Monday, May 31, 2010

Glass pendants



Last week's jewellery mission was to learn the technique for how to make glass pendants. When I finally got around to it, it was both fun, easier than I had thought and quite rewarding as you can see the result of your efforts almost immediately. To sum up - I am pleased I tried this!

This is one of the pendants I made, and I made a bunch of them once I got started, both round and square shapes.
I also made som acrylic pendants using the same technique, then I hung those on long copper chains and I was really pleased with the result. These will be listed in the webshop later this week.

Have a good week every one!
Cheers,
Anna

Friday, May 14, 2010

La Oficina - interior design for misfit roommates

In our house, there is only one room that we can use as an office/studio. It's a nice room facing a quiet street and there is a magificent rose bush just outside the window. Our prestigious name for these 12 square meters is "La Oficina" (or Campo de Guerra, depending on cleaning status), and in here, we have managed to squeeze in one company (mine) my husband's computer gadgets, a kind-of-workshop and a mobile photo studio.

The biggest challenge here is that me and my husband have to share this work space and that we are so different you ask yourself what we are doing on the same address. S is into IT (I have promised never to call him a nerd) and he would love to be confined into that room with blinds down, nonstop smoking, heavy metal in headphones and surrounded by all his IT/technical gear and Coke bottles, and preferably the walls would be painted black. (How on earth did we hook up - well, that's another story for another long post!)

My husband calls me a "Swedish Child of Nature", and I guess that's a good description, and I love fresh air, open windows, animals, nature, silence and generous space. You may sense conflict here and you are absolutely right.


So, how do you solve this roomateship between two persons that do not agree on one single thing? Easy - you build a cubicle!

I had this idea when we last rearranged the furniture, making new marks in the (ex) lovely wooden floor. I gently suggested that we could build in S's desk behind three book cases, so that he could have his own dark little cage. To my big surprise, he was very excited and he ran off to IKEA to buy some new BILLY book cases.

That evening, we finished the new office arrangement and an unexpected bonus was all the free space we had by not trippning over my book-keeping and tools that were previously spread on the floor.
This is how it turned out - no big deal, but so much better than the disaser before!

S workplace behind the book cases
Cheers,
Anna

Sunday, May 9, 2010

Happy Mother's Day!

I wish all wonderful mothers a good Mother's Day!



In my part of the world, we celebrate Mother's Day the last Sunday of May, so Mum/Grandma Gunnel - big hug for you today and a hundred more on May 30th!
Love, Anna


Monday, May 3, 2010

Weekend work


The last couple of weekends I have been in a good flow and thanks to a few days of rainy weather, I have been able to finish a number of jewellery projects that had been lying around for a while.
Above is a fine silver pendant that I have made of Art Clay. I am quite pleased how it turned out, and also how easy it was with the new tools I had bought instead of struggling with all sorts of homemade gadgets.
This pendant, and a couple of other pieces, are now available on www.navasilver.se and my Etsy shop.
Cheers,
Anna

Welcome!

This is my 3rd year running my own jewellery business Nava Silver, and I have already started this blog in English... :-) Her sister blog http://www.navasilver.blogspot.com/ in Swedish has been up and running for a bit longer - 2 months or so.

I am Anna, Swedish as you may have guessed from the above and I divide my time and attention between my 4-year-old son Victor, S who is my Mexican husband, our pets (more about them to come), jewellery-making, especially silver clay, my house including a neglected garden and my very own webshop http://www.navasilver.se/ & www.etsy.com/NavaSilver. Oh, I almost forgot, I have a full time day job too! :-)

The theme for this blog will mainly be jewellery and crafting, and some random bits from my everyday life.
Thanks for stopping by and welcome back!

Cheers,
Anna