or glass while flying or stuffing my face hundreds of miles from home. But something artistic has to happen or I get antsy. So I took along some 28 gauge Argentium sterling wire to make a Viking knit chain to go with the new resin pendant. I photographed it before with a very open, single knit chain, but I wanted a closely wired double knit chain.


It was great as long as it lasted - I forget how much wire I can go through in a very short time! It's just barely long enough after being drawn down, or at least it will be long enough as soon as I can make endcaps and clasp.


With nothing left to occupy my hands on the flight home, I resorted to the trusty sketchbook. Somehow I get in a groove on planes. I'm really drawn to the constructed box to house the hallmark, shown in bronze. This might be quite a challenge, but it looks fun!


I'm also gearing up to do a whole series of my wire link bracelets, so I drew one that uses simple hand-formed floral decorations. I'm anxious to make this one, as I have a drawer full of those floral bits. After many sad blobs of dried out clay at the end of packages, I've changed my working to make these components with that leftover clay. So the bracelet will just be cutting tiles and "gluing" on the flowers. Now, I need to work on the idea I have for making a cutter for my "squeezed pillow" shape, to make these bracelets really quick. Oh, and then there are the beaded connections -- I need a quick assembly line process for those.