I'm very excited to announce that I've come up with a name for my new shop! My new gemstone jewlery shop will be called Elizabethxoxo (http://www.elizabethxoxo.etsy.com). I still haven't thought of a name for my polymer clay jewelry shop, but that will hopefully follow. As it is I'm not ready to open that shop yet anyway, as I've decided to do everything one shop at a time. I've been thinking of names like Elizabethrosexoxo as a lot of the pieces I will be planning to sell on that shop will involve roses or some other kind of flower, but I'm not for sure yet.
I will let you know as soon as I'm sure what I want my second shop to be called, unfortunately it won't be on this blog.
I made this blog to match the name of my etsy shop, and now that I'm moving away from that shop, I realized I'd have to make a new blog as well. I'm not happy about having to make a new blog, but I feel like I have to to be consistent with my shop name.
my new blog is http://www.elizabethxoxo.blogspot.com, and I will start posting on there once my blog opens on Tuesday August 25th 2009.
Thanks for following! I hope you had as much fun reading as I did writing.
Sunday, August 16, 2009
New Shop = New Blog :(
Wednesday, August 5, 2009
Painting The Roses Red
I've felt a lot like '"Alice in Wonderland" lately, practicing making my clay roses over and over for my new jewelry shop I mentioned earlier. I'm pleased to say that after much practice my roses look much nicer than the clay one I blogged about before. However at this moment I only have white clay, so after my roses were baked I had to literally paint the white roses red :P.
I'm hoping to have my new shop up and running by the first of September. I have a few ideas of what I want to do with the name of the shop, but I think I'll keep them to myself until I have something for sure ^-^
I've only just started turning the roses into jewelry and I have many many ideas for designs and colors for those designs, which means I have some work to do! I also have a list of new ideas for my precious metal and gemstone jewelry shop - including my new "love you forever" line I will be putting out soon - though I don't have a date as of yet for the grand unveiling, I think I'm going to wait until after my new shop is done, just to keep me from losing my mind :)
Monday, August 3, 2009
Jewelry Video Tutorials
I had a few friends asking me how to make wire wrapped jewelry, and after showing them the basics of it I decided to make this video so that everyone who wants to can learn at least the basics for free on youtube, instead of having to have to buy "how to" books ect. like I did when I was starting out :)
The video was fun to make, though I must have gone through about 50 little pieces of wire, because every time I'd mess up a word I'd be half way through wrapping it, and the wire was no good anymore :P
I think I'll probably make more videos like this one, with other tutorials like "how to wrap a briolette" and simple things like that for now. I'll get into the more elaborate stuff as I go along.
I hope people find them useful ^-^ I also have a little version of the video from youtube on the side-bar of my blog with a link under it to the youtube page. I'll be putting new ones there in their place as they come up :)
Saturday, August 1, 2009
Baking Practice Inspires New Jewelry Shop
I mentioned a few posts ago that my sister recently became engaged (yay ^-^) and that she and I have taken on the task of her wedding cake. Neither of us have ever taken any sort of baking or cake decorating course, but we figure if we practice a lot during her three year engagement we can pull it off (if not do it well) with what knowledge we have.
So today was gum paste day. She wants to put gum paste roses on her cake, which are a little difficult to do - especially to do nicely, so we're starting practicing now. We watched a couple tutorials, and this is what I came up with. 
They aren't perfect by ANY stretch of the imagination, but next time I'll roll the gum paste a little thinner and stretch them out a little more. Regardless I was happy with it for a first try. Then I had the idea to make necklaces out of them! I think I will be opening up a shop that I will connect to my shop to sell non-gemstone jewelry so I can sell jewelry with these polymer clay roses :)
This is my first attempt at a polymer clay rose in plain old boring white:
Again, not stunning, but maybe after another 100 tries :P My new shop won't be opening for a while, but I'm very excited for when it does.
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Ring Day!
With only a couple days left of my "Engagment Sale" (read about it here) I've decided to ring crazy and make 7 more ring designs to add to the sale. Unfortunately 'Ring Day' was supposed to be almost a week ago, but my photography depends on the natural light coming in from my south facing window, and it's been raining every day between then and now. It was actually raining today, but the sun came out for about 5 minutes and I took all my pictures then.
Because of this inconvenience I'm designing a small studio like set up to take my pictures indoors and with artificial lighting so I can take pictures of my items regardless of the weather conditions and if it's 3:00 in the morning :) I'll be sure to list pictures of the contraption once I've finished making it, and report on whether or not it works well. I'm hoping to get all my supplies and have it finished this weekend.
Until then I will continue to use sunlight - whenever the sun decides to shine. This is a sneak peak at the rings I will be listing tonight. Enjoy! :)
Sunday, July 26, 2009
Dealing with a Picky Eater
My boyfriend's birthday is coming up in about a month - which is good, I have his present all picked out and everything. My only issue is that he doesn't like cake. I'd really like to make him a birthday cake, but I've tried - I can't find ANY kind of cake that he will eat.
People who know me - or have read some of my previous posts, know that I like to bake, and so NOT being able to make him a cake on his birthday kinda saddens me. I was going to settle for a rice crispy cake with sprinkles on it and candles (he like rice crispy cake) but I found something today that I like even better. 
Brownies are stepping up in the world. They seem to no longer be the simple;
- open mix
- stir in eggs and water
- pour in pan
- bake for 10 minutes
- cool and serve
that they once were.
They even make these silicone "pans" now for making individual brownie squares so you don't have to cut up the brownie - they're already baked in their own separate pieces, and other very useful tools to help you make better brownies like different icing tools, and 'cookie cutters' that are specifically made for brownies.
my favorite though is this new way I found to make brownies more fancy looking with these new 'stencils' they make for brownies, and colored dusting sugar.
You take these special stencils that are specifically made for brownies (and I'm sure you could make your own) and lay them over your brownie cake (I don't know if you need to ice it first or not) and take their 'dusting sugar' and sprinkle it over top to get an image on your cake. I thought it was a really cute idea.
This is an example of the finished product. I think I may do something like this for my boyfriend, or maybe I'll just make a regular brownie and put sprinkles and candles on it :P either way.
Saturday, July 25, 2009
Wedding Cake Designs
Today I've decided to go through wilton.com and look at all the different wedding cake styles. their website is so helpful. they even have a page that shows you a list of example cakes - what sizes the tiers are and how many people they feed. so helpful.
They also have about six pages of wedding cake design ideas - which is nice for me because I'm not only helping my sister pick out her wedding cake, but I'm helping her make it! This is pretty terrifying as the only cake I've ever decorated was an ugly mother's day cake I made for my mom one year. I do a lot of baking though, and I make chocolate and have made fondant once before... so I think she and I can pull this off if we make about a hundred practice cakes ahead of time. Here are some of my favorite designs.
And they also have a variety of toppers and books (to teach you how to do all this fancy stuff!) that you can order on the website. Very exciting :) Also she's asked me to make her jewelry for the big day, so I'm going to try my hand at wedding jewelry. wish me luck! ^-^
