Danglies!

I'm enjoying making very dangly colourful earrings at the moment. Maybe it's the time of year - it's been so wet and grey here for the last few days that I need more colour in my life! It's also partly due to the fact that I've been blow-drying my hair straight again recently and I like dangly earrings peeping out - and these ones are looong, with lots of movement.

These are the first two pairs. I should have taken photos of the purple pair a week or so back as they are actually for a friend who claimed them as her own when she saw me planning out the stones while she was filing her pendant during a recent tuition session. Anna - they're ready! I was going to solder long earwires on the back but Anna requested stud fittings, and they look fab like that, even if I do say so myself. The stones are smoky quartz and amethyst (one of my favourite combinations at the moment) with phospsidarite cabochons - a stone that I hadn't actually come across before but I love. You can find out more about the stone here if you like. The longer earrings are red onyz in a lovely rose cut cab, orange aventurine and smoky quartz again - very autumnal! These are actually my favourite of the two pairs, and I'm going to treat myself to some more stones so I can make myself a pair.

And these are very different from my usual style - lovely Sea-urchin ceramic cabs in a prong setting, separate earwires for lots of movement and forged drops of silver wire dangling underneath. I've been wanting to make a prong setting like this for ages, and I'm really pleased with it. It's the perfect setting for these cabs as I didn't want to hide any of the gorgeous texture. I've cut discs from the centre of the back of the setting so that you can still see the stamp that Lisa puts on all of her work. These are actually my entry to the Love My Art Jewelry monthly art spark challenge "colour and movement" - when I read the challenge this month I knew that I had the perfect design sketched out for it, but I've only just met the deadline - all that wallpaper stripping took up so much time this week!

The earrings will be on the website by tomorrow evening!