Welcome to Crafts and Design!
Hello
Welcome to my creative portfolio
I'm Steph, self-proclaimed creative person with many different artistic pass times. Most of these pass times I have been working on or in for years now. Just recently my husband and I decided to try and make these creative endeavors into a small business so we can share our creations with our local market and the world.
For the last several years, I have gotten back into making jewelry and recently leather work. Both have infinite possibilities for design, the only thing that can limit that is the materials (lets face it, the really good stuff is pretty expensive right now). Being that supplies are expensive, I have had to think outside the box when it comes to creating anything and everything I've worked on recently.
I have a good day time job, and that definitely helps the splurge on the good stuff every once and a while.
I started out drawing and playing music as a kid. My father was an exceptional artist, whether it was a technical drawing or a fanciful request from his daughter for a dog catching a frisbee with musical notes all around, his skills were memorizing. My grandmother's both played music, one piano, the other church organ. Between these 3 amazingly talented souls, I was inspired to be creative and have never given up on the creative part of my brain.
Oddly enough, sometimes I make I see in a dream. Sometimes what I make is me trying to retool or embellish a design or style I've seen on TV, out in public and/or the internet.
Currently, when it comes to jewelry I am really into Czech Glass and and gemstones. The Czech Glass not just for the beauty that each handmade bead has, but the centuries of craftsmanship that has been passed down to create these beautiful beads. This is still a family oriented trade, not a huge factory created bead. I love that. I respect that. I've always loved gemstones. As a kid I collected rocks from places my family would go and would buy pretty geodes where ever I could. I always wanted to find one!
Leather craft is definitely another craft that has endured the ages - and from what I have found so far requires much patience, practice and attention to detail - even the simple designs/projects. It's sort of therapeutic to get lost in making an item. I've come to enjoy making things that aren't just pretty but practical.
I'm not a regular participant in the current trends, but you can see some of them come out in my work. In my opinion, the creative market is saturated right now with many of the things I like to create. There is stiff competition and it takes some focus and abstract thinking to produce something that isn't the 2000th necklace you've seen with Czech Glass or the same style of leather accessory you'd buy at Walmart. While I may use mediums that many others do right now, I try to stay true to my quirky sense of design, square peg in a round hole way of thinking and do the best I can to create something that is unique.
Sometimes what I make, or most times maybe, is not for everyone. I do believe that there is someone out there who will appreciate my work, someone who will say 'that speaks to me'. LOL
I invite you into my creative brain, by sharing my works below. I hope you enjoy!
Handmade Items and Art
These are some of my jewelry designs, leather craft and other physical art pieces. I use many different medias and materials, but focus on jewelry, drawing/painting, scroll saw and some engraving work.
 With my husbands help on making frames, I created this wall hanging jewelry organizer. One in a series of 4 that I created. |  Hand cut leather pouches, made with a craft cut and one with scrap leather. Intended to be used for pencils, they can be used for reading glasses and makeup brushes too. |  The beginnings of the first leather purse I made. Using scrap leather and craft cuts, I had to meticulously cut all the pieces with a utility knife, then punch the stitch holes, 2-5 at a time. Detail work! |
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 The assembled, finished purse (with an amazon bought strap). |  The second leather purse I made. I used craft cuts for this one and made my own strap out of bolo tie leather... much better than the Amazon strap. |  One day, I devoted my time to making bracelet designs that had been floating around in my head for a while. |
 My attempt at fiery fringe to accompany the handmade Peruvian Dragon beads. |  My attempt at a Hot Air Balloon, using antiqued brass findings and agate stone. |  My collection of Summer Beah inspired jewelry. |
 Another piece from my Summer Beach inspired collection using Rose Gold coated shells and Aquamarine stone beads. |  These were created using Tierra cast Connectors, handmade Gold Face beads from Turkey, popular Crystal beads and Czech Glass flowers. |  Made from the inspiration of a semi-local annual celebration up near where we live. The frogs are handmade ceramic beads from Peru. |
 Inspired by a friends upcoming wedding, this was made to gift her on their special day at the beach in Florida. |  Made for a friend who shared the mutual love of Viking and Norse lore. The Celtic knotwork bead was taken from a broken bracelet the dangles are bead caps, repurposed. |  These were and experiment with colors - pink and Picasso Seed beads and metal tube beads. I am not sure these came out how I imagined them. LOL |
 Made with the inspiration from feeling excited about going to a Summer concert - for me a once in a lifetime show featuring many good bands. They were eventually gifted to a wonderful lady who works on the 2nd floor at Shriners Hospital for Children. |  An experimental Dragon Fly pendant, inspired from an internet posting. I beaded it up a little more, of course. |  One of the very first pairs of Fringe Earrings I made, using tube beads instead of all seed beads. The tube are Hummingbird colored when the light hits them. |
 Inspired by the mushroom trend that seems to be on the out LOL. My husband made the live edge bowl that my little diorama sits on. |  One of the first images I engraved with my Cricut using some of the designs in Design Space. Not as cool as some of the others, but pretty and simple nightlight none the less. |  This was inspired by my love of Craftsman/Arts and Crafts Design. It was a hand traced template of the famous McIntosh Rose collection that I cut on my first Scroll Saw. I made it into a lightbox that sits on my night stand. Very proud of this one. It took time and patience for sure. |
 Scroll Saw cut F-Bombs. I made many of these at the suggestion of friends and family as gifts. These are just a few! |  Composition photo to be used on marketing materials. |  Inspired by my step-daughter's love of skulls. This drawing was done on terrible, cheap drawing paper, but I put the work in none the less. I REALLY loved working with the Prismacolor colored pencils, they had a rich, blend-able pigment that was really enjoyable to use. If you like making gradients with colored pencil, those are the best in my opinion. |
 Inspired by the little video clips of a lady making little Dragons out of clay that floated around on social media for a while during the pandemic. |  Flyer made for my husbands local Wood Turning class. |  This flyer was made for the Christmas shopping event at a local creative business that my husband and I participated in - We were in charge of the 'Paint your own Snowman' activity for kids. |
 This is the front page of a commercial business flyer I designed that is still in use today. |  Retired version, outside tri-fold of a commercial business flyer I designed in 2017. |  Retired version, inside tri-fold of a commercial business flyer I designed in 2017. |
Photography
I love to take pictures of the natural world around me, particularly, Sunsets and creatures. Some of these images were taken with my professional camera and some on the fly with my cell phone camera.
