Last night I opted to observe the long held tradition of Sunday Craft Night. My celebrations included listening to Montana Public Radio while constructing a few pairs of earrings from components in my craft supply stash. Although my partners in craft are still in Oregon, I had their company in spirit.
This morning I awoke shortly following the sun's rise and so decided to utilize the low angled brightness as my photography spotlight. The Bitterroot Mountain range is my backdrop. A willow branch works as my model.
My favorite pair that I made last night, and have been wanting to make for quite awhile, are composed of two smushed pennies.
I put these pennies through a machine in Depot Bay, at my best guess, sometime during the summer of 2003. Both read “OREGON COAST” within their embossed image. Just a nail and hammer was needed to poke the hole through the longer oval end of the flattened copper alloy. It's that easy!
One has an image of a sailboat. The other, my favorite, is of a logging truck.
“Keys” is another simple pair. I used larger French Hooks for these silver keys (while definitely smaller and lighter than average keys, they're still somewhat weighty). I believe I salvaged this key set from Free Geek. A windmill is embossed on one side of each key.
“Pinked” is a junky pair of earrings, but certainly still worth wearing. The pink teardrop plastic bead is from a dismantled piece of costume jewelry I took from Candice. These beads have also been used for other pieces (see March's “Free Geek Glam”). A steel washer rests behind the bead. Malleable metal beads from another salvaged bracelet were pinched using pliers to clamp and secure the ends of the yellow-coated wire into a loop.
“Sprung” uses engraved plastic beads salvaged from SCRAP and a black steel spring from Free Geek. The components are pierced by a malleable metal pin. The upper end of the pin is coiled into a loop to secure the spring in place.
“Tubular” also uses a coiled metal pin arrangement. Colorful tiny beads salvaged from another earring surround a single cylinder hexagonal steel nut.
“Roped,” a lasso motif, consists of two steel nuts and green coated electrical wire.
“Washer” is a pair of earrings I made a couple weeks ago and is the only pair of earrings I brought with me to Montana. (Needless to say, they've certainly been getting some use.) Mismatched steel nuts, hexagonal cylinders, and a thin black coated wire make up this design.
“Linked” is a 1/2” nut linked to a smaller serrated edged washer using another tiny discolored washer.
These penny charms are wrapped in copper wire salvaged from computer circuit boards. The “Lucky” penny was a random find in the cash register of a used book store I volunteered with – and I have been wearing it ever since. The 1956 “ONE CENT” Wheatie is wrapped in wire sculpted to resemble a star.
Wearing the “Lucky” penny necklace and smushed earrings together might be over kill. But, sometimes, I like over kill.
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