Stamping metal isn’t difficult, and with a little practice, this easy metalworking technique can be used to personalize your jewelry and other metal creations.

You will need metal stamps – alphanumeric if you want to stamp things like words and dates, or shapes and symbols to decorate your piece.

You’ll also need a piece of sheet metal – pre-cut circles work well – and a hammer and a hard surface such as a steel bench block to stamp on.

Place the metal on the stamping surface and position the stamp where you want to make your mark.

Now take your hammer (I use a heavy rubber mallet) and whack the back of your stamp. Practice this a few times on metal scraps so you get the hang of how hard you need to hit the stamp to get a good impression – too hard is just as bad as too light, so get a feel for how much force works.

I get the best results with three (or more) taps: one dead on, one holding the stamp slightly angled to the right, once holding it slightly angled to the left.

Here’s a video of me stamping with my new heart & flower stamps from artbeads:

Unfortunately, you can’t see how the stamp looks due to me being a total novice when it comes to making video, but at least you get a quick idea of the process!

I’m so excited about this new book that is coming out soon: Where Women Create: Book of Inspiration: In the Studio and Behind the Scenes with Extraordinary Women. I’ve read a couple issues of the Somerset Where Women Create magazine, and it always inspires me to daydream about what my ideal workspace would look like. The featured artists always have such cool storage systems and decorations in their studios, and I love getting a peek at how other people work, so I’m really looking forward to reading this one when it’s available.

The birthstone for March is the lovely pale blue aquamarine. It is the pale blue or green version of beryl, and the color ranges from almost clear to mossy light green to sky blue. As with most gemstones, it comes in a range of prices and quality, and can be used in beaded jewelry or set into bezels. Writing about aqua reminds me that I have some beautiful aquamarine beads in my stash that I really should make into jewelry…

If you love seafoam green and sky blue, or are looking for jewelry that blends in with some of the pastel colors that typically show up in fashion around the beginning of spring, aquamarine is a perfect stone to consider.

It is lovely paired with silver, as shown in these beautiful pieces of handmade jewelry:

Silver and Aquamarine Jewelry

Have to have one of these pieces? Buy pages linked below:
(1) Necklace by Glitz Glitter
(2) Necklace by Ov Gillies Designs
(3) Earrings by MCR Designs
(4) Earrings by Silver Canyons
(5) Earrings by Marcie Jane Designs

To find more beautiful jewelry made with aquamarine, go to etsy.com and search “jetteam aquamarine”.

I’m on maternity leave – but before I left, I spent some time surfing the web for some great art and craft entertainment – so here are some links I enjoyed, hope you’ll like them too!

Mixed media and paper craft tutorials:
Make an inspiration book from a paper bag
(and from the same blog, make paper bag leaves and paper bag art journals, and follow the link to learn how to do a 4-hole bookbinding technique.)
Via @craftzine on twitter, a tutorial for making paper out of drying lint.
Video tutorial on making decorated resists with matte medium and Ranger’s Distress Ink

General creativity:
A great blog about creativity, business, goals, and more, by the author of a book I now must go check out, The Creative Entrepreneur.

Yay! iHanna is blogging again – last time I looked at her site, she was taking a break.

Blogging & business:
This article is about blogging for creative people who want to make a living with their art (don’t we all?)
Here’s a video from Craftypod about how to evaluate whether or not to pursue an opportunity that doesn’t pay.

February has been a good month for me. First I got a baby gift from the lovely and talented Marisa of Elegant Snobbery – it’s a princess sock monkey print to hang in my kid room:

Princess Sock Monkey Print by Elegant Snobbery

I already have a few boy-themed prints from her shop, so this will balance out the testosterone a bit for my little girl.

Then, I won a blog giveaway on Studio MME for a pair of gorgeous flower earrings by Wearable by Design. If you haven’t seen her lovely silver jewelry made from metal clay, you are missing out. She recently won a prestigious design award from Saul Bell, so it’s not just me — she is good!

These are the earrings I won:

Silver Flower Earrings from Wearable By Design

And THEN, on Valentines Day, my amethyst rough crystal necklace was on etsy’s front page, and I got about 1000 views in my shop! Thanks etsy!

