Clay and Glaze Experiments

 I wrote on Saturday about my Clay Crisis and how I wasn't able to get my regular clay from my supplier so I had to pick an alternate.  I have been fighting with this clay.  The main problem with switching clay is shown below.  Both pieces were glazed with the same glaze and fired to the same temperature.  It is one of my most consistent glazes, it almost always looks the same on my regular clay no matter how thin/thick or hot/cold it fires.  But on the new clay, it has a dramatically different color. That just isn't acceptable to me, so I am searching for another replacement clay.  I am optimistic about one that I have been working with, but I still need to run more tests.

So, to make lemonade out of lemons, I made the little pendants above.  All I can really do with this clay is roll out slabs and cookie-cutter them out after adding a bit of texture somehow (not with rubber stamps though... it sticks like crazy, even though I have tried multiple forms of release agent).  I used some white porcelain slip as a trailing slip to make textures and I really love the way it looks. Also, since I am using a clay that I can't use for my regular line of beads, I decided to use some glazes that I can't use with my regular line, too.  I have collected many bottles of really great glazes that are beautiful, but too inconsistent to provide the regular results that I need.  I have been looking for some quick and easy beads to add into production that I can use to make kits and sell at shows without needing to catalog them, so this is a fun start.

Melanie is an artist, blogger, writer, and ceramic beadmaker at Earthenwood Studio. Her beads and components can be found at her Etsy shop and her jewelry can be found in her Etsy Galleria. To comment on this post, visit the original post at the Earthenwood Studio Chronicles Blog.

Earthenwood Design Team: Gaea's Key to Spring

I have a quick Earthenwood Design Team update today!  Gaea Cannaday recently blogged about this bracelet, called Key to Spring, that she made with a cool mix of both of our handmade components!  She used a pale green Shimmer Key from my Earthen Oxide website and one of my clock links.  She added some of her own ceramic beads and a really cool enameled clasp that she made.  It's a treasure trove of art beads!  I love it. Read more about Gaea's design process for this bracelet on her blog.

Melanie is an artist, blogger, writer, and ceramic beadmaker at Earthenwood Studio. Her beads and components can be found at her Etsy shop and her jewelry can be found in her Etsy Galleria. To comment on this post, visit the original post at the Earthenwood Studio Chronicles Blog.

Studio Tour Sunday: Birdie Trinkets in New Colors

  I have been a super busy birdie today.  I glazed beads all morning and loaded two kilns, plus I did some chores around the house.  I am hustling hard to get as much of my work done as I can early this week because my brother and I are taking Wednesday through Saturday off to go to NCECA, a ceramics conference.  Jeremy is in the biennial show and another show plus he is doing a presentation.  He is kind of a clay rock star. :)   Anyway, I have a bunch of shipping and stuff to do before Wednesday but I wanted to pop in and show off a new item on the Earthenwood website.  Well, not so much a new item, as I have been making these Birdie Trinkets regularly since about 2006, but I have new colors!  I have added pale grey, apple green, and pinky colored Birdies to the available options.  I kept the ever popular brown and sea birds and removed the black bird (since I have the black and red Robin Birdie still). All the colors are available in charms and links. I think the new pink and apple birds go really well with the sea bird and would look great together in a colorful spring design!
That's what's going on in my studio this weekend.  Here are some reports from a few of my fellow bloggers' studios: A Bead A Day
Interested in learning more about decopauging your jewelry projects? In response to a reader question, Lisa provides some info to help you get started. 
About.com Jewelry Making
Tammy combines wire, chain, and crystal teardrops for some dramatic earrings.   Art Bead Scene
The ABS is serving up a free project courtesy of Ornamentea.   Beads & Books
Enter a jewelry, beading, or mixed media contest or challenge this spring. Michelle shares links to nearly a dozen opportunities.   Carmi's Art/Life World
Carmi has a two part beaded sachet tuorial this week on her blog.   Cindy Gimbrone, The Lampwork Diva
This week's Tuesday Tangle is about taking up a challenge!   Snap out of it, Jean! There's beading to be done!
Jean writes about a book she was given years ago concerning Elizabeth Taylor's astounding jewelry collection   The Bead Dreamer
Charlene creates earring from humble materials and simple design   The Writing and Art of Andrew Thornton
To celebrate National Craft Month, Andrew guest blogs for Beaducation.

