First butterfly and a frowning Jinja

I haven't blogged much lately. Especially not the last weeks even though I've had tonnes of spring pics to post if I wanted. As I've been working today, there won't be a long post this day either, but I just wanted to say I'm still here, I'm dying to post flower photos as we've had some lovely spring days in Skåne this last weekend and one flower after the other is popping up. Even the wood anemones, I noticed today. And the other day, saturday to be precise, I spotted the first butterfly of the year. It refused to sit still so this was the best pic I got.

Bumble bees and butterflies (saw more yesterday so it wasn't just that one). And birds, of cause. While the flora is the first sign of spring, it's the fauna that really makes you believe it'll be summer this year too.


It is Meowy Monday after all, even if it's been long since I remembered that, so why not throw in a cat pic?

Jinja has a tendency to forget to put the tongue back in if she's distracted by something while licking herself. In this case a sound. And it makes for fun little photos. Unusually it was she that wanted to be my photo assistant while I was getting photos of the yellow star-of-bethlehem (vårlök) in the lawn. She was in the best of moods due to the sudden warm weather. In fact, all the cats suddenly went from semi-hibernating indoors most of the day to sun-bathing outdoors as long as the sun was up.

Sleeping butterflies

The other day my sis and I went up the hill to take some photos of the sunset, accompanied by Julle and with Knatti meeting up in the coppice. When we got up, we kept stumbling into a lot of sleeping butterflies. Much easier to get photos of them there than trying to chase them daytime when they flutter incessantly over the garden, never sitting down long enough for you to get any photos.

It's pretty much just white butterflies. We have a lot of them this year as they were attracted by the rapeseed blossoms on the other side of the road.

The butterfly: patina on silverplate

This silver-plated butterfly component was buried in the same baker's ammonia-and-sawdust mixture as the bronze tags. Like the tag in the bottom right corner, it got a cobalt blue patina. Fearing it'd bleed just like the first tags, I let it dry on the window sill.

Turns out that dark blue doesn't only wash out if the patina is still moist (but not if dry it seems): it dissappears in sunlight too (or air, but the blue tag is still blue and I didn't seal it until today), turning into turquoise blue. You can still see some patches of darker blue, but it's now mainly a dusty turquoise. I also brushed it a bit with a tooth brush to see how durable the crusty patina was. There was dust and some of the plate shows through, but most of it still stuck to the metal.

I  tried to use the vinegar patina on plated components but it didn't take, at least not as fast as the ammonia mixture. Maybe the pieces where made using different plating metals or sealants, maybe the ammonia just works better on plating. Now the pieces from the vinegar jar are in the ammonia jar so we'll see if that works on them. (And the butterfly is in the vinegar and sawdust just because I want to and I already have ammonia turquoise tags so why a butterfly too in a colour I just like sometimes?)


Footnote: I say silverplated and believe it was describes as that, but it could also be white plate or rhodium plate. I'm not sure. Same goes for the two pieces I tested the vinegar-soaked sawdust on.

Digital collage II

I actually made another similar collage before the Harry Martinson one. This one has a text that's very familiar to Swedes: the first verse of Fjäriln vingad syns på Haga by Carl Michael Bellman. This is the 64th song in Fredmans sånger, published in 1791. It has been recorded in English under such titles as On a summer's day in Haga, Haga Butterfly and Haga. The setting is the Haga Park, founded by king Gustav III. Here you find famous buildings such as the Haga Palace, the Chinese Pavilion, Gustav III's Pavilion, the Echo Temple and the Copper Tents.

But let us return to the collage. I had a hard time with the layout here and I'm not that fond of the results. This isn't what I wanted and the density of the font paired with the spacing made it impossible to cover the whole page with the text as originally planned. In the end, I even made a second version by cropping the original image. And now I just realised I forgot to change the Äs and Ås, hence the question marks in the text. Stupid... As with the Harry Martinson image, I didn't intend to make the text clearly visible. I was after the mood of the lovely handwriting, rather than framing a quote for someone to read. The reason I used a quote rather than just write random words was that I wanted a mood to create the image around -- and from a practical point of view, a real text would look more realistic than a nonsense text.

