Baby, it’s good to have you home.
The next six months are all ours.
Let’s squander them on something good.
The next six months are all ours.
Let’s squander them on something good.
xx
Plume
Of Sea, Sky & Field
August 20, 2010 by
Composed of sterling, 14 karat gold, chrysoprase, pearl, aquamarine and elk ivory.
100% handcrafted in every way.
Not a single prefabricated piece of metal was used to create this necklace (with the exception of the chain, of course).
Elk ivory jewelry is a big deal in Idaho, Montana and Wyoming. Whenever locals find out I’m a bench jeweler they nearly always ask if I work with elk ivory. Elk ivory is actually an elk molar! They are deliciously smooth to the touch and are creamy white in color. They have to be prepared before they are set — essentially they need to be “back cabbed” so that they’ll sit flat in a bezel setting. To prepare this elk ivory I had to saw the root off the molar and then sand the back of the ivory until it was perfectly flat. I’m not sure if that’s the ideal and most technical way to do it but I work intuitively when it comes to experimentation and it seemed right to me. This is my first elk ivory design and it’s VERY unconventional compared to other such designs I’ve seen.
What I really wanted to talk to you about is where this design came from!
I have doubted myself and my work so much in the past few weeks. I have doubted my voice — thought that it might be weak, frail, flaccid, unoriginal. I have wondered why I’m doing what I’m doing. I thought my creativity was broken, atrophied, dissolved.
I thought all of these things over and over again. I’ve been unproductive (or so it feels) and my productivity is tied tight to my self worth.
On top of this, I have been tired. Tired of being alone. Tired of holding the fort. Tired of carrying all of these things by myself with him so far away. Tired of mowing the lawn. Tired of cooking meals. Tired of being tired.
Yesterday I dropped those shackles, unwound them from my wrists, claimed my title as an artist once again. I stripped down to the bare essentials, I found my inspiration once more and I saw myself as:
of the sea
of the sky
of the field
Feet firmly planted.
Wings tasting wind.
Skin bathed in salt water.
This piece is hefty, organic, original, natural
and creating it today lifted me up and felt 100% right.
In other news, I was finally FINALLY able to talk with RW last night.
He’ll be heading back down from Canada to the North Cascades Base on Friday. On Saturday I will drive to Washington to spend time with him on his days off. The thought of a two day drive is torturous. It makes me want to cry. But I have to see him. I need to see him. So I’m going to make the trip — the last trip of summer and I’m going to make it a grand old adventure that’s worth regaling you with upon my return home.
I will try to have a shop update prepared for tomorrow but I can’t make any promises! I’m running on fumes and it may have to wait until my return from Winthrop.
Thank you all, so much, for supporting me this week. For your letters, for your emails, for….everything. If I could, I’d mail you all a golden egg laying baby chicken as a thank you.
Lovelove,
Jillian Sue
McCall, Idaho
August 17, 2010 by
I made my way over and up to McCall this weekend.
I had a handful of reasons for going:
1. I had a delivery to make to Heidi.
2. I wanted to meet the McCall jumper base dispatch women (Oy vey, such amazing gals! More on them later!).
3. I wanted to check out this little mountain town because I’m trying to decide where I’d like to live next summer and this is a town RW can transfer into if he (we) decides he’d (we’d) like to transfer.
4. I really felt like swimming in a proper lake.
I departed for McCall on Saturday around noon. I had a South Dakotan house guest who left for the prairies on Saturday so when I finally hit the road I had a lot of summer in my hair and eventually a bunch of dust since the combines were ripping it up in the Snake River Valley between here and Boise.
Things started cooling off as soon as I started up into the mountains along the Payette River. The heat was filtered out first by clusters of ponderosa pines and then fir trees and the spray of whitewater on the rushing bends of that sweet mountain stream. I rolled into McCall exhausted and just in time for a glass of cold wine and some sushi at the local brew pub with a handful of lovely people.
