Custom Jewlery and Skelly Heads

I just got finished with one of my favorite types of custom work. My client brought me a beautiful, long strand of ivory-colored carved beads, and gave me no deadline, and no restrictions on what I could do with them. She had been told they might be ivory, but I think they are carved ox-bone from China.

 

This is the first necklace and earring set. I added raku donuts, ceramic donuts and fancy jasper. At first, I didn't realize that the raku beads didn't have holes in them.  I ended up attaching them by making loops of seed beads closed off with crimps. The second piece has a carved bone donut in the center. I attached it in the same way.

 Here is the completed second piece:

And here are some fun skeleton heads that I made for a new shop in downtown Fredericksburg called Horseshoes and Hand Grenades. It's the type of shop that I loved to go to when I was in college. It has all kinds of vintage clothing items, records and cool retro home furnishings.

It is a little unsettling for me to go in there, though. Most of the vintage items were brand new when I was in college! I guess that makes me vintage, too!