I think I like this one better even if it does look very much like an image cropped from a larger picture. Much tighter composition, putting the text in centre (though that wasn't the plan). Again, not perfect. Far from it. But better, I think. And, oh, if you didn't notice it yourself already: I'm really fond of that tree "sticker" in Picnik.

Summer in September

 Earlier this week I said it was definitely autumn now, but I spoke to soon it seems because while it was 15 degrees (Celsius), chilly and rainy, then, today it's been nothing but sun and temperatures around 25 degrees. So warm that it felt nice and warm eventhough it's been very windy.


And while I did see one white butterfly the day after I declared it autumn, the sun today brought out a few more that were still alive. And there's still some summer flowers in full bloom. Ok, flowers like the Himalayan Balsam/Policeman's helmet, which you can see above, normally bloom in september so it's late summer flowers that have either a long or a late flowering season. So perhaps it's not autumn just yet -- I got another summer day just like I wanted -- but it most likely is one of the very last days of summer today.

I'm not complaining, though. I like autumn. But I can't deny it was a pleasant surprise, waking up to a "bonus" summer day. What a lovely way to end a week.

Metallic butterfly wings

This little critter is an Arte Metal decorivet by Vintaj that I got as part of the delicious beady mail I got when winning the Rings & Things blog partner drawing this spring. If you want to see what it looked like before I altered it -- forgot to take a pic myself -- you can find a photo here.

Inspired by a keum-boo butterfly, I wanted to add a mottled effect to the wings using leaf metal flake. Leaf metal often comes in sheets, but flakes are -- as the name inplies -- a blend of different types/colours of leaf metal in small flakes. They are sold in different colour combination and here I choose to use one with purple and rose flakes on top of the gold, silver and copper ones. That is gold- and silver-coloured copper, not precious leaf metal.

Compared to working with sheets, it's very easy to "gild" a surface using flakes. For a mottled effect like this one you just simply dip the surface -- painted with size -- into the flakes, let it dry a little and brush of excess metal with a soft brush before letting it set completely. If you don't like the result, add size to points you like to cover with a different colour flakes and either dip again or apply single flakes to the spots using a soft, dampened brush.

The butterfly has tiny specks of leaf metal on the body. That's because I initially wanted to add foil to the bands across it, but didn't like the result so I scraped it off. You can't really see much of it IRL as the butterfly is smaller than in my photo, but I'll try and scrape some more off before sealing the gilding. Because it's copper-based, the leaf metal can easily tarnish unless coated.

Not my best work using leaf metal flakes, but a fun -- if slightly fiddly -- alternative to using paints, alcohol inks, gilder's paste and such.

Sometimes you're lucky

Like I mentioned in the giveaway post earlier, I feel like I've won several giveaways and prize draws lately. It's always been my intention to do something to show off on the blog and thereby also send a little thank you to the generous people that've given these beads and components to me. But seeing how I've not blogged much lately, I haven't really gotten around to do that. Sure, I've mentioned a couple of the things on my other blog, but today I thought I'd at least show you some of the things I've got and who I got them from.



This first pendant -- without the bail I've added just to test an idea of mine -- is from Clay Designs by glee. I won it in a Beads of Clay open studio event. If you, like me, love ceramic beads, be sure to check out the Beads of Clay website and blog.


Recently -- ok, probably some months ago, but it feels recent -- I also got some lovely patinated bronze clay components and a polymer clay heart by Staci Louise Originals from her Artisan Accents jewellery components line (in a giveaway at Lorelei Eurto's blog). One of the bronze pieces are missing from the photo.


What more have I got? Yes, I won a monthly prize draw as a Rings & Things blog partner. (That was probably a few months back by now -- time flies!) This included sparkly Chines rondelles and a small swarm of butterflies.


I love the butterflies, but one thing I really liked was the colour in these little rondelles. It's called 2-tone green and it's a sort of light sage green finish on crystal, which glitters with hints of mauve and also a slight blue tint. And, boy, does these rondelles sparkle despite their small size (3 mm)!


Then, this week I got this loot by Beads Direct. Not a giveaway, but a prize I won in their "bloggers and writers competition". I was one of three winners with my blog post "Grey looks best with colour!". In line with the colour I chose, I got this handpicked mix of monochrome beads. I especially like the lentils. I'd probably never buy them myself as I don't use chunky lentils that often and would've focused on other beads, but having them here in my hand I just love them.

