netsuke

This little sumo wrestler has been with me for a long time. I wear him on a cord around my neck although he was originally a kind of large button. People always think he's a Buddha, and I have to explain otherwise. The artist has signed his name in red ink on the sole of one foot.

hand

I love this glass pendant of a hand. I got it at the High Sierra Music Festival. It reminds me of the Aboriginal hand print pictographs. This pendant dresses up any T-shirt. And it sort of attaches you to the primal urge to wear ornaments. To value beauty above function.

perfect heart

This perfect heart pendant used to be a key chain from Disneyland. I got it in a thrift store for 50 cents. It's unusually flat and therfore bold design is why I like it so much. I've worn this heart for days on end. It goes with everything. It has just the slightest bit of coral in the color which makes it nice for my complexion. I had misplaced it in my drawer of bone and amber things otherwise I would have featured it before now. It is really a basic piece of my wardrobe.

More eggs

These are some of the eggs I would add to my Queen of Romania necklace except your own QoR necklace doesn't mean as much if you just throw money at it. The challege in making a QoR is in finding all the unique charms that fit within the spirit of the original. That's not to say I wouldn't buy these if I had the bucks! I'm obsessed with Faberge eggs for the second time in my life.
The first time was in the '80's. I'm very particular about which eggs I like. I only want very classic designs. Many of the eggs you can get today are too fussy. Too many geegaws and jimcracks. In other words, too over designed.

Some favs

Just a few of my favorite things. A couple from my own collection. Most not.  Still it's fun to make inspiration boards. I highly recommend starting one on pinterest.

postponed

Sometimes I like to buy a piece or two and save them for use later when I don't have money to buy new jewels. I got these at least two years ago. They are Vera Wang for Khols. I love the natural rock shapes in their bright gold bezels. But it seems like I should have somewhere special to wear them! Sometimes I forget for months at a time that I have these. If I do not wear them soon, they will be out of style. So tomorrow will be the day. I will have to think about what to wear that will show them off. Oh troubles and travails.

My hands today

These are the rings I'm wearing today. As you can see I always find that two is better than one. Two jeweled bands on the left middle finger, two wide bands on the pointers. Three small gold bands on the right ring finger, well you get the idea. Now that I am working again I'll be more inspired to change the themes of my rings although I'm also finding the inclination to find rings that permanently stay on one finger. This was somtime thought a paradox...(Hamlet).

Turquoise Western

Here are three Western style turquoise rings from my collection. Wouldn't they look good with the Indian head ring I talked about yesterday? These are truly an American idiom. Like gold nugget jewelry. A lady I know has the most beautiful gold nugget necklace I've ever seen (something like the one below). Large natural nuggets are chained together to make a slightly longer than choker lenght necklace. I imagined she got each nugget from a different beau. She was quite the beauty in her day. Just another jewelry goal. Sigh.

obsession

I'm obsessed with this Indian head ring. I love the profile. The coin is 22 kt gold from 1925. The question is would it be politically wrong to wear such an item? It seems like a very nice Western ring to have, a ring that would go with all my Western turquoise rings. And I love turquoise with gold.

turquoise

The style these days is to wear turquoise in a non-South-Western way. I see turquoise set with pearls and other precious gems. The two rings above are part of my collection. Mostly I have American Indian turquoise because I absolutely love it. But I find myself wearing the above pieces more these days. I think Indian jewelery is coming back into style though. I've seen concho belts paired with prairie skirts in the magazines. Yippee! I love that look.

inspiration board

The top pic is of a two fingered ring from India and the lower a turtle I found on eBay. I love these kinds of animal rings. They give me a reason to wake up in the morning, a reason to keep on living! So this is my inspiration board for the end of this week. Hope you like these critters as much as I do.

favorite gold

Three of my favorite gold necklaces this summer. The cherub comes off the Queen of Romania necklace. The Be My Valentine coin is from my husband, and the coin showing a cherub riding a dolphin was made in 1979, the year I finished High School. Yellow gold is very in right now so if you got it, flaunt it.

Queen of Romania necklace

I made this Queen Marie of Romania style necklace just over a year ago. It's been fun being able to switch out different charms if I happen to wear one seperately or find another great charm to add to the necklace. For instance I just added the little green eyed alligator to the mix. This style of necklace which I made out of an old watch chain combines a lot of charms while still letting you wear them seperately. I must be a charm nut since I have many other charms that don't fit on this necklace.

