All that’s left is a band of gold…

Silver, actually, but I had to keep within my self-imposed theme, and couldn’t think of a silver ring song.

See how hard I’m working?  I should have painted my nails or something before I took pics.  I haven’t actually been wearing these all on one hand, but I couldn’t figure out a way to hold my camera in my teeth and snap a pic of both hands at the same time.  Figure it was easier to move rings than set up a tripod and set a timer.

Tina and I have been taking a beginning silver-smithing class for 3 weeks now (2 weeks to go!).  We’d seen this guy, Chad Parker at a craft fair last year, and thought about how cool it would be to take a class and learn how to make cool silver stuff, but figured we’d wait til we both had more time (HA!).  Then Tina was talking to one of her friends about their crafty projects, and her friend mentioned making silver jewelry, and taking lessons, and putting together a class.  Turns out it was the same guy. 

The first week, we put together some fairly simple silver bands (seen on the pointer and middle fingers).  They are kind of easier than you would think, but kind of way harder.  I’m NOT good at soldering yet!  But, we do get to play with blow-torches, which is cool! 

The second week, we made some wire pendants with stones!  It was pretty cool.  Pics and descriptions will come another day – I need to make some necklaces to go with the pendants.

Last night, we made more rings.  The one on my ring finger has a rose quartz stone.  Just like most of my projects, I’d planned for this to look different than it ended up, but I’m still pretty happy!  As long as no one looks close, it looks pretty cool.  Close up, you can see all my flaws – but we’ll just call them “design elements”!  I’m still bad at soldering.  I’ve melted more than my fair share of silver wire trying to figure this stuff out.  But I haven’t set fire to anything (or anyone) yet, so I figure I’m doing okay.