Summer in January ... something to hold you over in the cold of winter.

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Green Corn Feather for Christen

This past weekend my family and I were out on the reservation for the annual Green Corn celebration. Because I was on my moon cycle, I was not able to participate fully. When it is your 'time' as a woman, you cannot touch the other people on the grounds because your body is in the process of purifying. You also are not able to touch the food, not even for preparation purposes. This left a great burden on the shoulders of my MIL because she was left with the task of preparing for the new fire from the ceremonial square AND doing all of the cooking and preparation for the men in our camp (for three out of four days). I was feeling rather guilty about leaving her with all of this work, but it was not like I had much choice in the matter. Thank goodness that her son Mark came down from New York and brought his girls. Christen, Mark's oldest daughter did a lot of women's work to make up for my inability to work. She was a tremendous help to Mimi (my MIL) and I cannot imagine Mimi having had to do it all alone. Thank goodness for Christen!

I found myself trying to think of an appropriate award for Kristen (and her sister Anna - who helped a great deal with my one year old daughter - a MUCH appreciated task) and of course my mind went to jewelry, because I can make that. :) As I struggled to think of something that would really resonate with their memories of the weekend, I remembered that sometimes as a reward to the male children and the men for contributions to their community (usually in the form of labor and/or performing certain tasks imperative to ceremonial functions), they might be given a feather. This is a special acknowledgement and a great honor. This gave me the brilliant idea of presenting Kristen and Anna with FEATHER pendants to acknowledge them for their contributions in the family camp. This is the first of two feathers. This one is for Kristen. Kristen also went through Green Corn this year, having fasted from midnight Friday until dinner on Saturday and having stayed up continuously from Saturday morning to noon on Sunday entirely by her own choice. She danced around the fire all night right along side everyone else. This is no easy task and I know that everyone, including myself, is very proud of her for this accomplishment. She is certainly on her way to becoming a woman.

I decided not to oxidize this piece because I am only putting it on a cord and I assume that she will likely switch it to a sterling chain later down the line. I would not want the feather to look 'dirty' next to the bright silver of a new chain, so I opted to leave the feather bright for her.

You can read more about Green Corn on my wordpress blog , and of our weekend. All to come as soon as I catch my breath and recover from the weekend. :)

Tutorial Notification List LOST!

Can you see me kicking myself? I just made a terrible mistake. I accidentally deleted my Tutorial Notification Mailing List. I lost hundreds of addresses of individuals wanting to be updated on new tutorial releases. Amazing how the click on one button can undo years of work. I just love technology, don't you? Arrrgh!

If you were on my list for tutorial notification, or you would like to be on my list for new tutorial notification, please email me at Tutorials@DeliaStone.com with a request and I will gladly add you to the new list.

So sorry all! Believe me when I say I am heart sick over this. Now ... back to kicking myself.

As many of you know I create jewelry making tutorials from time to time and I am about to start another one. My problem is that I just can’t decide which one to do next. I have so many pieces that people have requested tutorials that I just don’t know where to start. I’ve narrowed it down to two possibilities but I just can’t seem to make a decision, hence I pose the question to you. Any feedback is welcomed.

I think I should either do the ‘foray pendant’ tutorial next, which is a very basic lesson in the rainbow style using a strip set crystal as the focal. See the pictures below:



another example:



The second option would be my sculpted coil pendant. A few examples of the sculpted coil pendant are below:



Example 2



Example 3





So, after having seen the possibilities of the two techniques, which one would you prefer to see published next? Drop me a comment here, or email me at Tutorials@DeliaStone.com with feedback.

Filed under: How To ..., Jewelry Making Tutorials, Uncategorized

Making Progress
Monday, May 12, 2008


Well, if you've looked around on the site recently you can see I have been busy working to update it. I will be preparing to send out a newsletter as soon as the updates are completed. I have been working on photography a bit here and there and I have a few new photos up to share as well. You'll see the previous blog entry was updated with pictures just today and you'll find many more necklaces and pendants listed on the site as well. I still have much work to do, but at least I am making progress.

I recently won third place in the Metalchasers.com April Metamorphasis Contest. There was some fierce competition and many well deserving peices. I entered my 'Tribute to Spring' Necklace, shown below;



Yes folks ... those of you who know me know that it took every ounce of resistance I could muster to keep from oxidizing it! And it helped that my whole jar of LOS has disappeared since my last show. ::grrrr:: Ah well, I have decided I like this one bright. :)

More updates to come!

Life has been hectic ... seems like when the warmer months arrive time flys faster and even though there is more light in the day, there is less time in the day. It's just that there's so much more to do.

I'm presently preparing for the Northwest Florida Art Councils Outside Art Fair show to be held May 17th and 18th. I sure am hoping that the weather holds for me this go 'round. The last show I did was effectively rained out which made for a pitiful show. The economy is having ill consequences for American artists as it is .. and the weather doesn't seem to be helping much either. :( Come rain or shine, I will be sitting in my booth this weekend hoping to at least earn back my investment. If it's raining, put on your slickers and come see me anyway!

The last few weeks I've found myself tied up with comissions. One of them was quite the challenge for me. I made a basket weave bezel pendant on custom order with a pin backing. Originally I thought it would be as easy as ordering a prefab pin backing and afixing it to the pendant - WRONG. I could not find one in an appropriate size ... they were all either a couple of mm too big or too small so I had to make my own. I agonized over this pin backing. I wanted to be sure it was strong enough and fully secure and I had to redo it a couple of times to get it just so. But the good news is that I learned something from this project. Now I can add pins to my hat, so to speak. Though I must admit, I doubt I will take anymore pins on custom order because it took too much time - all the fretting and agonizing over getting it perfect. UGH.



After the pin was completed, I took a full 24 hours to celebrate before moving on to my next comission. A lady by the name of Joan had a ring that was special to her because it contained her prized angel skin coral carved rose stone. An amazingly beautiful stone ... but unfortunately the ring had been stepped on and it was beyond repair when it came into my hands. I remade the ring for her and was fretting over whether or not she would like the final product - thankfully I recieved news that she loved it. You can find a picture of the ring below.




Thanks for stopping by. Keep an eye on the website for some changes soon to come.