How It All Began

Before I get going I want to apologise for the horrendous photos here!  I took them during my 20 minute lunch break and didn't have a clue what I was doing!  Definitely more practice is needed...

I guess I should start this blog with a little bit about why I'm here.

I have always been a creative soul, colour and form are immensely important to me, and from the earliest days I have reveled in the ability to create.  Drawing writing, making music, all played a large part of my childhood.

I started making jewellery about eight years ago, simply stringing seed beads and cheap glass beads onto silk thread in patterns I found pleasing.  I loved the soothing and satisfying feeling generated by watching the patterns build up:

I used to love the methodical act of picking up these tiny little seed beads, it gave me a wonderful chance for some deep thinking!

This soon evolved into tinkering with wire.  I came home with a necklace that had caught my eye in an over priced accessory store and had a good look at it.  On closer inspection I could see that the beads were poorly formed, lumpy little things and the wire loops that joined them together were very sloppy and uneven.

And I had that magic thought - 'I could make that!'

I brought myself some cheap as chips mini jewellery pliers, looked up a few free tutorials and taught myself the basics of wire-wrapping.  I was hooked!

Haha, this photo is such a blurry mess!

Jewellery making quickly became my main creative outlet, with a few basic skills I started churning out pieces.  I didn't really feel the need to learn any more skills for a long time, I was quite happy producing pieces along similar lines, and like the simple beaded strings I made earlier the creative process for them mostly revolved around creating patterns.

I know, I know, awful photos!  But hopefully you can get some idea of what I have been producing :)

Then I stumbled upon Eni Oken's jewelrylessons.com.  I was amazed by the varied and fabulous forms wire could be manipulated into.  I was o gob-smacked by the beautiful work displayed there that I actually became a little bit dismayed, my work seemed pretty worthless next to all that wizardry!  I'm sad to say that at this point I hung up my pliers for a while and therefore I became Incredibly Grumpy (the Boyfriend can tell you what  I'm like when I'm not letting of creative steam!).

Luckily I was rescued when my mum, fed up with the Incredible Grumpiness, brought me some books on wire working that showed me a whole new pile of skills!  I think I will leave writing about that until tomorrow though, as this post is loooooong, and I need to take more cruddy photos ;)