Adventures in Resin - Part (oh who cares any more?)

I'm continuing my love/hate/learning journey with resin. Trying out different ideas for stuff to plunk in it and trying to come up with work arounds for obstacles.

The result is that I've now got quite a big pile of finished pieces (not as big of a pile as the "crap that didn't work out right" pile, but still) and am wondering what to do with them. Because I can't make them ALL into jewelry myself. I barely have time for regular beading projects. I have set aside a few special ones that I know I'm going to use, but...hmmmm...what to do with the rest?

I have an idea percolating...check back soon for a special announcement on that!

In the meantime, here are some of the pieces that survived my so-called "creative process" (which often involves things like accidentally plonking my finger into wet resin or shedding an eyelash into a piece or over-filling a bezel here and there)...

I think these are some of my favorites - I love the vintage flower images. A couple of them have crystals or gold heart charms that I added. Also, some are two-loop components rather than just pendants so they are more versatile for designing.

I really liked this bird image, too. And look - no fingerprints, dust OR eyelashes. AMAZING!

I got all these great kaleidascope type images and they look terriffic under resin - it kind of magnifies them and makes them look all spacey and cool and stuff. Too bad I ruined all the rest of the ones I did with those images. This guy was the only one to survive. I think he's pretty neat - and he has a sparkly saphhire crystal in the center which makes him extra special!

I'm actually doing okay on the pre-made bezels. It's the molds that I've had the most issues with. But, I may have solved that problem:

Not with these - these were an experiment. I didn't get enough color contrast between the glitter and the stickers. I tried drilling holes down into them for the posts - which SORT OF worked, but even though I used epoxy to glue the posts in, I just don't feel really confident that they are going to stand up to wear and tear.

So, then I came up with this idea:

I poured clear resin, then striped different colors of glitter diagonally across it (doesn't show well in the picture, but trust me, there are about 5 different colors) and let it dry. Then mixed a batch of resin with a dark navy blue glitter and poured a THIN layer of that and let it dry. Then I lightly filed the edges just to clean them up. I took a small piece of sterling silver wire, bent it in a U shape and glued it to the back. When it dried, I poured another layer of the navy glitter/resin mixture to cover up the wire.

Small problem in that the shiny silver wire color still peeks through the glitter. Only after I did this experiment did I realize that DUH! (lightbulb pops on over my head) I just need to take a Sharpie and color the wire so it doesn't show through before I glue it.

Now, I have a way to create loops that I'm confident will hold and NO DRILLING INVOLVED!

Yay, me.

So, now, I have pretty, sparkley, butterfly goodness WITH a loop on top that doesn't show on the back.

I even made a couple of "sets" where the top piece has two loops and the bottom piece is a dangle.

And yeah, I know, I'm all twelve years old with the sparkley butterfly stickers and glitter and stuff, but I don't care. If that glitter came in an eyeshadow - I would SO totally wear it ;-)

I resined a whole bunch of new stuff last night - trying to re-create the magic I had when I resined a couple of wooden butterfly pieces a few months ago. We'll see how everything comes out later this week!

Have a good one!

KJ