Three Men in the Fog - Straight Line series

Feel like I've been on a 2 day intensive.  I'm toast.

I wouldn't enter this in a contest but am pleased with what I learned.  Even fabricated the pin back which I often wimp out on for fear of melting everything at the last step. 
I would so love to study under a good jewelry artists, or several -so much to know.

To refresh: the path 3 men walked in the fog missing their destination (the black stone) and ending up back at the barn where they started.

My husband, Scott, was just telling me a story of meeting some farm boys in Rapid City, N. Dakota.  They said there are x-many steps from the barn to the house.  If there's a white out or blizzard and you go x-many steps without finding the house (or barn), turn around, retrace your steps back to the start point, try again.
Our winter cold isn't seeming so unpleasant at the moment.

I'd Understand...

I'd understand if you don't believe this constitutes 4 - 5 hours of work today.  I know... hard to keep motivated sometimes.
This is another "straight line" piece, the path three men took walking in the fog.  They made four near and not-so-near misses of their destination ending right back where they started at the barn. With more bends and turns there is more hammering, hardening, annealing and a whole lot more hassle. 

My first attempt of the day, with 16ga steel wire.  If you worked with forging you know the challenges.  If not, you probably don't want to know. Liken it to trying to fix a Slinky that gets pulled out of shape




 Pretty pleased with myself for figuring out little staples made by snipping the heads off and bending straight pins.  Didn't get my joins clean enough so only 1 of 9 solder joints 'took' and steel simply behaves differently than non-ferrous metals. Love the look of steel but mistakenly printed 75% sized templates for the next go-round so switched to smaller, 18ga, silver - and it just goes on and on and on...

Straightline and rough design

Roughed designs for my daughter Cara.  She laid out a general form for amber and rough garnet she has, wanting something sturdy but delicate looking, kind of Rivendell-ish.  I'm thinking filigree which will be new for me.

This delights me no end.  Without a fixed reference point, people cannot walk a straight line.  This is the path of a man, blindfolded and told to walk a straight line across an empty field.  He re-crossed the road at least 5 times and came to a stop when he hit a stump.  I took a screen shot with my phone and translated into this brooch. see the video http://www.wimp.com/straightline . 3" x 2 5/8", steel, brass.  My first time soldering steel.  seems to behave much like the brass.