I'll be Teaching an Enameling Class at John C. Campbell Folk School

What to do with all your scrap copper? Make jewelry, and then enamel it! If you'd like to learn how, you can take my class Sept. 12-14 at the John C. Campbell Folk School in Brasstown, NC.  With the high price of copper, it just makes sense to use scrap! The class is titled "Reuse, Recycle...Enamel!" and is designed for beginners and intermediate enamelists. And when I say beginners, I mean it!
We will cover where to find scrap, including roofing copper, old copper tubing and other types,  how to clean and cut it to make pendants, and then we will go through the process of enameling step-by-step! All materials and tools will be provided, so all you have to do is sign up, show up, and plan to learn a lot and have tons of fun doing it!
Go to www.folkschool.org or call the school at 828-837- 2775 if you're interested!  And check out the pendants to the right that were all made from scraps!

Stenciling with Real Leaves!

June: I LOVE spring and summer, as everything is in bloom and providing ideas for lots of new projects. I've been having fun using real leaf clusters as stencils for my enameled plates and bowls. The process is simple: fire on the first coat of enamel on the front (whatever color you want to see show through as the leaves) and back. Then spray the front well with a 50/50 Klyr Fire and water mixture, place the leaves where you want them, spray the leaves with the Klyr Fire mixture, and then sift on your second color. Lift the leaves off carefully and you should have a perfect picture of the leaves in the enamel. If a few bits of enamel fall into the pattern, lift them out with a wet, not dripping, paint brush. Let dry and fire as usual. On this plate, I used Thompson 2030 clear as the first coat, then blue and green on the second. 211o Thompson wax yellow, makes a very beautiful gold undercoat also. Obviously, flat leaves work best - I've had good luck with ferns, Nandina, and Yarrow leaves. This works best when the leaves are supple and fresh - dry leaves tend to crumble!