effort less

I had a day of mixed success in the studio yesterday. I was re-blasting a piece that I had attempted to colour with the microtorch last week, which hadn’t worked out. Blasting and refinishing all went fine, with the colouring that I decided upon working a treat. Re-stringing was easy too; I had decided to omit a piece of the puzzle, the effect of which changed/improved the whole look of the pendant. It was going great, until I had to solder. Four simple ends should be easy-peasy; it’s something that I have to do on practically every piece. I’m looking right now at a brooch I wore recently, and it has eight of these solder points, which is about average.

Yesterday though? Could. Not. Do.

I had many attempts, with the ends of the cable getting shorter and shorter each time (you just can’t make silver solder stick to carbon-blackened stainless steel). In the end I had to walk away, three out of four points completed.

As my littlest sister would say: “Fail. Epic fail.” (The rest of my sisters would quote John Lennon in the Beatles movie Help and say “Jeweller, you’ve failed!“)

Today I’m in hiding from the studio, doing paperwork. Cowed?… yes. Attempting to regroup for more action tomorrow? Certainly.