Etsy Front Page, February 14, 2010

Happy Valentines Day

To all my blog readers:

I *heart* You

And one more:

Love

Feel free to use these three graphics for personal use (as long as you give me credit for making them). Not for commercial use.

Wrap, Stitch, Fold & Rivet by Mary Hettmansberger is a great jewelry making book that explains how to use a lot of creative cold connections in metal and fiber jewelry work.

If you like rustic looking jewelry, you’ll love this book. The projects all have that handmade look, and the author encourages experimenting.

I love cold connections, which is probably evident when you look at my jewelry – lots of wire wrapping, and in my metalwork I often use variations on rivet techniques to hold things together while allowing for some movement – as in this pendant:

Caterpillar Pendant

Once you master a few easy techniques for connecting metal parts without soldering, you start to get lots of design ideas, and can create pieces that look and feel more complex than what you can do without these connections. I like to use a combination of torchwork, wirework, and cold connections in my work.

If you like using fiber in your jewelry, or fiber techniques, you’ll appreciate a few sections of the book that deal with things like weaving wire. Weaving with thin-gauge wire enables a designer to create very intricate, details pieces – without needing a lot of expensive metalworking tools.

I definitely recommend this book to anyone who is a beginning metalworker wanting to learn some cold connections, or anyone who loves handmade jewelry with a rustic feel – plenty of inspiration for these kinds of designs.

So, I took my jasper bangle idea and redid it in copper, and I’m SO much happier with the results now:

Jasper and Copper Bangle

The colors blend better, and I think it shows off the jasper beads better too. Instead of a soldered or fused bangle, I forged the ends of my copper wire and made what almost looks like a clasp, although it is not intended to open and close. I also hammer textured the wire a bit to add some sparkle while strengthening the bangle. I have the prototype shown above for sale on etsy and I’m thinking I need to make some more copper bangles since this one turned out so well.

Oh, and I am loving the pink on my new copper head pins! I read a trick for getting that color in a new jewelry book I got for Christmas, Wrap, Stitch, Fold & Rivet by Mary Hettmansberger, which I’ll be reviewing very soon.

I loved my set of 6 upcycled bangles, which recently sold out, so I’m working on another set. There is one thick bangle, and a few that involved loosely wiring together some very skinny bracelets with charms. I love the stones I’m using on this set – here’s a preview of the first three that are available:

Upcycled Bangles

A smooth polished citrine nugget, a gorgeous smoky-quartz-like round glass bead, and a rough natural aquamarine. (Did you know aquamarine is the birthstone for March? Get a head start on your birthday shopping….)

Didn’t remake the jasper and pearl bangle yet, but I have a pretty good idea of where I’m going with it so hopefully I will have some new photos to share of that one soon – as well as the vine-inspired series that is still dancing around in my head.

Of course…I’m also planning to have a baby sometime between now and about March 3rd…so hopefully I’m not being too ambitious with all these design ideas!

I’ve been wanting to play with some new copper head pins I made that have beautiful deep pink ball ends, and when I received my latest goodies from artbeads to review, I knew the red poppy jasper beads would be perfect. (You can find the jasper beads and other shades of red and pink in the Valentines Day gemstone bead section of their website.)

I paired a jasper on copper charm with a deep purple freshwater pearl one, and added them to a slim silver bangle:

Jasper and Pearl Charm Bangle

Looking at the finished piece, I like it, but I think it would be a more successful design if the bangle was made from copper – so I’m hoping to experiment with some copper bangles if my son takes a good nap this afternoon. The warm tones in the copper charms would blend a lot better with a warm copper bangle base – and maybe matching earrings? And while I’m being critical of myself, if I’d chosen a black pearl with more green/gold undertones, I think that also might have worked a bit better. But hey – aren’t my pink copper head pins gorgeous with the jasper?

Disclaimer: artbeads.com gave me the jasper beads in exchange for me blogging about them. I am not paid to say anything nice, I can say whatever I want in fact, and I get to keep the samples they send.