I can not believe that almost a week has gone by since my last post.  Last Saturday I did find and bring home quite a bit of petrified wood.  I have been so busy re-doing some jewelry that I haven't even taken a good look at the wood.  Tomorrow it is off to Santa Fe again to close on some property.  A move to Santa Fe is in the future hopefully sooner rather than later.  I'm posting pics of the jewelry that I modified to use a different type of closure.  Seems that people want an adjustable closure, so I added a lobster clasp and some extender chain as opposed to my hand-crafted toggle clasps.  These pictures were made before I changed out the clasps.

You can probably tell that I am partial to lapis.  I love its deep blue color.

I also love this beautiful pistachio green jasper.  I found this at Quartzsite, AZ a couple of years ago and bought all that I could find.  I had never seen any stone like it before and haven't seen any since.

And, of course, turquoise. 

I plan to work in the studio next week.  I want to work on some new designs, but have several rings to make for a gallery in Texas.  That takes precedence.

Petrified wood hunt.

I'm going to a ranch today a little south of Santa Fe, NM to look for petrified wood.  Hope I can find some pieces that are jewelry making quality!

I have been making earrings the last couple of days.  I made the bezel mountings for the two Cherry Creek Jasper earrings a year ago and then never finished the rest of the earring.  I really like the colors in the stones.  They look like little abstract painting to me.  One of my friends said they remind her of some of Joan Miro's paintings.

The other earrings I made are one of my most popular pair of earrings.  They are mixed metal of Argentium silver, copper and brass.  The shapes are domed using a 20-ton hydraulic press.  Because I make so many of these, I had a cutting die made that uses the press to cut out the domed shape.  That saves me a lot of time since I no longer have to saw out each individual shape.  They still need filing and sanding, but that isn't too bad.  The name of the company that makes my cutting dies is Sheltech.

 I designed a new pair of earrings a few days ago.  I may start working on those tomorrow if not tonight!