The orignal Queen of Romania necklace. Image thanks to Joan Rivers.P09

modernist silver cuff

I saw this graceful Hans Hansen of Denmark bangle on Save the Jewelry and thought it looked a lot like something I'd picked up for a song a some thrift store somewhere. The cuff below was also hallmarked: Spiegel, USA. Before Spiegel was the '80's catalog giant it was a big deparment store in Chicago. I think my modernish bracelet must come from the '40's or '50's. The bracelet above was priced at $315.00! It was a fun experience to find a brushed silver bracelet forgotten about in my own jewelry box. In these hard economic times it serves you well to "Shop your closet." All you need is some silver polish.

enhancement 2

I'm pretty happy with my alligator with his new green eyes. I thought the original red eyes were dorky so I glued some very tiny green stones into the eye sockets. Because of the lighting only one eye glows in the picture, but around my neck, they both do. Anyway I consider this little project a success and love the results.

Wearing your collection

I think Elizabeth Taylor wore jewelry to perfection. She didn't seem like a particularly happy person, and I think her jewels were her friends, always beautiful and always there for her. Her entire collection was sold at Christies back in 2011 and brought in much more than expected. Part of the proceeds went to her AIDS Foundation. I remember when her book, My Love Affair with Jewels, came out, sitting in a chair at Borders and looking at every page. Even then I thought it was too expensive, but now it's out of print, and I wish I would have bought a copy. As a celebrity Liz had ample opportunity to wear items from her collection. For those of us without such busy social calendars, we ask, when shall we wear our gems? My answer is "around the house." But this does lead to the question: when is a colletion too large? A good curator chooses the best and gives away the rest. A collection need focus. Liz specialized in major gems. I like mid-century designs and old tourist jewelry from around the world. Should I cull my collection?

pearl rings

I have a number of pearl rings, and I am always attracted to buying others, but I don't seem to wear them! I don't know if this is a matter of the current trends and styles or whether I just haven't found the right ring. Most of my pearl rings are solitaires, and I'm thinking that I might want something more. I have a beautful pearl cluster ring that I inherited from my Aunt Olive that haven't worn much lately either. I think the shape I like now is round like the ring below. But I love those stacked pearl bands in the last picture. I have a lot of stacking rings, but I never thought of looking for pearl bands. This is an idea I will keep in my thinking cap since I'm not in the market for any expensive jewelry at the moment. It seems to me that becoming radically debt free is the first step in becoming a social activist. I'm almost there and want to buy my freedom to pursue causes that I care about.

Image from Gem Gossip

Cats

I'm obessing about finding the right ring made up by a cat figurine. The above example is what you usually run into, a sort of cheap, sort of cat like figure in a basically undesigned ring. I guess I'm sort of sorry I didn't buy the below piece since it is the best I've seen so far. At least the below cats have personality! This is a hunt that I think may remain a jewelry goal for awhile. It's very hard to incorporate the body of an animal or any other figure for that matter into the design of a ring. That's why I love the Barry Keiselstein Cord alligator rings.

peridot 2

Check out new peridot finds at http://pinterest.com/mlynwalters/peridot/

enhancement

I'm interested in buying this piece, not just because it's an alligator, but because I think I can enhance it. It seems, by looking at the piece closely that the red eyes are just painted on. I think I can clean this paint off and glue some green stones into the eye sockets and turn this into a jeweled piece. It's sterling and three dimensional and probably as close to a Kieselstein Cord alligator as I'm going to get this year!

treasure box 4

I finally had to call my friend and ask her what her mother wore these things with; they are so striking! She tried to email me a pic of her mother wearing these pieces but it wouldn't come through so I have to wait until my friend comes back from her vacation to find out the answer to this urgent question! Consider the necklace below. I'm guessing jasper beads with carved nephrite and carved nuts. There is a large bead, oblong with some kind of carved cat or dog on it made of some kind of agate. The piece is heavy and bold with all the beads knotted together. I want to wear these lovely things but don't quite know what with. I mean you can wear anything with a T shirt and jeans. But how would you dress these pieces up? I imagine my friend's mom wearing somthing like a Caftan.