Vintage Vibes

My latest jewelry projects have been few and far between, given the challenges my family has been facing the past several months. On top of the holidays and my father's passing, we were in the middle of moving my parents out of the house they lived in since 1976 to a small retirement cottage. We've done a lot of purging and packing!!! We now have Mom all moved in to the new place, and she is busy unpacking boxes, and making fun decisions (like what color towels to use in the bathrooms, etc). Her days are full, and I think the move has helped her in dealing with the loss of her husband (my dad). I still drop in on her after work most days, to make sure she's ok - and she's doing well. However, this isn't a post about that.

What I'm getting to is that I have not had much time since Labor day to work on jewelry. Every once in a while, I'd find myself at home by 8:00 at night, and would have the energy to go to my bead room, and unwind there.

Mom gave me this rhinestone dress clip in the course of the purging and packing. I don't know who it belonged to, or where she got it. But all it needed was a couple vintage crystals and some gun metal chain to transform into a necklace.

And, if it ever needs to be worn as a dress clip again, The connector rings can be easily removed!


About every year, before the holidays, I take a day off from work, and go shopping with my girlfriend Joan. We go to Collingswood, NJ. There are a few little shops (not as many as previous years - a sign of the times I suppose), and lots of interesting restaurants. Jubili beads is nestled right in the middle of the action. Of course, it's our main stop. They have some vintage finds, reasonably priced too. I picked up both the carved button tops and the little wooden flower discs at Jubili. The button tops (I guess they are "cabs", but they look like old buttons to me) remind me of carved Bakelite. I'll admit, I bought quite a few of them.

I've named this "Orange Slice"

That is it, for now! Thanks for sticking with me.