Christmas Earrings for Special Women

I have only made a few sets of earrings so far and they are a challenge creating something on a small scale.  They are beautiful and hold a special sort of mana for the wearer.

I have had to learn about moulding and shaping stirling silver as well, something that I had never intended on doing when starting pounamu but an interesting skill still.

This set is made from a small slice of stone found in my Grandfathers top drawer after he passed away.  So not entirely sure where it is from but significant to my family still.  My wife has been dropping suggestions that she needed a pair of earrings so I made these from this slice for her and gave them to her for Christmas 2016.

Making the ball on the end of the silver hoop is pretty cool.  Just using a blow torch to heat up the silver to melting and holding it with a really long set of pliers is all it takes.  The silver wire, when it hits melting point just jumps into a ball.  There is heaps of tutorials on youtube if you want to see it in action.  Then to polish the silver again, I used a green dish wash scourer.

These earrings are made from the same stone as a fantail pendant I made for my Mum a while ago.  See that post and pendant here.  I gave these to her for Christmas 2016 to complete the set.

Chatoyant Jade is when the layers of the stone end up parallel with minimal interwoven felted strands.  This gives the strips and interesting translucency that comes with chatoyant jade, and an unusual beauty.  It also makes it a challenge to carve as it is prone flaking and breaking off just at the wrong moment.

So as I was carving these in the final stages I was holding my breath, trying my hardest not make an error and break a large piece off.