Melanie is an artist, blogger, writer, and ceramic beadmaker at Earthenwood Studio. Her beads and components can be found at her Etsy shop and her jewelry can be found in her Etsy Galleria. To comment on this post, visit the original post at the Earthenwood Studio Chronicles Blog.

Response Saturday: Clay Crisis

 I haven't had any time this week to play with non-clay materials for Response Saturday.  See, I have had a bit of a clay crisis.  I went to pick up some clay from my regular supplier, which I do about twice a year.  We just happened to be passing by on our way to Ohio, and I had just used up all my porcelain and even processed my scrap, so it was perfectly timed.  Unfortunately, they didn't have my regular clay, a very fine grolleg porcelain.  Frustrated, I picked up 50 lbs of their production porcelain.  This week, I broke into it and started to use it.  I discovered that I really dislike this clay for beadmaking. My supplier is also the manufacturer of my porcelain, and a phone call discovered that they would be out for several weeks.  Ouch.  So I am looking for an alternative and I think I have found one, luckily.  We just happened to order some clay and slip to play with from Matt and Dave's Clays and the clay I got seems to be a good match to my usual.  Whew!  I still have to see how it sands and fires, but I am optimistic.

So I am left with 50lbs of this clay that I don't like. It's not a bad clay, just not good for my usual techniques.  It will likely get used up by someone in this house. Also, I rolled out 4 slabs of it, which I need to use up before it dries up.  I mentioned that I ordered some slip from Matt and Dave's, so I tried a few pendants with it.  I think I am going to spend the afternoon using the slabs to make very simple cutout circle and square links and play around with the slip to make pendants like the ones I experimented with above.  I really don't have time for an afternoon of experimentation, but I am going to go ahead and take it while the opportunity strikes.  Happy Saturday, everyone!

Melanie is an artist, blogger, writer, and ceramic beadmaker at Earthenwood Studio. Her beads and components can be found at her Etsy shop and her jewelry can be found in her Etsy Galleria. To comment on this post, visit the original post at the Earthenwood Studio Chronicles Blog.

Thoughts on my Published Jewelry

Today I listed a few more pieces that I made for publications in the Etsy Galleria.  It has been kind of fun to go through these pieces and write them up.  I have been revisiting all the work and time that goes into writing for magazines. There are so many steps over such a long period of time. I can remember when I designed the components, then when I made the necklaces, then when I submitted them and got them accepted, then when I wrote them and then the waiting a few months for them to get printed.  I have been writing for several years now, and have written over 70 projects and articles, but the process still amazes me.
For a long time, I hoarded the items that were published.  They make a great display at bead shows and give people ideas on what they can do with my components.  And I will still keep some of the best pieces that are good examples using my beads.  But it feels good to finally let go and get these creations into the hands (and on the necks!) of people who will wear and love them like I do. I am trying to list 3-4 every day, as the pile of jewelry is overflowing.  Because along with each piece that did get picked for publication, there are two or three that didn't make it to print.  So yeah, that's a lot of jewelry.  Keep an eye on the Galleria for new stuff, and don't forget the spring jewelry sale!  Details are in the etsy banner.

Melanie is an artist, blogger, writer, and ceramic beadmaker at Earthenwood Studio. Her beads and components can be found at her Etsy shop and her jewelry can be found in her Etsy Galleria. To comment on this post, visit the original post at the Earthenwood Studio Chronicles Blog.

Spring Jewelry Sale at Earthenwood Etsy Galleria

I have been feeling really good lately about my studio spring cleaning efforts!  I moved a lot of components out of the studio in the last few weeks between my Etsy sale and my bead show.  Now it is time to focus on jewelry.  I have been getting pieces ready to ship off to galleries and shows, and I have decided to have a sale over in my Etsy Galleria of jewelry. From now until April 1st, take 20% off of all finished jewelry in the shop by using the code SpringSale  Items range from some of the more elaborate and decorative pieces I have made for magazine publication to more simple items that are great for daily wear.  I have already been pleased with this sale so far, so I am eager to find some time to get more jewelry listed this spring.  Keep checking back for new items!

Melanie is an artist, blogger, writer, and ceramic beadmaker at Earthenwood Studio. Her beads and components can be found at her Etsy shop and her jewelry can be found in her Etsy Galleria. To comment on this post, visit the original post at the Earthenwood Studio Chronicles Blog.

