Challenges for 2011

Challenges - we have 2!

Butterfly Pin Challenge - due in March 2011

Carol Harder has challenged members to use an enameled butterfly pin (her gift to each member as a thank - you for making her charm bracelet ,) She has a variety of butterflies to select from. The challenge: use the butterfly pin in a piece of jewelry or something.....She attached one to a beaded flower ring, above. If you missed the meeting you can stop by Harder Performance to get a butterfly or pick one up at the February meeting (Feb. 15, 2011)


KC Fountains Challenge - due in May 2011 Be inspired by one of the many Kansas City fountains to create something! Must include some PMC or other metal clay.

Making Custom Headpins and more

The KC PMC Guild Chapter's January meeting was filled with new ideas and Jule's headpin demo.

What's new?   Verrey Glass© Fusing (Cold Cast Pate-de-Verre)

Margaret Braet (long-time member of our guild chapter and local Kansas City artist) has been developing her own product - called Verrey Glass© - and she's now teaching classes and selling her product. The next local class is at the end of January 2011 - at Heartland Bead Marketing in Lenexa.

What's new about this? Traditonal pate-de-verre is a class casting technique layering glass (frit in a suspension medium) in a plaster mold for firing. (photo of a fabulous beaded collar by member, Betty Chaison, with a cast glass serpent in the center which she brought to show at the meeting.)

This requires working blind and backwards if using colors and leaves a plaster film which must be removed. Margaret's technique permit reusing molds (even like silicone texture stamps) and much more control of color placement. Go, Margaret! She's promised to demo this for us later this year.

Headpin Demo 

 
Using 20ga fine silver wire and a variety of small shapes (flowers, disks and balls) Jule's created various headpins, suitable making so-simple earrings or using with beads or any way you might use a headpin. She also demonstrated how to ball the ends of the wire with a torch and to ball up scraps of wire or bits of PMC scrap. This also works with Sterling silver, but the balls turn black and need to be pickled.

Tip 1: to make uniform balls of silver (for setting onto a PMC piece or soldering to a fabricated piece)

1. wind the wire around a mandrel as for making jump rings, choosing the mandrel size to control the amount of wire per piece
2. cut the coil as for jump rings, the resulting rings will have a equal length of wire
3. using a small torch on a charcoal block, ball (heat with torch until it melts) up the pieces 

View a Cool Tools video on Youtube.com here.

Tip 2: hold the wire straight into the flame - a tilted wire results in an off center ball or one that melts and drops off.
Tip 3: torches vary! The hotter the torch, the faster the wire melts, so know your equipment.
 
BE SAFE: Always work over a flame-protected area, wear eye protection and cotton clothing...

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Want to be reminded about

• KC PMC Guild Events
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Want to connect with or find others in the Kansas City metropolitan area that share your interest in precious metal clays (and related activities)?

Here's how:
Check out our website at www.kcpmcguild.org - where we post

• regular (mostly) updates about meeting topics, locations, what to bring to demos, etc.
• driving directions to our meeting location 
• pics of cools stuff people bring to meetings
• links to local classes and PMC teachers
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Read our semi-regular blog posts at www.kcpmcguild.blogspot.com . You can also click to
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SUBSCRIBE to posts (does the same thing, basically)
This eliminates the need to go check the blog unless there is new information there. We promise not to be pesky - we usually add posts before and after our monthly meetings, not every day.

On Facebook, look for PMC Guild International and like it. They post news and info about what's happening in the PMC world, such as this recent link to a cool PMC firing chart.

You can also help - if you are a shop selling PMC or jewelry supplies and /or offer classes in PMC (or other metal clays) we'd like to add you to our reference list. Please contact us. Note: you will need to edit the email address from "at" to "@" for the email to send.

We are NOT using our old Yahoo Groups to communicate and will be removing that link from our site.

January 18, 2011 Meeting Demo Info

 Jules Van Hoecke will demo how to make silver balls for decorating your PMC pieces and how to do the same with scrap PMC (fired). AND, we'll make decorative head pins with silver wire and clay. Sounds like an interesting evening!






 Bring your own wire (20 ga FINE silver), clay and tools. Torch optional. Wire and PMC will be available to purchase at the meeting. We hope to use the on-site kiln to fire finished headpins.

Tools and Supplies needed to make your own decorative head pins

    * torch ( + firing equipment i.e. charcoal block, protective surface, etc)
    * 20 ga fine silver wire (we have some if you want to buy)
    * clay
    * wire cutters
    * tools needed to work with clay
    * scraps silver (fired pmc) or silver wire ( for making decorative balls)

If you have ever accidentally melted your silver with a torch, you know how frustrating that can be. However, you can also learn to intentionally melt silver into perfect little balls of metal - it's nearly as fun as hammering or kneading bread - a little destructive aggression can be channeled into something useful!

