Jewelled Web - July 2014 - Link Love

June has gone by so, so fast this year. I seem to have been running to catch up with myself, and not quite making it, nearly every day.

And here I am, at the end of the month, with a cold. In summer. That just seems wrong.

I hope you like my links for July though - don't worry, you won't catch my cold just by clicking ;)


~jewellery links~

Wire bead tutorial, courtesy of Blue Forest Jewellery. Lots more tutorials dotted around this blog too...

Making domed shapes in resin, a simple tutorial I'm filing for future reference.

Cozy Sister is a great web site full of information and tutorials about wire jewellery.

Great post by Nan Fan about choosing the props she uses when styling her jewellery photographs.

Some help on how to make faceted polymer clay beads - with some links to more help.

I didn't know it was possible but it seems you can make your own metal clay. Here's a tutorial on making bronze and silver clay, and here's one for copper. I haven't tried this, and may well not do so (toxic chemicals and all) but the fact it's possible is fascinating.


~non-jewellery links~

Silversmithing is dirty, messy, and carries with it the perpetual risk of setting the table on fire but despite that I hanker for any single one of these tidy, bright and non-burning creative work spaces.

Such sweet illustrations - could anyone not love these?

Amazon reviews with just a hint of humour to them...

I like this formula for looking after yourself, something we should all do more of, I suspect...

Which browser do you use and just how out of date is it?

I don't think I use the net as efficiently as I could or should. I often feel like I'm 'wasting' time, even when I'm trying not to, if only because download speeds are painfully slow more and more frequently. So here's a little list of web tools I either use, have signed up to, or (most likely) think would be great to use if I ever got round to figuring out how they work - 

Dragdis - A neat tool for simple bookmarking - I overuse both Firefox and Chrome's handy drag-the-address-to-the-toolbar ability way too much and would like something with the same speed and ease of use, but Dragdis hopefully means that I can impose a little more order on my new bookmarks. The old ones are just a jumbled mess unfortunately...

Flipboard - Create your own 'magazine' from everything that interests you on the net. In theory, should save you having to hunt around for that same 'everything'. And it makes it pretty.

Feedly - seems bit similar to above, but perhaps more of a feed reader. This needs a bit more exploring.

Simplenote - A little like Evernote but perhaps more simple...? And it's free.

Instapaper - I've heard good things about this as a way of saving things from the net to read later. I'm guessing it's not that free though as it says you can 'try' if for free... hmm

Do let me know if you use any of these and they're worth taking the time to learn and use, or if you find anything else makes the web a little easier to navigate and explore.



Hope your June has been long and leisurely and that you have a good July...