{"id":9529,"date":"2015-03-10T05:00:23","date_gmt":"2015-03-10T12:00:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/michellejolin.com\/wordpress\/?p=9529"},"modified":"2015-03-09T21:45:37","modified_gmt":"2015-03-10T04:45:37","slug":"new-thing-to-do-3479","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/?p=9529","title":{"rendered":"New thing to do #3,479"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tonight I started a class on turning silver into jewelry. Fabrication, to be specific. There will be very little casting, and a lot of welding, cutting, milling and whatever goes into putting hunks of precious metal together.<\/p>\n

Last night I did several things for the first time–I used a propane torch and an acetyline torch. I melted silver and poured it into a mold. I quenched it. I squished it into wire and I annealed it.<\/p>\n

I neither screamed, fainted or flinched while lighting and using the torches. The propane torch made a nifty noise like a jet engine when I turned it way up. Kinda liked it.  Some of you might be wondering about that, because having experienced being on fire in the past you might assume that I have a very rational fear of it. It’s true. I am very uncomfortable with fire. So much so that I need to challenge myself now and then. Push the boundaries.<\/p>\n

It was fine, which is good because in the next six weeks I’ll be using the torches quite a bit.<\/p>\n

This is what I ended up with tonight:<\/p>\n

Edit<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\"\"\ufeff<\/p>\n

Yes. It’s a hunk of sterling silver. About 18 grams of it. Pretty exciting, right? Next week I’m going to make it into a longer, skinnier hunk of sterling silver. Maybe learn how to weld. This might be a good time to think about what I want the silver to become.<\/p>\n

A bracelet, perhaps….<\/p>\n

Four out of ten students in the class are left-handed.  Do you suppose that’s meaningful?  Are lefties more apt to be into creative endeavors?  Is it a big coincidence? I dunno. <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tonight I started a class on turning silver into jewelry. Fabrication, to be specific. There will be very little casting, and a lot of welding, cutting, milling and whatever goes into putting hunks of precious metal together. Last night I did several things for the first time–I used a propane torch and an acetyline torch. … Continue reading New thing to do #3,479<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_hide_featured_image":false,"_jetpack_featured_image_duplicate_dismissed":0,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9529","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-words"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7lr3R-2tH","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":9599,"url":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/?p=9599","url_meta":{"origin":9529,"position":0},"title":"Too distracted for writing…","author":"Michelle","date":"March 18, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Why am I distracted?Oh, for several reasons.\u00a0I have a new mattress. I really want to go to bed and try it out. It may be that I am in bed at a very unreasonably early hour doing just that. \u00a0Clean sheets and a new mattress are pretty hard to beat.\u00a0Maybe\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Words"","block_context":{"text":"Words","link":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/?cat=7"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":10294,"url":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/?p=10294","url_meta":{"origin":9529,"position":1},"title":"Where there’s fire, there’s..wait, how does that go?","author":"Michelle","date":"July 9, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Metal smithing, lesson four: playing with fire. Soldering with big scary torches. Acetylene. Yes, they still scare me even after the other class I took. Don't get me wrong--I can use one, but I need a seriously Big Brave Facade in place to do it. Instructor: I thought you said\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Random thoughts"","block_context":{"text":"Random thoughts","link":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/?cat=20"},"img":{"alt_text":"image","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/michellejolin.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/image-300x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":10488,"url":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/?p=10488","url_meta":{"origin":9529,"position":2},"title":"Metalsmithing summary","author":"Michelle","date":"October 6, 2015","format":"gallery","excerpt":"Here are the things I learned to make this Spring and Summer. Bear in mind that some of these are just learning exercises. And yes, that is a Sea Monkey. It was an exercise in using a jeweler's saw. I think he is very fetching.\u00a0 Techniques? Simple soldering\/braze welding, bezel\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Random thoughts"","block_context":{"text":"Random thoughts","link":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/?cat=20"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/michellejolin.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/image10-e1440381838257.jpg?fit=500%2C616&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":9814,"url":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/?p=9814","url_meta":{"origin":9529,"position":3},"title":"How to make a bracelet","author":"Michelle","date":"April 21, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"First, get some silver. Apply fire. A lot of fire. Then, when it's all nice and melty, pour it into a mold. It will look something like this: \u00a0 \u00a0 Then stretch it out. It will take a lot of pressure and some more fire. Eventually, you will have something\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Words"","block_context":{"text":"Words","link":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/?cat=7"},"img":{"alt_text":"IMG_2711.JPG","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/michellejolin.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/04\/IMG_2711-300x224.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":10400,"url":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/?p=10400","url_meta":{"origin":9529,"position":4},"title":"In which I make a circle","author":"Michelle","date":"August 5, 2015","format":"gallery","excerpt":"So, you take this flat piece of silver with a design sawed into it. Then you bend it into a not all that circular shape, making sure the ends are flush. Then you apply fire and solder to make it into a continuous circle-ish shape. You are not overly concerned\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Random thoughts"","block_context":{"text":"Random thoughts","link":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/?cat=20"},"img":{"alt_text":"IMG_0303.JPG","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/michellejolin.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/IMG_0303-225x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":9065,"url":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/?p=9065","url_meta":{"origin":9529,"position":5},"title":"Death, cat pee and ink stains","author":"Michelle","date":"January 21, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"\"Not only are there no happy endings,\" she told him, \"there aren't even any endings.\" --Neil Gaiman The notice that the divorce was final came in the mail on the same day she faxed in the paperwork to have her father cremated. There were technical difficulties, and she got ink\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Words"","block_context":{"text":"Words","link":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/?cat=7"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9529","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9529"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9529\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9529"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9529"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michellejolin.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9529"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}