The worms will love it!

Pretty, isn't it?? OK, well maybe not. But the worms will love it. And so will my garden. I'm determined to master composting this year. I have a lot of dead leaves, plants and flowers from my garden that I know would make good compost that can be used to enrich the soil of my garden. Plus all those vegetables peels, coffee grinds, tea bags and egg shells from my kitchen. This type of recycling may not produce beautiful products like those found in the Reclaimed to Fame market on 1000 Markets but it's a very helpful way of recycling all those nutrients that are thrown away from our kitchens and yards each day.



Last year I started throwing my coffee grinds into the garden. But this year I wanted to do it right. But when I went to check out compost bins, I found that they are between $100 to $250 and even more. That wasn't what I had in mind.

So here's my homemade effort. I've punched in at least 200 holes all over the garbage can, bigger ones on the top and bottom. I hope that's going to be enough to give it good ventilation. I've done some research on composting and there are three main things needed to have a good compost bin - air, water and food.



To give the compost heap air, I'll need to make sure the pile doesn't get too wet so it all mashes down. I'll have to roll the garbage can around to break it all up so it will have enough air. And make sure that it's a little wet, but not too wet. It it gets too wet, I'll have to add more dry materials to it. There are two types of "food" for the compost bin - brown and green. Brown is all those dead leaves, dead plants, straw and sawdust. Green is green weeds, coffee grinds, tea bags and all those vegetable and fruit scraps from the kitchen. It has to be a pretty even combination of the two.



So hopefully in a couple of months, I'll have some rich, black compost full of nutrients for my garden. I've added some photos of a few of the flowers that have already appeared here in New Jersey - daffodils and crocus. Next year they should be even more beautiful from all the good soil they'll have from my compost bin!

The wonder of sea glass

I realized today that whenever I talk about Marjorie's Cracked Plate Jewelry, I usually mention the broken china work that I do. And lately the Waterford crystal pieces I've added. But I haven't talked about my sea glass jewelry in quite some time and since warmer days will soon be on their way, I thought I devote a blog to sea glass.













I think the intrigue of sea glass is that, when you find a glittering piece on the shore, you can only imagine the places that piece of glass has been to. Tossed into the sea, the glass was swept along on tides, rolled with the waves, nudged by the fish, gently rubbed on the sand and was rollercoasted during storms. For years and years, sometimes as many as 50 - 70 years or more, the glass was broken down into smaller pieces and those pieces were worn and smoothed and shaped by the ocean and sand. And then the ocean gave it to you to find on the shore.







True authentic sea glass has a beautiful frosted sheen. It's become harder to find these days when more containers and bottles are made from plastic than glass. But if you're diligent and have a good eye, you can still find these jewels on beaches. Most of the sea glass found in stores and online today is tumbled sea glass, which is artificially created in tumbling machines. All of the sea glass jewelry shown on this page are designed from authentic sea glass found of the shores of New Jersey. And all of these pieces are available on my website at www.marjoriescracked.com.

Blue Willow custom order started

I had mentioned before about the custom order I've received to design china from a customer's Blue Willow china platter. This china belonged to her aunt whom she loved and admired greatly. Unfortunately, the platter fell off the top of the refrigerator and broke into far too many pieces to salvage. The customer has requested that I design jewelry from the china for her to give her relatives this Christmas. Since it is a Christmas order, I hadn't done anything with the china when it arrived. But I've now broken it into the desired pieces. I can't believe my luck that I was able to save the two birds and the boat which are such an integral part of the Blue Willow tale. To read the fascinating tale, please check out my prior blog posting.

Here are some of the pieces that I'll be using to make the pendants. In talking it over with my customer, we decided not to use the tree piece. Instead we may be using another one of the oval designs which is located in several places around the border of the platter. All of the pieces shown here are in very rough form and still need to be shaped and smoothed.



These pieces will be transformed in several pairs of earrings.
















And these will be used to make men's tie tacks. I'm very excited to be branching out into men's jewelry and will be adding more of this type of jewelry to my site in the very near future.
















So stayed tuned to see the final designs from this beautiful Blue Willow china platter.

St. Patrick's Day Jewelry is now available!

Remember the Irish shamrock teapot that I blogged about recently? Well, it's now quite a few pieces of Irish jewelry! The was one of the hardest pieces of china that I've yet worked on. By hard, I don't mean difficult - just hard china! Whoever cracked that teapot in the first place must have dropped it from a plane! It took all the strength I had to break it into pieces. But what lovely pieces they were - so smooth and shiny.

I've made some matching sets but each piece is available separately on my website. First there's a set wrapped with gold artist wire with green beading added. The pendant is 1" x 1-3/4" and the earrings measure 1/4" by 2" including the hoops.



Then I have a copper wire wrapped set. The copper looks particularly nice with the green shamrocks. This pendant is 1" x 2-1/4" and the earrings are 1/2" x 1-1/2" counting the hoops.



This is the silver wire wrapped set. The pendant measures 1" x 2-1/4" and the earrings are 1-1/4" x 2-1/4".



I also made a separate silver wrapped pendant measuring 1" x 2-1/2". Each of the pendants comes with an 18" black velvet cord with a 2" extension chain.



So celebrate this St. Patrick's Day with a truly "green" piece of jewelry - not only green in the Irish sense but also green in the recycled sense. And then enjoy these pieces every day for the rest of the year, too. Each of these jewelry pieces are available now at Marjorie's Cracked Plate Jewelry Store.

Featured on Body Icing By Jennifer

There's a great new website that has just gone live - Body Icing By Jennifer - that you should keep an eye on. Jennifer has created a site where jewelry artists can find information on their craft, whether it be "how to" tips, how to start a jewelry business or how to improve their current business. I just found a great tutorial on making ear cuffs there. She also has some jewelry-related articles up and has even started her own jewelry social forum. Plus she has a featured artist section and has very kindly featured yours truly!

Body Icing by Jennifer

How nice - two features!

Two online social networks are featuring me this week and I'm pleased as punch about it!

The Ultimate Connection for Small Business Owners has chosen me as one of their featured members for the entire month of March:

http://ultimateconnection.ning.com/profiles/friend/listFeatured

And I've been chosen as Diva of the Week on the Diva Within:


http://www.diva-within.com/

How nice is that??!