Last month, our wire workers group committed the meeting to Steampunk style jewelry. Steampunk might be described as a combination of technology and romance and in the case of jewelry this could be vintage pieces combined with mechanical parts such as cogs, wheels or watch parts. The bulk of my customers have just looked at me strangely when I asked if they liked Steampunk jewelry and when I described it, they were pretty sure they didn’t want any. Yet, trying to learn from every new opportunity, I tried to make a Steampunk necklace. It wasn’t bad and although I didn’t have any watch parts or cogs to use in it, the vintage parts came together nicely and on its first trip out to the stores, it sold. Unfortunately, I didn’t take a picture of that piece.

Today, I decided I should give Steampunk another chance. The first necklace shown here is based on the theme of flowers and is quite eclectic. The second piece wasn’t planned as Steampunk, but rather influenced by it. I didn’t have any beads that specifically matched the bezeled cab I made, so I let my experience on the first necklace free me to use complimentary beads rather than perfect matches on this second piece.

  I applied this same “almost anything goes” approach to the meatloaf I fed the men at noon and it turned out pretty good as well. A little of this with a little of that covered with plenty of barbeque sauce and it was fine. Yet, I think I should drop this approach immediately since I preparing to do some etching. Playing with adding just any old chemical to muriatic acid would most likely spell disaster. I think I’d better follow the right recipe for this process.