the Akamai Knitter

I like the shiny. I like it a lot. But sometimes the shiny just isn’t the right look for a piece of jewelry. So I decided to antique a few pieces.

I started by boiling a couple of eggs for about 15-20 minuntes.

woohoo! boiling eggs! how exciting!

Then I laid out all the pieces of jewelry I wanted to antique flat in an airtight bag with the eggs. I proceeded to crush the eggs until the yolks were exposed. I wanted to get a picture of all this action, but the best I could do was this:

the steam defies me!

The steam did not cooperate with the picture taking.

Backtracking to the night before when I had tried this method with only one egg cut in half and a mayonaisse jar. The results weren’t so spectacular.

this don't look so good.

The jar didn’t work well because I couldn’t turn the jewelry and because I had so many pieces of jewelry I really did need more then one egg.

After about 35-40 minutes of obsessively checking on the pieces and turning them so they were evenly oxidized, I decided that I had achieved a decent patina.

oxidized jewelry

They still need to be polished in my little toy tumbler, but I like the way they look. I’m so glad I can achieve this particular effect without using any type of toxic chemicals. It’s good to be green! :)

Just for giggles, I’ll throw in a before and after shot of one of the pieces.

before

after

In other news, I have picked up the needles again! Yes! It’s true! Progress has been slow, but at least it’s there.  So maybe there will be actual knitting to report on the knitting blog soon. Wouldn’t that be something? :-o

Happy Friday everyone! Have a smashing weekend. :-)

Once a year my friend Elaine has a party at her house where she invites vendors to come and sell their jewelry. I’ve passed on this event for the past few years as I’ve been more focused on the fiber arts, but this year I’m making it a point to attend. So I’ve been trying to create inventory for the show.

Last week I dedicated Wednesday to jewelry making. I made these *

art nouveau earrings

And these…

various heart component earrings

The party is on Black Friday.  It’ll be a race against time for me to have everything I want done by then. Unfortunately this means my other hobbies will suffer from neglect.

Yes. I’m slowly coming to the realization that I can’t do it all.

As for those of you who think Sammy is too sweet to plot any evil? Check out this picture of him.

evil sammy

See him giving me the evil eye? See?

Happy Monday, everyone! Thanks for reading. :)

*If you see a pair of earrings that you must have, just email me at opal AT akamaiknitter DOT com. There are more pictures here. Just scroll to the bottom. :)

except…

If you’re curious, the cat in question is Sammy. Does he look evil to you?

evil sammy?

You decide. :-P

Also, check out the glass spinning wheel in action! Too cool.

Happy Sunday, you all. I hope your weekend is going swimmingly. ;-)

car knitting rocks.  I started a pair of socks for my friend Kai on October 20th. I’ve managed to finish the first of the pair without ever having knit a stitch at home. I will admit to also working on these during my Aloha Knitters meetings, but the majority of the knitting done on these socks were done in the car while running errands.

first sock

You might notice there’s a bit of size difference between her foot and mine. She’s a size 10/11 shoe and I’m a size 7. This makes me even more proud to be done with the first sock. (I’m washing the socks before I give them to her.)

big sock, small foot

I also managed to get some work done on the second sock.

second sock

I don’t have much experience knitting socks for others. This makes me a little nervous that the sock won’t fit her even though I have measurements from her. I remain hopeful.

Right now I’m on a mission to knit socks for others. I simply have too many socks for a person living in the tropics. I think I have something like 18 pairs, which is ridiculous. I do plan on keeping special pairs for myself, like the Mingus socks that are currently hibernating.  But I like to keep a plain sock on the needles for the car and for knit group, so those are going to friends.

In other news, Sammy is growing. The vet said he’s probably going to grow to be over 10 lbs and I’m a little sad about that. It’s not that I won’t love him if he gets bigger, I just think he’s the perfect size as he is now. I guess I don’t want my baby to grow up!

sammy

Happy Wednesday everyone! Thanks for reading! :))

I had a birthday last month and I was blessed with many fibery treats from a couple of very good friends.

Not only did Megan give me some gorgeous French Angora to play with, but she also made me a very special Romney batt.

romney birthday batt

Then Jen gave me three different braids! That’s right! Three!

Gaia and Butterscotch

On the left there’s Rambouillet and on the right there’s Merino.  I’ve already thrown the third braid on the wheel. I forgot to take a picture of it while it was braided, so here it is in a ball.

mud pie

And here it is on the wheel.

mud pie single

I’m spinning it up into a 2-ply laceweight yarn. I’m thinking it might make a nice Honeybee Stole. We shall have to see how it looks once it’s plied.

All this fiber has really helped me get my spinning mojo back in gear, but I still found time to make another amigurumi toy.

she-devil cat

She came out looking a lot different than the original pattern due to the fact that I used different eyes. This was not by design, I just didn’t have the eyes called for in the pattern. So instead of a pure devil, I have a cat/devil type thing.

I also left out the mouth, because I just couldn’t figure out what would be an appropriate type of mouth. I think she looks fine without one, but what say you?

Finally, I want to thank everyone who expressed their concern over my silly statement in my last post. I’m going through a rough patch, but I’m more then positive it’ll pass. Especially with all the good friends I’ve made in the blogosphere. :))

Happy Friday, everyone! Have a fantabulous weekend!