I have been working hard on finishing my studio for the last year. I've decided it will never really be finished, and I'm not going to keep pressuring myself to "get everything done". I realized I was keeping myself blocked - I had to finish the list, but I really didn't want to do the things on the list, so I procrastinated until I didn't go down there at all.
After much creative therapy reading (I'll discuss those in a later post), I've decided to enjoy the process of what I'm doing - with a focus on finishing - not perfect - just finished - small successes. So, I made some tags for my glass shelves.
I've been thinking about these for a while. I saw a post and a magazine article by Deryn Mentock at somethingsublime.typepad.com - she made these beautiful earrings with looped and twisted wire, words cut from books, and epoxy. They were gorgeous leaves attached to the sides of a larger bead. Anyway, I thought I could adapt the idea for my labels.
I twisted copper wire for hours! I twisted, looped, and twisted again and couldn't get any of them compact enough to make a label. Then, I remembered my stained glass supplies. Since it was copper, I used my soldering iron and lead free solder to attach the ends of my loops together. I made a jig from a piece of 2x4 and a couple of nail gun nails that I snipped the end off of. Next time, I'll take the time to sand the top of the nails - I got a nasty scratch on the back of my arm when I reached across the top of the jig.
I switched to a more fireproof surface for soldering after the first few - I didn't want to burn down the house. I cut decorative papers into the same oval shape and stamped and distressed them. I used packing tape transfers for the words (NF and FUS denote fusible and non-fusible). Then, I attached both peices to the sticky side of some packing tape and added the epoxy. When they were set, I cut away the excess packing tape. I used decorative tacks to attach them to the slots of my glass shelf.
I love the way they turned out. I was going for rustic - kind of like the labels on those old locker baskets. I think I got it. And, the interesting thing is that I did get some work done on my list items as well while I was waiting on things to dry. I also did some work in a couple of art journals I have going. It was a good weekend!
