My Little Mjolnir

It's very hard to find a small Mjolnir. Being a representation of the thunder god's most cherished weapon tends to not lend itself to descriptions such as 'small' or 'delicate'.



The early Mjolnir pendants, such as this one discovered in Denmark, were often times made of stone or iron, and ranged from intricately detailed works of art to rough, simple almost abstract shapes. They were first worn as protective talismans, but soon also became defiant symbols of faith as Christianity spread into the Germanic lands. Today they can be found recreated as nearly identical reproductions of the ancient pendants, or with entirely new designs and engravings. But on the whole they are still rather large and clunky. Which is why I was elated when my fiance found me this one at the Ren Faire in San Francisco years ago.



It was most certainly delicate, though not terribly small, measuring about 1.5" by 1". When it comes to the jewelry I wear on a daily basis, I like tiny things on small chains. Light and airy things. And though I love this Mjolnir, it is sometimes a bit much for every single day.
Last weekend, me and my fiance were poking around The Lucky Monkey gift shop in Bellingham, looking for a birthday card for my best friends daughter. And there it was. Back in the shadowy pagan corner. The tiniest Mjolnir ever.



Eeep! It is so small. I just had to have it. Funds have been low lately, and it was smack dab in the middle of the sterling silver jewelry tray. I dreaded the response, and almost couldn't bring myself to ask the fateful words 'How much?'. My jaw nearly hit the floor when the sweet heart behind the counter said six bucks. Six bucks. For a sterling silver Mjolnir. My birthday is next month, so I told Morgan he would have to come back and pick it up for me. He gently responded screw that, we're getting it now. Eeee!



So now I have the tiniest of tiny Mjolnirs. It is darn near dwarfed by my original one. I couldn't wait to get home and make a chain for it. I strung it up with sterling and fresh water pearls, and it is just perfect.




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The Sun Is Finally Out

... and boy are the kitties happy. It's been cloudy and overcast for quite a while here in my wonderfully soggy Washington, but the sun came out today and was greeted by fluffy cats flumping in every sun beam they could find.



This is Nick. She is a big fuzzy lump of Norwegian Forrest cat. I have never had a cat that took flopping so seriously. She excels at the sport. Ninety percent of the time you will find her cradled in pillows and piles of blankets. And she does it in such a way that she can fall asleep on her back, front paws hovering over her chest and back paws akimbo. The goddess Freya, when not riding her boar, rides in a chariot drawn by cats. Some think that it was in fact the Norwegian Forest cat that was up to this task. If so she wouldn't have gotten very far with Nick.



Bagheera, the big black Indian Fishing cat mixed with Siamese, and Frank, the Birman, prefer more dignified sniggling.

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Yay! Owl Vomit!

My dear, dear mother who knows me way too well, sent me the most amazing gift the other day. Owl pellets! Owl pellets are the regurgitated undigestible parts of an owl's breakfast, lunch, or dinner. And if you are fortunate enough to have a friend with a family of owls roosting in your yard, they are quite easily acquired. And if you are unfortunate enough to have me for a daughter you may find yourself in your friends yard pawing through the grass and picking owl puke. Thanks mom!



I forgot to snap some photo's before I started the macerating process, so here are some generic pics of owl pellets if you have never seen them before. They are small, dry lumps of matted fur and various goodies. Kind of like a cat's hair ball but with tiny bones in it!
I tried to macerate a dead bird I found in my yard by soaking it in bleach, only to find that the bleach destroys both the flesh and the bone. So this time, after doing a little research online, I decided to go with cold water maceration. You just drop the pellets in a jar of water, make sure the lid is on tight ( I cannot over state that part) and put it in a warm location. Mine ended up residing in the sunny windowsill of my living room. Soon I had a thick, greenish brown slurry of rotting flesh, fur, twigs and bones. Again, I'm sorry, I forgot to pull out my camera. And as long as your lid is on tight, the joy of smelling said concoction can wait till it's time to separate out the bones from the gunk. Mine sat for three days.



Yes, I do have a camera! So here we are, most of the way through the treasure hunt when I finally realize I should be taking some pictures. I made a strainer out of some window screen and part of a box. I then got the unique and unenviable experience of opening a jar of rotting mice that has sat in the sun for half a week. The nearly visible wave of stench that hit me made me want to drop to my knees and thank the gods for small favors like my severe allergies and near constant sinus congestion. The flesh and bone milkshake was poured into the strainer and rinsed thoroughly to remove most of the unwanted bits. I then went through with tweezers and removed all the bone from the remaining matted clots of hair. This was a painstaking, tedious and aromatic endeavor.



Back in the jar they went, skulls, ribs, femurs, teeth. It was like being on the set of the Texas Dollhouse Chainsaw Massacre. They will now spend a few more days lounging in the sun while the remaining bits of unwanted flesh decompose.



I will return when they have finished macerating.



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Koke Pendant

My mom has a beautiful little Meyers parrot named Koke. He's an adorable little mimic with beautiful plumage that ranges in color from dark grey and aquamarine to vibrant yellow and teal. She has been collecting his discarded feathers for a while now, and has sent boxes and boxes of the lovely downy quills to me.



I'd been pondering just what to do with these little treasures, when my mom asked if I would make her a pendant box with his feathers. Brilliant! I've been at work trimming, shaping, and curling the little buggers, trying to make an arrangement inside of a tiny box.