The fire community in McCall is a tight one and it has me tied up in envious knots. I can’t imagine what it’s like to be a tough little woman who gets to see her smokejumper man so often. It made me want to cry to watch them all dancing, holding hands, tasting each others beer, talking face to face, finding out who was working when; for this reason, my trip was horribly bittersweet. It was so wonderful to be with fire families and so sad to be without RW.
I want to live in the town where RW is based, so badly.
So badly do I want this that it really does honestly hurt.
A bit.
I didn’t realize it until a half hour ago when I ran out to the local grocery store for avocados but I’m a bit sad, I’m really quite a bit sad tonight.
I knew what I was getting myself into when I married that mountain man of mine. The fact is, life would be half the adventure it is if it was only half as torturous as it is! HA!
Anyway, Sunday was a full day. Heidi and I blitzed out to a meadow where the McCall boys were doing a practice jump and I nabbed a few shots for you just to solidify the fact, in your minds, that smokejumping really is the dead sexiest job a fellow (or a lady) could ever have (besides being a fire dispatcher or a lion tamer…). The sun was strong on my face while I watched the boys, one by one, appear magically into thin air, spit out by their orange and white plane, and then drift down like Kevlar suited dandelion seeds into the meadow below:
*round of applause*
Heidi and I spent the rest of the day driving about in the Landcruiser, hiking (she’s preggers, but she’s tough as nails and fit as a fiddle — former smokejumper you know), eating ice cream, swimming in the lake, talking and laughing.
The dogs frolicked about like wild things in the mountain streams and in the lake.
The sun felt so good.
The company was fantastic.
I don’t want to jinx my friendship with this girl but boy oh boy, it
would take a lot of something strange for me to grow weary of her presence.
This morning, after a tasty breakfast with Heidi, I popped over to the jumper base to say toodaloo to the dispatch gals and here’s where I’m going to talk about them for a second:
THOSE GIRLS!
Yeesh. I took a glimpse at some of their desks and it was so brilliant to see pieces of me pinned to their workstations. Photos of mine. Jewelry write ups! Bits of my heart and soul already mingling with theirs. I think this is one of the brightest reasons why I feel like I fit in so well in McCall. These beautiful, funny, talented, strong, independent girls are part of my life already and I can’t help but feel drawn, even more strongly, to the area because of them! Oh you dispatch ladies, you fire talkers, you tough cookies, you feisty huckleberries, you’re quite the bunch and you won my heart over. I’ll see you again, and soon, I’m sure of it.
Before leaving McCall today, I drove around the lake, swam at three different locations, squinted in the sun, splashed about with my dog and dreamed about living in McCall next summer. Then I drove down out of the mountains and swam in four different sections of the Payette River before descending into the heat of Boise and beyond.
Oh McCall.
McCall, I have a crush on you,
McCall, I have a crush on you,
for serious,
and someday I’m going to make you mine, all mine.
In case you were wondering, I officially love this state more than I did the day before. It’s so diverse. It’s so sweepingly grand.
In case you were wondering, I officially love this state more than I did the day before. It’s so diverse. It’s so sweepingly grand.
I hope your weekend was stuffed full of adventures!
…and watermelon.
…and watermelon.
xx
The Noisy Plume
PS If you want to enlarge any of the photos in this post, just click on them!
Look What the Cat Dragged In:
July 22, 2010 by
My man is home! Quite by surprise!
I’m officially on holiday until Wednesday of next week.
See you soon!
xx
Missus Plume
The Bliss Project
July 6, 2010 by
Good Tuesday to you all!
It’s a beautiful morning here.
I had a bit of a sleep in because I wound up on the phone with my smokejumper around 2AM this morning. The conversation started like this:
RING RING
J: ROBBIE?!!!
R: Hey babe! I love you. I’m just leaving the Albertson’s in Fairbanks and my hands are full of chicken but I wanted to catch you just in case I’m out again tomorrow. Can I call you again in a few minutes.
J: YESssssSSSSsSSSSSssssSSSSSS!!!!!
_____________________________________________________
I haven’t talked to RW for a really long time. My heart about jumped out of my chest when I heard his smiling voice. And if you know RW, you know his voice DOES smile.