(Click on each pic to enlarge it: they don't look as dark then.)

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There you have it, just some bragging. Sometimes it really pays off to enter giveaways and competitions, even when it feels like you never win. Because one day you will. I'm not luckier than anyone else and see what I got! It's just a matter of not giving up just because of the odds and of finding the opportunities.

One good way of finding these opportunities is of cause to follow blogs (as well as following people on Twitter and FB) and sign up for newsletters. In the newsletters, shops and magazines will announce upcoming and current contests they arrange. As for blogs, follow blogs where you know giveaways are common, but it also pays to follow other blogs as bloggers often gets extra chances to win if the blog, tweet or write something on Facebook about the giveaway they want to enter. Some bloggers -- like me, over at Manekis Pärlblogg, or Michelle Mach -- will also blog about contests, calls for submissions etc that we hear about.

If you're active on a forum, there might be a section where members can post tips about contests etc. If not, you might want to start one. You can also start a section or thread with giveaway tips. Help each other to find all the fun contests and giveaways/blog candy online.

Most of all, if you find a giveaway or competition, don't pass up just because you keep telling yourself you never win. Who knows, this time it might be your name they draw or your creation the judges will choose. Maybe you win, maybe you don't. You won't win most of the time, that's just the way it is, but hang in there and you will win one day. The only way you're definitely not going to win is if you pass up when the opportunity arises. And it's always the things we don't do, not the things we do, that we regret later. So take the chance whenever you can. Find the opportunities. Just do it!

Year's first butterfly

Ok, technically this isn't the first butterfly I've seen this year. I've seen several small tortoiseshell butterflies (nässelfjärilar) these last seven or ten days and also one radiant common brimstone butterfly (citronfjäril) yesterday. But it is the first butterfly that I've been able to capture on camera this year.

Do wish I had my camera when we saw the brimstone. They're not that rare, but the tortoiseshell butterflies are much more common so while I have several photos of them (also some of large white [kålfjäril] and inachis io [påfågelöga]) I've got almost zero of brimstone butterflies. Well, I'm bound to get more chances to take pics of it later: towards summer we often have lots of butterflies that fiest on our thistles.

My sis, who loves the colour blue, is always on the lookout for polyommatini (blåvingar), but we don't seem to have many blue butterflies around here. On a really warm and sunny day -- one of those days when you can feel the thunder in the humid air -- years ago we visited Ales stenar and climbing up the hills towards the ancient monument we were surrounded by polyommatini butterflies. My sis was cranky from the heat and effort of walking and climbing up the steep paths, but seeing those little blue butterflies made her feel a lot better. You have to bear in mind, we had barely seen blue butterflies in real life before and here they were everywere, tumbling around our feet.

I remember those butterflies just as well as I remember the view from the site. The monument is placed by the cliffs that line the southern coast of Skåne in the area. Up there you have a fabulous view of the waters separating Sweden and Skåne from Germany (and Poland). The day we went up there, the sun made the Baltic Sea glitter like tinsel. Blue and pale gold tinsel stretching as far as I could see to the south, east and west. It was a beautiful sight and it made me think "no wonder they choose to make a monument here, if it really is a king buried there I understand why he chose this place to rest".

More etching: Butterfly meadow onyx pendant

I found this pic on my computer. It's an onyx pendant I etched at the same time I made the bird pendant for Joanna. To make it I composed a scene using several different peel-off stickers or parts of stickers. The stone covered by stickers stay shiny while the rest of the surfaces i frosted by the etch.

I'm still pretty much a beginner at etching motifs like this. When etching on stone it's not just a risk of etching too deep, but also that etching too much can bring out some unwanted surprises like bandning in the stone. That happened to another bird pendant I did in the same batch. And in the pendant above, you can see another problem: the pale lines where the cream (I presume) starts to get in under the edges of the stickers. I hope cutting the etching time will eliminate the problem because these really were etched a few minute more than necessary.

I like the touch of velvet matte stone, but the reason I've made several stone pendants is at least partially because I found it easier to get by black stone pendants than simple, unadorned glass pendants.