Scottish Piping

Okay, so from the title of this post you might think I'm going to blog about the Scottish bagpipes but what I'm actually referring to is Scottish wool and red piping!  I finally gathered up the courage to cut into this beautiful blue Scottish wool that my mother-in-law gave me last year.  There wasn't quite enough to make the full design of this dress (which should have a collar and dainty short sleeves) but I made the most of it.  In fact the piece of fabric was not quite long enough for this dress so I had to add a 3-inch strip to the hem.  Luckily I remembered to keep enough length in the red piping so that the extra hem line in the wool looks more like a detail that was put there intentionally.  It took two painful attempts before the "invisible zipper" at the back of the dress was no longer glaringly visible but it was well worth the effort.

This flattering dress pattern is definitely one that I will use again since it typically takes several iterations before I can get something to fit right.  Now that I have the proper measurements it should be much easier to get through the next variation of this design.

Lost Wax Casting: Floral Bracelet (cont'd)

Over the holidays I read about an easy way to add a dark patina to your sterling silver with just a container and some hard-boiled eggs.  The sulfur released from the eggs reacts with the metal the same way that the Liver of Sulfur chemical does, only much slower.  After boiling one egg I peeled the shell, cut it into quarters, and put the sections into a clear container with the bracelet while the egg was still hot.  The clear container keeps the sulfur in while allowing you to monitor your silver piece (which was still tricky due to the condensation).  After about an hour I was satisfied with the colour and took out the bracelet.  This is what it looked like!

I used a silver-cleaning polishing pad to remove the dark patina from the high points of the bracelet and voila!  Here is a photo of the finished product (with my first bracelet in the background).