Terra Treasures Revisited

This is a project I designed for the Fall 2007 issue of Stringing Magazine. It was very popular at the time, so I was pleased to hear the Interweave re-released it in their Best of Stringing: Simply Organic E-Book. It's even the cover image!

I have made up some complete kits for this project. Each Terra Treasure Necklace Kit comes with all the handmade beads, seed beads, accents, and waxed linen cord needed to make an (at least) 18" necklace.

In other revisited product news, I just added the Pinecone charm used in this project to the website.  I don't know how I overlooked that one!  I am in the process of adding a few new colors of my ever popular Birdie Trinkets very soon, so look for an announcement about that in the next few days.

Melanie is an artist, blogger, writer, and ceramic beadmaker at Earthenwood Studio. Her beads and components can be found at her Etsy shop and her jewelry can be found in her Etsy Galleria. To comment on this post, visit the original post at the Earthenwood Studio Chronicles Blog.

Earthenwood Design Team Update Part Two!

Lookie!  Check out what Design Team member Lorelei Eurto made with one of the Collage Keys I sent her from my new Earthen Oxide line!  It's gorgeous in that eclectic and wonderful way that Lorelei brings to everything she touches.  I love the asymmetry, the colors and opally textures, and the mix of materials.  Check out her blog to read more about her thoughts on creating this piece.

Wow, check this out!  Honorary Design Team member Leslie Gidden of Mad Maggie Designs made this necklace using a Collage Key.  I absolutely love how she used a variety of tiny beads to weave together a toggle that perfectly compliments the key.  I love the purples and the little bit of brassy chain and toggle bar that she used to accent the metal of the key and contrast against the beautiful purples and pinks.  Read more about Leslie's creation on her blog.

Melanie is an artist, blogger, writer, and ceramic beadmaker at Earthenwood Studio. Her beads and components can be found at her Etsy shop and her jewelry can be found in her Etsy Galleria. To comment on this post, visit the original post at the Earthenwood Studio Chronicles Blog.

Earthenwood Design Team Update Part One and Late Studio Tour

  The always awesome Earthenwood Design Team member Gaea Cannaday sent me a link to this devilishly cool bracelet she made with one of my heart charms from the February challenge!  She paired it with one of her Diablo beads and a mix of firey colored accents with off white beads with one dark chocolate bead thrown in for contrast.  Check out the clasp, too.. part of Gaea's recent experimentation with enamel.  I love this piece!  Check out her blog for more of her inspired designs.
Since I was at a show yesterday, I missed posting the Studio Tour Sunday links, so here ya go: A Bead A Day
Lisa shares the steps to making super simple gnome earrings just in time for spring!   About.com Jewelry Making
Tammy explains the strategy she uses when reviewing jewelry making books.   Art Bead Scene
Do you collect rocks? Make a bracelet with them using this free project from Art Bead Scene!   Beading Arts
Cyndi posted a tutorial to show how she made her Bead Soup necklace!   Beads & Books
Michelle shares her storage idea for spools of beading wire.   Carmi's Art/Life World
Would you believe that you could wear flocked velvet wallpaper?   Cindy Gimbrone, The Lampwork Diva
Cindy's been out with the flu so this week's a rewind on spicing up your plain old packaging.   Earthenwood Studio Chronicles
Melanie celebrates a new hairstyle for spring by making a pendant to match her new purple hair extensions!   The Bead Dreamer
Charlene reviews The Penland Book of Jewelry and is touched by the artistic statements, humanity, talent and sharing of the ten artists in the book.   The Writing and Art of Andrew Thornton
Working with wire and ammonite slices, Andrew creates three Calder-inspired pendants.


Melanie is an artist, blogger, writer, and ceramic beadmaker at Earthenwood Studio. Her beads and components can be found at her Etsy shop and her jewelry can be found in her Etsy Galleria. To comment on this post, visit the original post at the Earthenwood Studio Chronicles Blog.

Response Saturday: Leafy Heart

 Ack!  Too busy for Response Saturday this week!  Too busy to blog, even!  But I do have something to share.  I made this at the same time as the Grassy Pendant a couple of weeks ago.  I used a dried leaf from the floral arranging section of a craft store.  Nice leaves, actually.  They look like they have been enhanced somehow, which gave them exaggerated color and texture.  The leaves were rather stiff and brittle so I had a hard time cutting it to size and I somehow got it into the bezel in two pieces and poured the resin, but they kept popping up and I gave up.