Jules will bring tools but bring your own set up if you really want to make some headpins during the meeting. We'll try to fire up Carol's kiln and fire what we make.

Note: Fine silver wire must be used for making headpins with PMC heads. Sterling wire may be used to make simple balled wire headpins. 20 or 22 ga is best.

Meeting starts at 7 pm.
 Don't forget our first CHALLENGE - due in May 2011.

KC PMC Guild 2010 Charm Exchange

This was our third annual charm exchange, where members spend the November meeting making charms to exchange with one another in December. We have done both silver and copper clay, this year returning to use PMC3 silver clay. Although more signed up, at our December meeting we had 12 people with finished charms.

This is the collection of charms I received - not everyone made their charms identical, so some of us likely have a different collection. It's always interesting to see how people decide to use their variety of charms, so in the coming months we will share finished jewelry photos.

Artists' names included when known. We'll try to identify and add names.

The tab-style charm with musical not design was by Cheryl Coleman. 

Some of her charms were stamped with a sun-face motif.

Jules Van Hoecke (sweet heart imprint with darkened detail)

Lynette Fisk  (used 2-part silicone molding putty to create a mold from an old spoon handle, then added LOS patina.)

Darkly patina-ed flower from

This one looks a bit like an ancient coin.

(square charm with added chrystal)

Great patina on this 4-pointed star by Linda Maloney. She used stamps on both sides, cut the charm freehand and heavily oxydized it.

Dainty textured star

Leafy cutout from a textured round charm by Liz Willis. Liz enameled most of her charms but this is one of several on which she experimented using different hole punches.

Floral imprint, perhaps from an old button?

Jen Finley  (Man in the moon charm with crystals)

Carol Harder (leaf charm to which she added a variety of colored glass beads)

Thanks, Carol Harder

At our December meeting and Christmas party, the members of the Kansas City Chapter of the PMC Guild surprised our host Carol with a thank you gift - we pulled off the surprise! Members were all invited to make a charm (or two) in their favorite medium (PMC or other) to add to a bracelet for Carol Harder.

Since our first meeting several years ago, Carol has generously hosted our meetings in her driving school's classroom space. She makes us coffee, offers treats, bottled water and we use her paper supplies. She frequently is a presenter, sharing her many years of teaching experience and jewelry-making skills as well as her supplies. We have done pewter casting, glass enameling on copper, and many other things thanks to her sharing of supplies and equipment. Carol has an MFA in metalsmithing and taught high school art in the KC area for over 30 years.

She has also battled cancer more than once, including now, and yet never complains and always attends our meetings or makes sure we have access to the room if she is ill or out of town.

So....here is the nearly finished bracelet....

Some of the charms are PMC and others are beaded, fabricated, woven, felted, wired, found or sculpted.

Janice Lemasters created three charms, using wire, beads and found objects.

Leanne Doljac created a sparkler from PMC and a rhinestone bead ball.

This amazing charm was made by Betty Chaisson by painting a leaf with PMC paste and adding a pearl.

Robin MacIntosh created a large (1 1/8" long) PMC charm with a bead.

Jules Van Hoecke created a sculptural layered flower with a topaz colored CZ fired in the center.

Jen Finley's creation features PMC paste fired onto a large round lava rock bead.

Joyce Reed knows Carol's love of color, and combined beads with a silver headpin to create this charm.

Carol Hale used her fabricating skills to create this tree or arrowhead shape from sheet silver and added gold and silver beadwork.

Pat Kuehn used a variety of techniques to make charms from a felted bead and wire, press glass beads and a doll's eye with a seed beaded bezel.

Liz Willis (also a beader) created a beaded bead, weaving a hollow bead from tiny seed beads and using it to create her charm.

Lynette Fisk's charm is faux antique coral bead, created from polymer clay, sterling and brass wire and acrylic paint.

 Linda Maloney created a PMC coin which she embellished with dice and heart charms.

Mindy McLaughlin made a charm using pearls, turquoise and Bali silver on wire.

Cheryl Coleman's charm has symbolism, representing her nickname (Pooh bear), her company (Angel Stamps) on a yin yang bead.

 Janie Clark's adorable bird charm was lost in my Christmas card pile! It will soon be added to Carol's bracelet.

We were pleased with the results...

Our guild chapter has nearly 50 names on our roster, though not all are currently active. However, if other members want to add to Carol's bracelet, they still may. She's a jeweler, after all - she can add them herself!

We did print a 4x6 photo of each charm to be signed by the artist and presented to Carol so she can remember each of us by our charm.

Merry Christmas!

Tonight is our annual members charm exchange - watch for pictures later this week of the great items we expect to see tonight. Guests are welcome - we'll start at 7:00 p.m. Bring a snack to share.

Directions on our website at www.kcpmcguild.org