I finished another workshop at The Crucible today about Art Silver Clay. It's this KICK ASS stuff--it's a clay that's 99.9% silver with some water and binders to make it claylike. You can mold it, shape it, stamp it, and roll it--you can do anything to it that you can do to clay (except throw it, really, because for that you'd need a huge amount). So, okay? Can you imagine yet how cool it is? You make little pieces of jewelry, or tiny sculptures, and you stick them in a kiln or fire them under a torch, and whoah, what? It's fine silver! Bona fide. In the course of eight hours over two days, we the students each made four honest-to-goodness pieces of jewelry. Here are the two that I made that I really like:

The winged infinity is life-size, but the eye is only about as long as the infinity (minus the wings) is wide. They're a little blurry because I don't have a digital camera, so I am condemned to scanning three-dimensional objects. You can't tell but the gem in the eye is this nice champagne color.

But yeah, so now I'm going to start doing this at home. Not in an often-enough-to-sell-them-regularly kind of way, just whenever I get a great idea for a piece of jewelry or I have a gift to give.

Art: the gift that gives to the giver!

I told my dad about the workshop, and showed him the pieces I made, and he thought it was really cool. I told him how easy it was to make this stuff at home, and mentioned that all I needed was a torch. And lo and behold, "Oh, I have a propane torch you could use!" Turns out he bought it a while ago when he was thinking of learning how to solder, but never ended up using it.

My dad's really handicrafty like that. He's a natural at just about any kind of hand art (not so much at design), be it drawing, painting, or sculpture, and he also built half the stuff in our old house and the house they live in now. Basically, he can do anything a house could need, it's just a matter of time. He'll hire someone if it's just a big job that needs to get done quickly, but if he thinks he can tackle it, he will, with gusto.

I'm so used to the idea that if something's not working, if all else fails, ask dad. The idea of hiring someone to do little repair jobs and minor remodeling is totally foreign to me. Because of my dad, everything in our house(s) works well and is tailor-made to suit our preferences. (Though he's a practical soul, so the beautification is up to my sister and I.) I recently realized that not everyone has this luxury. Which made me think that I ought to pay more attention to how he does his thing. Because what if my life partner doesn't know how to do this kind of stuff? It's a possibility. In which case, it would have to be me. There will come a time when dad will no longer be able to refurbish the stairwell, as much as he wants to.

At which point, he will have to... pass on the torch.

:}

11:37 p.m. 2003-07-27