 After the resin set and I had more patience, I decided to fill in the pendant with a little more resin and I added a brass fern leaf to give it a little more interest.  Overall, I am pleased with it, but if I were to do it again, I would paint in the back with dark green so the background didn't show around the leaf cutting.  I think that making a heart template would probably be a good idea if I do more.  I really like these bezels by Nunn Design...they have nice deep bezels and are great to work with.

Melanie is an artist, blogger, writer, and ceramic beadmaker at Earthenwood Studio. Her beads and components can be found at her Etsy shop and her jewelry can be found in her Etsy Galleria. To comment on this post, visit the original post at the Earthenwood Studio Chronicles Blog.

Earthen Oxide Update: Peacock Keys

I have updated the Earthen Oxide shop with a new set of Collage and Shimmer Keys in teal/blue/purple tones.  I am very pleased with how these colors turned out!  I have done some green before but was not happy with the color, so I was hesitant, but this teal green is really lovely.  I mixed some blues and purples into the resin, sometimes mixing them right onto the key, so there is a lot of nice variety in the surfaces.  They remind me of peacock feathers!  These will be up today and tomorrow but I will have to close the shop for my Sunday show, as the keys are coming with me.  I wanted to give my online friends first crack at them first though!

Melanie is an artist, blogger, writer, and ceramic beadmaker at Earthenwood Studio. Her beads and components can be found at her Etsy shop and her jewelry can be found in her Etsy Galleria. To comment on this post, visit the original post at the Earthenwood Studio Chronicles Blog.

Bonanza of Beads!

 Mossy Home Bundle from the Earthenwood Wholesale Etsy Shop I am up to my eyeballs in beadies, my friends.  I have the Bead Bonanza in Southfield, MI this weekend and I have been working hard to get ready for that while also trying to process orders, maintain inventory, work on taxes, and balance my regular life stuff.  Alex has the week off for Spring Break, so we took yesterday off to go antiquing and I also took some time off this weekend for stuff with friends.  Today I am feeling a little overwhelmed from all that time off and am rushing to catch up and continue getting ready for the Bonanza.  To add to the pressure, I decided that for the show, I don't want to dip into my website inventory that I have worked so hard to build up.  I have been doing really well selling from my website and I don't want to clear it out for a show, so I am planning on bringing a mix of spring cleaning/sale items and new mixed media items for the show, in addition to whatever stock I can make by Sunday. Whoohoo it's a crazy bead house here!  I will probably be taking the rest of the week off from blogging because of all of this, so I just wanted to check in and say "see ya" in a bit!  Happy Beading...


Melanie is an artist, blogger, writer, and ceramic beadmaker at Earthenwood Studio. Her beads and components can be found at her Etsy shop and her jewelry can be found in her Etsy Galleria. To comment on this post, visit the original post at the Earthenwood Studio Chronicles Blog.

Studio Tour Sunday: Half Tone

I spent today at a baby shower for some good friends, doing an seemingly endless errand run, and getting used to the time change (which involved a short nap, especially after all that morning and afternoon activity!).  I also experimented with a new fun app for my iPod that make photos look like half tone comic book pages. hehe fun! Here is some more fun for you... this week's Studio Sunday links: The Writing and Art of Andrew Thornton
Inspired by Calder and Medieval crowns, Andrew sets out to create his own crown out of wire and Roman Glass.

Earthenwood Studio Chronicles
Melanie shares some of her process and inspiration for her new Earthen Oxide collage key pendants

Cindy Gimbrone, The Lampwork Diva
In this week’s rewind, Cindy hammers home a point about tools.

Carmi’s Art/Life World
Carmi uses an image of Anna Pavlova for her new necklace idea.

Beads & Books
Win a copy of two novels: Waking Up in the Land of Glitter and Miss Scarlet’s School of Patternless Sewing.

Beading Arts
Mixing traditional embroidery with beads leads to a garden full of promises…

Art Bead Scene
Stop by and see the Art Bead Scene’s Monthly Challenge painting.

About.com Jewelry Making
It’s the perfect time to make your own luck with this lucky earring tutorial.

