Catherine,

Thank you for liking my work! Fellow makers that appreciate the energy and effort that goes into creating pieces through traditional techniques are precious! Sometimes I feel like a very lonely voice crying in the vastness of innovative art jewelry but then ideas that turn ancient designs into something aesthetically pleasing today hit and I cannot resist trying them out. Thank you again!

I'm doing......okay.  How do you  do it?  I admire your tremendously.  I look at what you accomplish and sigh and think of better days for me to be more organized, more productive.  I constantly  think of the questions that you sent me and I did get started and think of the all the time (to sit down and finish mine)  I look at the jewelry you make, the art you produce......you must have a great support system.  Not that I'm whinning, it's all on me.  I just feel stagnant and need some classes to get me motivated.  Anyway, really I'm good.  I should have never taken a job.  It started out as a part time job, but has now worked it way into almost full time.  I'm saving money to do some travelling, but I want to make some jewelry.  Anyway...are you doing well?  Thanks for asking!   Still would like to get an opportunity to get to call you and have a chat. xo

Good morning Catherine, thank you for sharing your experience with pmc.

I had figured out that I needed support of some kind. Yesterday I managed to make one of the two rings that make the bangle. Today I will try for the second one and then attempt to put them together. I think I will solder them before I granulate. Anyway, thank you again for being so generous with your information. It seems to me that pmc is more fragile and prone to more stresses than ordinary gold or silver. I just have to adjust to that!G

Hi Catherine,

The granulation on the existing Crafthaus photos is the usual one. I use the torch to create the little balls---practice makes things better:) and then position then and adhere them to the wire or surface. I have been trying, as I said in another note, to create volume together with the granulation and not the usual flat surface where you arrange the granules geometrically.

As far as metal clay is concerned, I have been working with it for the last two months. I have been successful in creating uniform little balls using a very small, thin hollow straw. I have made two brooches and now I am making a double bangle with the brooch design as a centerpiece. The most difficult part is the construction of the bangle with twisted pmc wire....will try again today. Yesterday's attempt were foiled!!!!

Thank you for your kins words. Sophia

Catherine,

Thank you! I am a professor of classics turned jeweler.Lately, I have been experimenting with metal clay and I have been working like crazy to learn the way it handles. I have constructed two brooches and am in the process of making a bangle..with granulation. Wish me luck! When they are finished I will submit them for consideration to Powder Metallurgy..

I love your pieces--especially, the bowls and almost all of the necklaces. They are beautiful!

Yay!  Happy holidays Catherine

You can contact me directly through my website: jstoneenamels.com.  Yes, I am head of the enameling department at The Crucible, www.thecrucible.org, and yes, I will be teaching at Mendocino this coming summer.  Oakland is closer!

Hey!! Happy Holidays to you too!!!! :))))))