"Verdigris"

To start off, I got this fun, bright, shiny copper pendant from Artbeads. I picked it not because I liked it, but because I had a vision of what it could become. I always loved the shiny copper roofs on some of those building you see sometimes. What I liked even more was watching them change over time to this wonderful verdigris patina. Well, I did not have that kind of time so I improvised. {I am good at that ;)} I will tell you first that I have been a scrapbooker for about 5 years now, and I have accumulated a ton of stuff over the years. One of my favorite
things is embossing. I have sooo many colours, I can not even begin to list them off for you. So without further ado... THE EMBOSSED PENDANT!!!!

First you need "Ranger Verdigris embossing powder". I took the pendant and heated it with my heat gun. Because the pendant is metal, you don't need to use a watermark to hold the powder, just heat the metal and "dip" the pendant, or "dust" the top of the pendant with powder. Because you have heated the metal pendant, the powder melts on contact. Keep heating it though, it does not always all melt. Repeat this process
until your entire pendant, front and back are covered. You will need several layers to make it look right, although you can leave a few small bare spots with the original copper showing through.

You will need to hold it with needle nose pliers obviously, because it will get very hot. Do not put it down!! You need it to cool off completely before you do, or big chunks of the embossing will come off if it touches another surface. {my son was "helping"me and knocked it over from where I had it cooling off. So I know!!}
Once it is dry, drip a drop of walnut{or brown}alcohol ink and sponge it. Repeat in a couple of different areas and repeat with a bi of copper alcohol ink. Make sure that is dry and then take an old nail file and sand a little bit at the corners and any other thick spots. That's it! You are done.

HERE IS THE FINISHED PENDANT!!! {pretty cool huh??}

I am not sure if any of you know this, but when Artbeads first started their "beaders that Blog" group, I was asked to join. I was truly honoured to say yes. In all honesty I did not believe I was good enough to even be considered! I have evolved so much since then. I honestly feel like I was given a chance by someone who saw something in me that I did not know was there yet. Thank You Steve Gronier for believing in me, you have been a HUGE part of my evolution and I am eternally grateful. This necklace, I feel, is one of my best.

Here is a close up of some of the beads. You can see green Aventurine, two colours of Fresh Water Pearls, Copper beads, Glass beads and even Lampwork beads along with a few copper spacers.

And here is the finished Necklace, with the beautiful copper pendant given to me by Artbeads and altered by me.

You will have to go see the Enchanted Adornments flicker/facebook page and see all the wonderful entries for their Mixed Media competition. I have two necklaces so far and both of them have pendants from Artbeads.

I hope you have the confidence in me to add me to your blogroll and to become a follower. That would mean a lot to me. I am grateful for all of you who come to see me and I hope to see you all back again soon.

Marie