A Bead A Day
Are you ready for gnomes? Lisa is getting a bit of spring fever and ready to get out the gnomes, gnome jewelry that is!

The Bead Dreamer
Inspired by signs that spring is on the way, Charlene creates a lush leaf and flower bracelet and pair of earrings.


Melanie is an artist, blogger, writer, and ceramic beadmaker at Earthenwood Studio. Her beads and components can be found at her Etsy shop and her jewelry can be found in her Etsy Galleria. To comment on this post, visit the original post at the Earthenwood Studio Chronicles Blog.

Response Saturday: Purple Hair

Yet another week of busy, busy, busy!  Not much time again to play with new things. Well, that's not entirely true... I did try something new this week.  I got purple colored hair extensions a few days ago, so I have a new look!  Of course, I didn't make those... my fabulous hairdresser Jackie from Studio for Hair did them for me (and gave me a new cut for spring, too!)  There are just a few purple streaks that peek though my hair now, and I love them!  I actually really love my hair and hair color, so I don't like the idea of dying it, but this gave me some fun color without the damage and permanence of a dye job.

While Jackie was trimming the extensions, a little tuft fell into my lap. You may recall that I already experimented with hair and resin last week but wanted to experiment further, and this was a perfect opportunity to try a different kind of hair under resin, so I made the pendant above.  I worked more carefully with the glue this time and used smaller pieces of hair, letting them flow more naturally in the space of the bezel.  It ended up making really soft lines and looked feather-like.  Pretty nice potential there.  Jackie mentioned that she would save trimmings of other colors for me if I want them... blending colors might bring a lot of depth and interest to these pendants.  I am definitely going to keep this one for myself, since it matches my hair perfectly and I think it will be really striking.  Well, maybe I will part with it in a couple of months when the extensions are ready to come out.  Then I can choose a new color, hehe!

I dunno why pictures from my iPod don't align the right way, even when I correct them in photoshop and rotate them on my computer.  So we will have to call it an artistic choice and be done with it.  I am tired tonight!

Melanie is an artist, blogger, writer, and ceramic beadmaker at Earthenwood Studio. Her beads and components can be found at her Etsy shop and her jewelry can be found in her Etsy Galleria. To comment on this post, visit the original post at the Earthenwood Studio Chronicles Blog.

Shimmer Keyplate and Design Team Winners

Wow, I have had a great response over the last couple of days to the EarthenOxide site!  Thanks everyone!  The stock is pretty low right now, so it looks like some resin work is in order for me this weekend.  I do have the Shimmer Keyplate above in the shop now, which is one of my very favorite things at the moment.  Alex and I are planning an antiquing trip next week, so my plan is to pick up more keyplates.  I just love them!
And now I have the winners of the March honorary Design Team membership to announce!  Congrats to Lisa of Lucid Moon Studio and Leslie of Mad Maggie Designs!  Email me at earthenwood@gmail.com with your mailing addresses and I will send out your keys!  Thanks for commenting, everyone!

Melanie is an artist, blogger, writer, and ceramic beadmaker at Earthenwood Studio. Her beads and components can be found at her Etsy shop and her jewelry can be found in her Etsy Galleria. To comment on this post, visit the original post at the Earthenwood Studio Chronicles Blog.

Collage Keys

Today I have two new Collage Keys from my Earthen Oxide collection to show you!  I was getting ready to do a new batch and I decided I wanted to try some purple resin.  For some reason, I thought it would be a hard color to mix.  Reds can often be fickle in various media and I had a hard time mixing green, so I thought the mixing might be tricky.  But it turned out great right away!  I keep adding colors and shimmer to the resin after painting a key or two, so the batch of keys has a lot of variations.

This newest round of Collage Keys are a bit more elaborate than the first round.  I used some plain text from old pocket dictionaries for the first batch and just focused on fields of text to create some pattern.  This time around, I broke open a new vintage book that I bought recently:

I found this book at an antique store recently and fell in love with it!  It's a tool catalog and the pages are full of very detailed engravings of all sorts of tools!  I am going to get a lot of use out of this book!  I also used some pages from one of the dictionaries that had some images in it.

