First There Was One…

     Tomorrow is the first day of school. I am a little bit nervous because we will have 4 new kids in our class. Meeting new kids always makes me a bit nervous because there is no relationship with them and you have to build one. Until then you have kids that may or may not trust you and may or may not want to work with you. It's a tricky time. But I am sure this will be a great year. And crowded! There are a more kids and more adults in our room this year. We will probably spend more time than ever being in each others way. 

     Yesterday, I was not sure what to do after I got home from doing a bunch of errands. I have a lot of finished dolls at the moment. I am not sure what to make next. I have western pleasure dolls, casual western dolls, hunt seat dolls, upper level dressage dolls, casual English dolls, even a casual English doll with tattoos. So yeah, I am not sure what to make next. So I decided to give myself a brain-break... and make something I hate making. 

     I don't know what possessed me to do it, but I made this set of black saddlebags. So far there is nothing in them, other than the water bottles, because I don't currently have the things to put in them. That will have to be a project for another day. And it will also have to be some things ordered because I am not going to make all the things. But probably a lot of things. 

    This week, or more correctly, the end of last week and this weekend, I got back into some jewelry making and stone wrapping. It has been a long time since I have done any of that. I also discovered some fun settings on my iphone camera so I could take this really cool picture. This necklace is celestine and quartz beads. The stones are a bit bluer than this photo shows, but I really like this photo!

      So you know how I said "first there was one"? Well, I figured I already had all the stuff out to do a project that I really do kind of hate, so why not work on some more saddlebags? The convenience of having a dedicated studio space is being able to leave my crap out. The doll iron is on the desk, the ziplocks of random pieces that I use for the bags are out. It's really convenient. I won't say it makes this hated task better, but it makes it more efficient. 

     Once I got started on wrapping stones and making jewelry again, I decided to keep on going. So this weekend I made a bunch of things. This obsidian and tourmaline necklace, which is insanely hard to photograph, was another piece. This one hasn't made it to my website yet but hopefully soon. 

     Several stones got wrapped in this style over the weekend. Including this blue aventurine. It's fun, different than what I usually do, and works really well on flat stones. I did also try it on a rough stone that was not flat, and it worked, but I want to redo that one before I share it. Sometimes I just don't like the way a wrap turns out. But anyway, after not making any jewelry, or doing any wrapping, for months, I got 7 pieces done this past week/end.

     And we can't forget the saddlebags. I did finish the lime green set and the pink set. So now there are 3. Which is pretty good. I am trying to see if I can talk myself into making a couple more this week. School starts tomorrow, but I do have time after school to make one set of bags, if I get started sort of right when I get home. If I do that, if I can stay awake to do that, I can have two more sets done this week. Because no doll work happens on Friday after school. Travis and I have our coffee date then. Wow, when I think of the week in terms of after school work and coffee dates... it's already almost the weekend. Which is weird, seeing as it's only Tuesday. 

     I do still need to get and make the stuff to go inside the saddlebags, since people do seem to prefer the bags that have stuff in them to empty ones. That will take some time. I also am thinking to make at least some other miniature items, though I am not sure exactly what or when. And I am sure someone has to be wondering when these items could possibly be available. Well, miniature items are only ever available at my live sales. The next one will be my Black Friday sale. And I promise, this one is actually going to happen. I know I have said a couple of times this past year that I was going to have one, but I just didn't have the time to pull together enough stuff to make it worth it to do one. But I will definitely do a sale for Black Friday. So far I am planning on dolls, at least a few sets of saddlebags, mystery boxes... and I have no idea what else. But it should be fun!