Silver wire wrapped enamel butterfly necklace

Last month was my niece's 8th birthday. She's starting to become more interested in clothes and fashion, so I made her a double-sided enamel butterfly necklace:

Her favorite colors are purple and blue, so I used them in the pendant. She's modeling the side that has more purple... and her elephant (a gift from her best friend) is showing off the other side. She loves to dress her stuffed animals and dolls, and is constantly changing and switching their outfits -- so I take the elephant wearing my work as a huge compliment!

Like me, my niece is into drawing and crafts, and I hope she'll continue to have this interest as she gets older. Making her a necklace was not only my way of giving her a gift from the heart, but was also my way to show her what you can do if you work hard and have patience. These days, it's pretty easy to get what you need; I can go into most stores and find an inexpensive and pretty piece of jewelry that was mass produced. But it's so much more satisfying for me to make it myself. I hope I can teach her that she doesn't always have to take the easy way out and buy things, but can find the enjoyment in learning how to cook or sew, or make jewelry.

When she's older, I'll see if she's interested in learning some jewelry-making skills from me. Meantime, I'm happy to have her stuffed animals model my work!

Check out the rest of my handmade wire wrapped and enamel jewellery at Naomi's Designs and MayaGirl Creations.

Making Jewelry: Felting and other crafting projects

Today is our niece's 7th birthday! This past weekend, my husband and I visited our in-laws in Maine so we could celebrate. Our niece loves painting, drawing, playing with clay, so we always have a great time making things together. During our four-day vacation, I didn't make any real jewelry (I'll explain in a moment), but I did get to try some new crafts.

For the past few years, my niece has had her birthday party in a local art studio that caters to kids. The party guests get to complete several different projects throughout the afternoon and always have a lot of fun. My niece is an avid reader and is currently very interested in Botswana, so her party theme honored the country. The kids got to paint African masks and color cut-outs of animals and Botswana's flag.

All of the other adults sat around and took photos of the kids -- but I jumped right in and joined them, making a mask of my own! The chairs are designed for children so I was practically sitting on the floor, but I squeezed into one and had a blast painting.

Later, the kids enjoyed cupcakes as my niece opened her gifts. She received many artistic presents, including a sketch pad, pottery-making set, bracelet-making kit and a particularly interesting-looking kit called "Felted Friends."

Back home, she immediately checked out all of her presents. The bracelet kit came with four colorful wrist bands on which you place stickers, so she and I each designed two. I wore my "jewelry" to enameling class yesterday and everyone loved it!

However, making the "Felted Friends" turned out to be a much more complicated endeavor. I'd never done any felting; in fact, I didn't even know that felting is a thing, but apparently making items from felt is a very popular craft. Basically, you take a long felting needle and poke and mold the felt into shapes; if you want to add a section -- say, a leg to a felt doll -- you poke at the seam until the sections attach. When you poke at the felt, the fibers tangle, which allows the sections to connect and maintain their shapes.

Anyway, this gift is actually for ages 10 and up and there was no way I was going to let my niece use a sharp needle. Therefore, it was up to me to make a felt cat. My husband tried, but got bored after only a few minutes of felt poking. I was more patient and spent over an hour making this thing. I twice poked myself in the finger and my cat -- which I named "Lopsided" -- looks like a demented blob, but here it is:

No, it's not my finest work, but you know what? Felting is fun. I liked it more than I thought I would and am considering getting myself a grown-up felting kit. I think with some practice I can make something that doesn't look like a rag with ears.

By the way, the real cat in the photo is our kitty, Maya. My niece "gave" me the felt cat (apparently I have to work for my gifts) and wanted me to show it to Maya. I promised my niece I'd take a picture of the cats together. As you can see, Maya was very curious about her new felt friend...

Our vacation is over, though, so it's back to my jewelry! Please check out my handmade wire wrapped and enamel jewellery at Naomi's Designs and MayaGirl Creations.

Silver wire earrings with yellow Swarovski crystals

One of the great things about jewelry is that it's not only beautiful, but often has a memory attached. I'm sure most of us can recall the first piece of jewelry we received or the first that we gave someone. That's what I hope my jewelry does for people. I want to know that my pieces are bringing a positive experience to the wearer and that they'll be able to associate my bracelets or necklaces with an event like say, a friend's wedding or a baby's Christening.

This has got me thinking of some of my favorite jewelry memories. I've never been gung ho about getting expensive jewelry, even when it came to my engagement ring. But I've still always had a liking for fun, creative pieces and do have a few items that are very important in my life.

1. My double heart necklace. This was the very first present I ever received from a boy. I was in the second grade and had a crush on a boy in my class, Chris. Well, I was shocked when he handed me a small package at our class Christmas party. It was wrapped in holiday paper, but since I'm Jewish, he wrote in "Chanukah" wherever it said Christmas. I then opened it and there was a necklace inside. It had a silver chain and a double heart charm that was made out of some kind of shell, I think. I loved it. He put it on for me and for a short time after that was my boyfriend. I've since lost touch with Chris, but I still have that necklace!

2. My Ling Ling necklace. When I was about 3 or 4, my parents took me to see the pandas in the Washington, D.C. soon. I loved them and they bought me a necklace made in the likeness of the panda, Ling Ling. I wore it everywhere. Then one day, I was playing on the monkey bars and lost it -- and I was devastated. I think my father found it -- I do remember him looking for it -- but while I can't recall every fact, I remember the panda charm, clear as day.

3. My Strawberry Shortcake ring. Around the time I was 8, I was obsessed with Strawberry Shortcake. One time, I was on a camping trip with my parents and we were taking a hike through the woods. I saw a shiny object on the ground -- and it was a little ring with Strawberry Shortcake on it! I couldn't believe my luck and pocketed it before anyone else could get their hands on this valuable merchandise.

4. My black "Cleopatra" necklace. When I was 10, my parents took me to Egypt (we traveled a lot because my parents were teachers who had summers off). While we were there, we took a cruise down the Nile and on the last night, the boat threw a costume party. I dressed up as Cleopatra in this blue, filmy genie costume and a crown, and my mom even let me wear my very long hair down (she usually made me keep it in braids). Each of us had to get up and show off our costumes. When it was my turn, I did the whole "Walk Like An Egyptian" dance (it was 1984!) and everyone was impressed. I ended up winning the costume contest and they gave me a choice of prizes; I chose this black beaded necklace that had multi-colored beads woven through it.

5. My engagement ring. Choosing a ring was probably difficult for my husband, Jon, because I'm not wild about diamonds. A lot of people believe that the bigger the diamond, the more he loves you, but at the time, I wanted us to save up money for a home. During out talks about the possibility of marriage, I'd hinted to Jon about what kind of ring I wanted - something with a colorful stone, like an emerald. On the day he proposed, February 14, 1999, he ended up giving me exactly what I wanted: a ring that had a circle of emeralds with a small diamond in the middle. A lot of people, even to this day, think it's a weird engagement ring, but it fits my personality to a T.

So there you have it, so of my own memories about jewelry. My piece for today are my silver earrings with yellow Swarovski crystals. I'd originally made a pair of these for a friend who loves pink and wove in pink crystals. I wanted to make a similar pair with something that looked a little like yellow diamonds.

I used to not be a huge fan of yellow, but I'm finding that I really like the color in jewelry. Yellow stands out and makes things pop. Plus, it looks good with many other colors.

So what are some of your favorite jewelry memories?

To purchase my jewelry (and create some memories for yourself or a loved one), head to Naomi's Designs or Naomi's Studio.