Here is a shot of the keys before they get the resin treatment.  I need to be a little more careful not to add to much color and shimmer next time, as some of the imagery was lost in a few keys, because the resin got too opaque and dark.  They still look beautiful, but it is sad to see the imagery disappear.  I want to do some that are more graphic and black and white (or more like ivory and rust)

And don't forget... if you want to enter to win one of these keys for the Design Team challenge, you have until tomorrow to leave a comment on yesterday's blog post to be considered!

Melanie is an artist, blogger, writer, and ceramic beadmaker at Earthenwood Studio. Her beads and components can be found at her Etsy shop and her jewelry can be found in her Etsy Galleria. To comment on this post, visit the original post at the Earthenwood Studio Chronicles Blog.

Earthenwood Design Team Update!

I have a couple of great pieces to show you from Design Team members who used the February bundles to make some wonderful jewelry!  First up, Marie Dodd, who made the necklace above.  It's got some of her metal work, paired nicely with my ceramic heart and links, and some delicious old beads from the 1800s.  I love Marie's moody photographs and eclectic style!  Read more about this piece on her beautiful blog.

February Honorary team member AJ from ErtheFae made this cool necklace with some of the links!  I love that AJ broke from the red and black scheme that everyone seemed to work in last month.  I did send her red hearts, but she is planning something elaborate with them.  Can't wait to see it sometime down the road!  I also love that she made this to wear to Wild Wild West Con, which sounds like a western-steampunk themed convention.  AJ and I have lots of things in common, like beads and steampunk and the geeky convention circuit.  Read more about this piece and more on her blog.

And now for the reveal of the March challenge items!  Spring officially starts this month, and I like to celebrate new things in Spring!  My newest thing is the launch of the EarthenOxide website and the new line of Collage and Shimmer Keys!  I am working on some brighter colors and interesting textures and got some great purple keys made yesterday! I have a collection of  lovely earthy and gem toned colors with lots of opalescent shimmer to them, and I can't wait to see what everyone makes with them!   As always, I am going to choose two honorary Design Team members to receive goodies this month.  Since February was so short and I am still finishing up the keys for this month, I am in a bit late this month.  I will be shipping on Wednesday, so I am going to give you until noon on March 9th to leave a comment here for consideration. (You must have a blog and be in the US to qualify, thank you)

Melanie is an artist, blogger, writer, and ceramic beadmaker at Earthenwood Studio. Her beads and components can be found at her Etsy shop and her jewelry can be found in her Etsy Galleria. To comment on this post, visit the original post at the Earthenwood Studio Chronicles Blog.

Studio Tour Sunday: Busy Busy

 Busy day today...very productive!  I glazed, loaded and fired a kiln, did some shopping, and had a wonderful work session with resin.  I will have some really great PURPLE keys coming to EarthenOxide soon, similar to the amber Collage Key above. I hope to have things to show you this week, but for now I shall leave you with this week's Studio Blog Links:

About.com Jewelry Making
Celebrate National Craft Month with jewelry and all kinds of other interesting crafts to try.

Earthenwood Studio Chronicles
Melanie shares her Bead Soup project, made with a shimmery upcycled key and keyplate from her new Earthen Oxide website mixed with some wonderful lampworked glass by MJRbeads

Snap out of it, Jean! There's beading to be done!
Jean reviews STEEL WIRE JEWELRY by Brenda Schweder and is totally wowed!

The Writing and Art of Andrew Thornton
Andrew sits down with the fine folks of Beadaholique to answer a few questions. Check out his interview!

Cindy Gimbrone, The Lampwork Diva

Come see "what matters most" on Cindy's bead table this week!

Beads & Books
If you make earrings, you'll want to read Michelle's review of the Easy Earring Cards Punch Kit

Art Bead Scene
Take a peek at what's on the bead table each week - it's Bead Table Wednesday!

The Bead Dreamer
Charlene reviews the book Creating Glass Beads by Jeri L. Warhaftig. It’s a wonderful book for ambitious beginners and intermediate glass bead makers. Charlene – she just wants the beads!

Carmi's Art/Life World
A lovely piece of paper inspires a new red necklace!

Beading Arts
Since there were so many participants, The Bead Soup Party is still in full swing, thanks to the efforts of the fabulous Lori Anderson!

Melanie is an artist, blogger, writer, and ceramic beadmaker at Earthenwood Studio. Her beads and components can be found at her Etsy shop and her jewelry can be found in her Etsy Galleria. To comment on this post, visit the original post at the Earthenwood Studio Chronicles Blog.