Light at the end of the tunnel !!

I seem to have turned the corner with the guitar now, and things are starting to come together. I did the first layer of varnish on the back and neck of the guitar yesterday, and as I type it's drying off nicely. Hopefully later today I'll be able to flip it over and do the front. Then just the task of threading hundreds and hundreds of tiny seed beads to redo the neck part of it. Not something I'm looking forward to doing , but at least I'll know the end is in sight then :o)

While I've been waiting for the varnish to dry, I've been cleaning the grout off a mirror I've been making for another gallery. I've used clear textured glass on this one, which at the time I thought was a good idea...on hind sight ...no it wasn't lol. The grout has stuck to every part of the glass and it being textured has made it a very long job, to pick off all the dried grout. Why don't I think these idea's out properly before I do them lol ? I've also got a 2nd mirror I've done, this one is a sort of sunburst style and has loads of beads in the design ...once again when I've managed to clean the grout off it, it'll look pretty stunning I think. Although I can't decide what colour wash to do on the grout yet. I also need to assemble some more pendants as the gallery on the island is getting low on them.So much to do, so little time to do it in sigh !!!

Another day gluing !!

Well I've spent another day gluing bits of brown paper on to the pair of Dr Marten boots. I really do question my own sanity at times lol. The boots seem pretty solid now, even though they haven't dried out properly from this last assault of paper and glue.

I'll be using beads, tiny pieces of mirror and various sorts of glass tiles to decorate them. I'm thinking that I might have to cut the glass even smaller than the usual 1/4" squares of glass I do, so that the tiles mould as much as possible to the shape of the boots. That alone will be very time consuming as it's much harder to cut tiny pieces of glass than you might think. I'm sure that my fingers will be smoothered with tiny cuts as usual, which despite their size can be quite painful.

No matter how much these boots sell for, I doubt very much whether it will actually ever pay me much above 50p an hour, if I added up the amount of hours that it actually takes me to do them. But that is my choice, I'll never be rich from my crafts, I do it for the love of it.

I've always been one of those type of people that likes to keep busy, which is probably why my crafts often turn out to be quite intricate a lot of the time.

The first photo today is an oil painting I did, this measures about 12" by 8" and is done on board. Most of my paintings and drawings are either nude or semi nude as I love to draw the human form.




This mirror is a style of mirror I do called jester mirrors, it was a commisioned mirror. It is made from stained glass with nuggets and copper wire embellisments



The last photo today is of little copper foiled stained glass guardian angels, they're about 4 " tall and come with their own little bags. I've made and sold more of these than I can count, but I always end up with burnt fingers as the size being so small means the glass heats up very quickly ...ouch !!!