So then he called again and we talked for an hour or so and I was exhausted and I had to whisper because my house guests were slumbering in a nearby room but it was so lovely to finally talk to him. He made me laugh. He made me feel lucky to live in Idaho.
He made me feel proud of him, of me, of us.
And I knew, and I do still, that we’ll make it.
And then, when we finally hit the off buttons on our phones, I tossed and turned and thought about jewelry for a while. I always know I’m coming into some really good work when I can’t sleep at night for the flood of design ideas that are flying through my mind. It’s a double edged sword. I’m always so afraid that if I don’t turn on the light and sketch and write about my dreamy-in-the-middle-of-the-bewitching-hours-ideas that I’ll lose them forever. Last night I was so tired I had to lay there in the dark and trace the details of the ideas with my mind, hoping they would imprint and stay with me until the morning. Sometimes I DO find that the ideas are lost when morning comes but I reckon, as long as I don’t lose my head, they’ll surface again sometime, since they belong to my mind and soul.
Since they belong to MY MIND AND SOUL.
Talking to RW really energized me. I’ve been missing him like something else. I can’t help but feel like that missingness is permeating everything I say and do. Sometimes it makes me get in my truck in the middle of the afternoon so I can get on the highway and drive with the windows down and the breeze in my hair with the music on loud. Just to fly. For a second. To let the missingness zoom out behind me like a cape while I chase that yellow line towards the horizon.
No one makes me laugh until I cry quite like him.
In other news, I’ve embarked on a bit of a project here.
One of my dearest friends asked me if I had made something for myself lately. I realized I hadn’t. I have kept things for myself lately but I haven’t taken a moment to design and create something especially for ME. It’s so good for an artist to do this from time to time. It’s so good for the soul to intentionally design, create and keep a piece of work.
So I started this project.
It’s The Bliss Project.
It looks like this:
I made this piece for myself.
It wears most phantasmagorically
I encased a couple of poppy seed tops in green resin. From the base of this focal pendant drops a bezel set and pinned section of aspen branch that I harvested HERE. I encased it in resin as well and attached a sterling branch that swings down from the bezel cup to a pendulous sterling leaf. I know what the entirety of the design means to me. What do you think of when you see it? How do you define bliss? Pure joy. Pure delight. A cat laying in the sun. Standing hip deep in wildflowers. However you define it, I always reckon bliss is addicting. Bliss is a natural high. Rapture. The calm awareness of The Divine in a sweet and perfectly beautiful moment…like Annie Dillard’s tree of lights.
Working with resin has been a delight. I’m always looking for ways to completely and entirely create a piece of jewelry from literal scratch. In point of fact, I love that enamel has allowed me to say, “This piece is 100% handcrafted. Zero prefabricated components build it. I dreamed it and I built it from the ground up with raw materials…” How awesome is that? Anyway, resin is one more way for me create jewelry that is entirely made by me. The very thought makes my mind fly. There’s so much exploring to do with this medium. I’m beside myself with dreams. My mind has wings. My heart drums. Just because of the possibility of it all.
I’m off to get a coffee and perhaps I’ll blaze a little trail on the highway before coming home to settle into work today. I’ve a pile of beautiful things here that I’m waiting to list later on this week. I’m so focused on studio work right now that I can’t make myself set aside a day to photograph and list these pieces until I have a few designs out of my system. Mark my words, beauty abounds here and I’ll make it available soon.
I hope you’ve all had a lovely lovely week so far! I’ve been so busy with company, I’ve hardly had time for life! I’ve really missed you all. I was telling RW last night that I’m so glad I’ve always viewed this blog space as a community instead of a marketing tool (while it does market my work, that’s not the main reason why I’m so dedicated to the upkeep of this space).
I want you to visit this space and feel joy, see beauty and feel amazed by life!
You really do continue to lift me up this summer.
And I appreciate you ALL so much.
I want you to visit this space and feel joy, see beauty and feel amazed by life!
You really do continue to lift me up this summer.
And I appreciate you ALL so much.
Thank you so much for being part of my world.
Your souls really do ring with beauty.
Always.
x
The Plume