I'm such a square

I have a long history of making and selling wire jewelry, but I've always wanted to move into the world of soldering. Last fall and winter, I did it; buying the initial supplies and tools to begin working with metal in new ways. 

Of course I read a lot of books and watched even more You Tube videos before trying my hand. I'm still basically practicing using copper, brass and nickel silver (which doesn't contain actual silver, but is an alloy of zinc, nickel and copper) and here's a cute pair of earrings I made the other day -

They're only about an inch long and 1/2 inch square, but I love the way they turned out. I tried a couple of different soldering techniques to secure the ear wires to the back and so now I know which works best. Cutting and measuring is something everyone needs to pay attention to when making jewelry and so I went really carefully about that part. 

I also experimented with soldering bricks. Some hold heat better and some stay quite cold which means I have to keep the flame on the piece longer - not good. It's interesting to learn which works best when. Ditto with fusing which is something I still do a lot of.

So as I progress through different little practice projects I'll post them here. Soon I hope my quality is good enough to buy sterling silver and make pieces for you!