Barbara S Fernald Jewelry

…for the Orchid Show at the Botanical Gardens. A beautiful sunny day outside, and a beautiful day inside.

Susie took Nora, me, and her friend Gabriella to Arthur Avenue in the Bronx today. Great shopping in Italian markets. I have cheese, sausage, and speck to bring home to Bruce on Monday. Lots of people were around, shopping for Palm Sunday and the Easter week. Many wishes of Buono Pasque. We had a really good lunch of  antipasto and delicious fresh linguine with shrimp and garlic at Dominic’s.

… while I visit Susie and Simon in Rye. But yesterday, at the post office, Henry forgot his glasses. Joy, our fearless postmaster came to the rescue. When she found the striped readers at Reny’s, she bought them all! A variety of magnifications. She figures she’ll use them sooner or later. If she can’t, there’s always a customer or two who will.

Firing tomorrow. PMC silver beads and clasps. 

I get asked about this a lot, so here’s what works for me.

Put a layer of hot glue in the bottom of a shallow glass dish. Settle a third or so of the rock into the glue before it hardens. The top of the rock should sit below the top edge of the dish.

Fill dish with water. Insert diamond drill bit into flex shaft handpiece.

Start drilling slowly through the layer of water into the rock. The glue will hold the rock in place. Peck gently once you have the hole started. Moving the drill in and out of the hole so the bit cools in the water and fresh water flows into the hole. The water will start to get cloudy. If the drill is held in place for too long or the drill is too fast, the bit will overheat and the diamond pieces will start to flake off. You will know the drill is through the rock when you feel the change as the bit goes into the softer glue beneath.

Dump out cloudy water, refill, and drill the next rock. When all rocks in a dish are drilled, run the dish under hot water to loosen the glue. It is usually easier to get the whole piece of glue out of the dish. More hot water will make the glue bendable so the rocks can be worked out of their glue hole.

I find that a diamond core drill bit works better than a twist drill bit. The best advice I got about learning to drill rocks was to be patient!

Today was a day spent off the island, doing errands and having lunch with Mom. No studio time, so here’s one of my old favorite photos. 

Here’s another clue…

Had I not stopped to photograph these toggle clasps for the blog, I might have fired them first and then realized that they would not hang right. The loop on the side of the toggle needed to be moved to the underside of the toggle so the clasp would sit flat when strung.

I would have been so lost without this article by Hadar Jacobson.  http://www.artinsilver.com/blog/

I fired the disc beads in an upright position to keep them from collapsing. One of them still settled enough to change the orientation of the holes,  and collapsed in enough to prevent a needle from going through.

The post earrings are hollow, made in two pieces. A domed front attached to a flat back. They were fired face down in the charcoal, and did not collapse much at all.

Results were not consistent from piece to piece. Next time I will photograph where I place them in the pan before firing. I will also try lowering  the kiln temperature for the second phase from 1550º to 1520º.

The 1″ figure below is how I procrastinated by needle felting, before finally learning how to program my new kiln.                      Its seasonal………