As with anything you feel newly enthusiastic about, trying to put together a collection of jewellery is a painfully slow process.
If I'm not waiting for things to arrive at or return from the caster, findings, chains and all the unexpected tools and pieces of machinery that I gradually discover are crucial to completing the task all take time to arrive.
Key to learning anything is hitting stumbling blocks and figuring out how to manoeuvre around them and my god, the precious metal road is liberally littered with obstacles.
Happily, silversmithing itself is both fun and interesting to learn about and I've discovered an incredibly rare thing; an online community that wants exclusively to share knowledge and help one another out. There's no embarrassment or intimidation suffered, which means asking those questions that are obvious to everyone else is nothing to sweat over.
Back to the time issue, though: I have one. Sprinkle in a few projects with Souled Out Studios and commercial jobs that latch on and suck triple the amount of time they're meant to from your schedule - and 'pop!' goes the year.
Ditto travel, which I'm doing more of than I ever have before, what with being childless and everything.
The reason I'm in such a hurry to have more than a mere handful of pieces in the store is the Living North Christmas Fair.
I'm in and given that it starts on Nov 2, I've secured an eye-wateringly early start to the festive season and I need more than two necklaces and a tie pin to stock a stall.
With that, here's what's new:
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