I have to say this has become one of my favorite boxes. The photo's just do not do it justice. I usually use lightly tinted book pages as backgrounds, but the delicate feathers were lost against the print on the paper. I ended up putting a wash of rich black gesso over the paper, which made the vibrant greens and blues of the feathers pop. Darkening the back ground gave it a dramatic, elegant feel. Combined with sparkling silver watch parts and twinkling rhinestones, it brings to mind a fan of peacock plumes a victorian heiress might have brought to a gala masquerade ball.



Koke's name is formed on the back with clipped print, and underlined by one of his bright yellow feathers, trimmed to perfection.



The necklace is finished off with sterling silver chain and wire wrapped deep blue peacock pearls. I'll be sorry to see this one go!



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The fun of storage

I love storage. The only thing better than organizing all your bits and pieces into perfectly sized containers is obtaining the bits and pieces themselves. And having beautiful containers that look lovely on display.
A while back I bought up a whole slew of little craft paper boxes in various shapes and sizes. They were nesting boxes, ranging in size from about 1" across to 2" across, and came in square and hexagonal. They had been clearanced down to just pennies a box, and I couldn't pass them up, even though I had no clue what I was going to do with them. After playing around with them for a while, I came up with a wonderful use. I now have cute little shelves made of 2" L shaped molding full of my little treasures and supplies on display.



Here's how:

Remove the lids from the boxes, and trace a cutting line on the top of the lid apx 1/8 -1/4" away from the outer edge. Use an X-acto knife to cut along your line and remove the 'window' from the lid of your box.
Now you need a sturdy piece of clear plastic sheeting to use as your window pane, and the plastic packaging that comes with the everyday odds and ends you buy is perfect. You know the plastic packaging that comes on on darn near every little electronic gizmo you buy? That annoying wrapper with the melted together seams that you just about need a cutting torch and machete to get open? Well that stuff is perfect! And it can be found on many other items as well. It's crystal clear, with a good sturdy thickness. It took me a bit of scrounging through my boxes and closets, but I eventually found enough of it to make all the panes I needed.




Use the 'window' you already cut out of your lids as a template. You are going to want to cut your panes larger than the template, but small enough to fit into the inside your your box lids. Once you have those cut, use a simple white craft tacky glue to glue them into your box lids. Remember people, your plastic pane goes inside the lid. Set them aside to dry completely.
Now you are going to glaze your panes. This will add stability, and seems to increase the transparency of the plastic. I used Inkssentials Crackle Accent, but any thick 3 dimensional glossy medium should work. If you use the Crackle Accent like I did, it will not crackle and craze throughout the whole surface due to the properties of the plastic surface beneath it. But it will crackle along the edges of your pane where it touches the craft box, creating a frosty edged - winter window look that is very fun. Whatever you choose to use, be sure and remove any bubbles by dragging them to the surface with a pin, and allow to dry completely.
I chose to paint the inside of my boxes. I used black for a more dramatic look, but you could use white to keep things lighter, or use a color that coordinates with the room they will be in.
After filling them, I use little black rubber bands to keep them closed should they get knocked off the shelf by a frisky cat.




I now have lovely little shelves full of little curiosities begging people to take a peek inside. And you will find everything from assorted ball bearings and the cast off shells of robin's eggs, to insect husks and gem stones. So please enjoy, and leave me a comment if anything is lacking in my instructions.


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1" Curiosities

I've been putting together some one inch by one inch shadow box pendants, and they've turned out really cute.



Collages of hand painted and stained book pages and individually antiqued letter tiles, studded with watch gears and little mechanical parts. Some are frosted with tiny rhinestones, and one even has tiny princess cut topaz loosely tumbling around inside with small blue metallic orbs. A touch of heart shaped confetti and some clipped type finish off another box. They have been way too much fun to make.



I've got some sterling chain and wire on the way, and soon my little boxes will be combined with pearls and crystals to make finished necklaces. I can't wait! I've promised a friend of mine she and her coworkers will have first pick of them, and the rest will be split between etsy and the gallery.





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Empty Shelves and Possibilites

I was invited last week to put some of my treasures in the Art and Soul Gallery in Bothell Washington. It's part of the uber quaint little Country Village So I packed up a basket full of trinkets and brought them down. Problem is, now my etsy shop is almost bare. I took down my newest box, so I'll just have to show some pics of it here.



I'm trying to whip up some little 1" shadow box pendants to fill my shelves again.



It's slow going. The surface of the paper I'm using to construct them is glossy, so I'm having a heck of a time keeping them glued in place till I can solder them. Oh well, they should turn out pretty cute. Now, what to fill them with?


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Help with photos

I'm creating this post to get some help with photos. I'm trying to photograph glass boxes with decorative interiors. I've constructed a light box, with an above light, and a light on each side, all otlites.



Here is how the pics are turning out. Very dark interiors, with glare from all other light sources.





Here is a shot with also using the flash on my camera. You can finally see inside the box, bit it's vary harsh.



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Yggdrasill

I'm working on a new box, and it seems it's just too darn small. I really didn't think this one out.
There's no way I'm fitting Asgardhr, Ljossalfheimr, Niflheimr, Jotunheimr, Svartalheimr, Muspellsheimr, Vanaheimer, Midhgardhr and Hel into a little 2" x 3" box. Not to mention all the wells, or the stags in it's branches, or the snakes in Hvergelmir.



Here is my wire Yddgrasill, in a little box with a water colored landscape behind.
I think I'm gonna have to set this box aside and work on a larger one. Oh this is gonna be a project.


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New Banner

Just whipped up a new banner for my shop, the old one wasn't cutting it.



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Slowly but surely

Oh how cool! I'm still figuring out all the neat little things to do on etsy.com, and today I visited the Storque Blog page. I was blown away when I saw one of my pieces on the front page. Too cool! You can check out the article here


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