More cheers

This pair has a blue fabric center, brass medallion and crystal on a Belles beer cap. Modeled by Kara.

Cheers for your ears

I stole this design from a vendor at the Tulip Festival this Spring. They are made from Coors Lite bottle caps--the logo is on the back side of the earring. I built on the design by filling the center of the cap with a black and white fabric, adding a medallion and a crystal and finishing them with a tiny peace sign charm. They are modeled by my lovely daughter-in-law. I am selling earrings like these for $20 a pair.

new jewelry design

After too many tries to find the right shot on these earrings, I've decided this one is okay and there are other things to do on this lovely Saturday morning. I've been experimenting with using fabric in earring designs. A good friend, who is a quilter, supplied the fabric and here are my first two attempts. I'm really having fun using different fabrics to see what jewelry components they suggest. The earrings are super light, and despite the print on the fabric, they tend to go with lots of things.

Mike

Really hard for me to capture this one. The quote says, "A society grows great when old men plant trees in whose shade they will never sit." This was a gift for Mike, who is my boss. It's been a hard transition for him to go from serving clients where results were immediate and tangible to being the Chief Learning and Development Officer where, on a good day, you influence the creation of learning platforms and initiatives. In spite of the personal challenge, Mike has accomplished so much for the people of Ernst & Young and I wanted him to know that I recognized and appreciated his legacy.

I have three males on my team and failed to photograph their gifts. I bought each one an appropriate book for their coaching specialty and then made them each a leather bookmark. I dyed the leather and wrote sayings on each one that I think captured their personalities. For example, on Jim's I wrote, "I see good people" as he always looks for what is good in others and never has an unkind word for anyone. I attached a "charm" to each bookmark. I searched thru rolls of pennies until I found the year that each of them joined EY and then attached that penny to an antiqued disc that I stamped with the phrase "lucky EY". I'm the one that has been lucky to know all the members of this team!

Joan

Joan is one of our newer coaches and calls herself "a traveler, not a tourist". I made this bracelet for her and included a compass charm.

Karen

I tried several different designs until I landed on this necklace for Karen. It is natural and elegant just like her. What was really interesting was that on the evening that I gave my team members their gifts, the jewelry matched what they were wearing.

Vera

In a team-building exercise that only coaches could do, Vera identified herself as a "quirky pioneer", which we shortened to QP--thus the kewpie doll. I searched on etsy until I found the right centerpiece. I stitched seed beads to a leather cuff and made a mermaid dangle that contains the initials Q and P with some beads. I knew she would turn bright red with laughter when she opened her gift and she did!