Jewellery By Shalini

Looking Forward to seeing you at the Stamford Crafts Market on Sunday, 20th September. Jewellery By Shalini will be in the Stamford Arts Centre. Greensleaves Florists will also be attending and the stall is on the Stamford High Street.

I have agreed to have a craft stall at the Stamford Dog Show being held on the Stamford Meadows on Sunday, 13 th September 2009. The Stamford Dog Show is organised by Trinity Methodist Church, Barn Hill, Stamford Lincs . This is the 5 th Annual Dog Show and Children's Pet show. It has always been a family Fun Day out and is very popular with animal lovers, young and old. And our Friends Tony and Sandra from Pets Korner Stamford are the Main Sponsor for the Dog & Pet Show. I will display my jewellery there (of course!) but we will also display a range of rough rocks and tumble stones. These are becoming increasingly popular as decorations and also for people who are into crystal healing. And of course my dear friend Amanda of Greensleaves Florist will be sharing the stand with me with her range of Fresh flower Bunches, Bouquets, Flower arrangements and Silk Flower displays. Amanda also makes greeting cards for all occasions. From previous experience at craft fairs and fami...

I've talked about the Cabochons I made in some of my earlier posts. Here is a Pendant I made from one of my cabs. What is special about this pendant is that I was responsible for every step involved in creating the Cabochon. First I cut the rough piece of Rutilated Quartz on the rock saw then shaped it on our Home Made Cabochon machine . Once the stone had been through the process of shaping it was put through various stages on the silicone carbide belts to smooth the surface and finally polished on the polishing wheel using cerium oxide polish. The cabochon I made was pretty special, if I may say so myself :-) No marks, fractures or rough bits and it took a mirror like polish. Woo Hoo! So the cabochon is ready. What next? Of course I had to get it wire-wrapped as quickly as I could, before Dave kidnapped it for one of his jewellery pieces (Ha Ha). I was not going to let him have this one! Yes I know he has done some very special work on his Labradorite cabochons and made specta...

It’s almost a year today since I first met Amanda Clarke who runs Greensleaves Florist in Stamford. And what a fantastic meeting that was! I made a friend. Amanda is an independent florist with years of experience about flowers and floristry. Her flower arrangements are just beautiful. What amazes me about Amanda is the passion she has for flowers and how much of her special touch she puts into each arrangement whether it’s a little posy or a big Wedding order. Amanda has a beautiful shop at the Stamford Garden Centre in Great Casterton and what a shop it is! You walk in and everything is so beautifully displayed, the shop just makes you feel so welcome. The fresh flower arrangements are really fresh and the silk displays so pretty. All created by Amanda. There is even a private little room where you can discuss your requirements of flowers for your Wedding Day, Birthday Party or that very sombre moment when you have to go in and discuss wreaths and tributes because a loved one ...

Here is a picture of my first cabs :-) As I said before I am not 100% satisfied with them but it's a start. It's my first attempt and some of them have turned out all right. The others, well back to the grinding wheel again I guess. Here is a close up of the individual cabochons: These are the ones that definitely need more work! ------------------------------------------- These I am reasonably pleased with for a first attempt :-) They are a lot shinier than the pictures show ------------------------------------------- And this one was a bugger! Its a Porcelain Jasper with such beautiful patterns on it but try as I might it does not get an overall smooth finish. The different patterns all seem to have different properties and grind down differently. I'll think about this one a bit more. ------------------------------------------- And I am proud of this one!

OK so I have made some cabochons now. Not 100% satisfied with them, but not too bad for a first attempt. I don't have pictures to show yet. I took some but the light wasn't too good and the focus was bad so they look like little coloured blobs. I am going to ask the expert - Dave - to take the photos for me and if he can do it today I will post them later this evening.

I have taken my first step towards making Cabochons :-) You have already seen some beautiful photos I posted of the Cabs Dave has made. Well I'm making them as well now. I have watched and learned from him and started. Yes that does mean I am now hogging the Cabochon making machine (see picture) :-) but it's a lot of fun. Ok so how it starts is that you cut the rough rock chunks into slabs, then shape them on the diamond wheel, then take it through the various phases of grinding down to a smooth finish. If done right you should end up with a perfectly polished piece with a mirror like shine. That's the general idea anyway. Right, so some rocks were slabbed on the Saw and then they were ready for working on. Let’s get on with it then…. But I wanted to do Rose Quartz and Sodalite and these were not part of the slabs we had cut. I have seen Dave spend hours on putting these slabs on Dop Sticks using wax. See picture of dop Sticks. He had a Rose Quartz and a Sodalite piece on ...