made by Julianne

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etched rocket necklace

30 December 2009 by Julianne

This weekend was my boyfriend’s big birthday and I wanted to make him something really special. We had a pretty magical moment involving a 40′ tall rocket at Burning Man, so rockets are a significant motif in our relationship.

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The pendant is made out of a penny that was flattened by a souvenir machine, and then the image (it was a penguin) that was stamped on it got ground off by my jeweler friend. Next I etched the penny, treating it just like any other (tiny) copper plate. I used a red stop-out ground, did the outline first, then the body, then the little flames shooting out the back. I went with an asphaltum ground for the back.

I couldn’t resist adding something mushy to the back of the pendant.

I tried printing the plate, but because of the slight curve of the penny the print didn’t come out at all. But the ink did add a great patina to the penny, and I was able to get some decent rubbings with thin paper and a hard lead.

I used an old penny with a high copper:zinc ratio and then sealed the pendant, so it won’t oxidize out of control. Then I went old school with a friendship-bracelet style necklace, so the whole thing is handmade. Unfortunately I did not take into account how much bigger his man-neck is than mine, so I have to make him a longer necklace. I put it in a little drawstring pouch that smells mysteriously good.

My man doesn’t wear jewelry, but I really wanted to make this for him. It was so hard to keep this a secret! I had it for 3 weeks before giving it to him. I was going to wait until we got to the Grand Canyon on his birthday, but instead I gave it to him the night before. It just felt like the right moment, and he was pretty excited.

OK, that was staged, but you get the idea.

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FUNGITRON

30 December 2009 by Julianne

So I came up with this idea on the looong drive back from Burning Man (2,500 miles=lots of time to think). Fungitron debuted at Halloween but its real venue is Burning Man, with a planned appearance at Mardi Gras along the way.

These Smurfs and I danced in the street to the Fraggle Rock theme song.

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I wore it to Voodoo Fest during the day, which was awesome! People kept coming up to me to pose for pictures; I was the unofficial mascot of a music/head shop called The Mushroom; at the Gogol Bordello show I really stood out and was easy to spot on the jumbotron, as well as by the band! Also I was interviewed for a spot on Fuse TV, which was pretty cool.

The bodysuit is silver sequins lined with nude spandex. I added silver rick-rack and some rhinestones for extra pizzazz. The hood is not attached to the suit.

The cap is paper mache! The white spot are cut out of milk cartons and actually cover little bowls, which eventually will have LEDs in them. For Halloween I put in glow sticks, so I really stood out at the festival and on Frenchman Street later that night.

Of course, there had to be a utility belt. My friend came over and borrowed another bodysuit. My boyfriend bought our socks.

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suiting up

30 December 2009 by Julianne

For about a year and a half I’ve been eying some glitter Spandex at Joann’s, knowing exactly what I would make out of it if I could only find the excuse. Well, this year I went to BURNING MAN. It was insane; it was incredible; it was indescribable! And I was well dressed.

First, here’s a shot from the desert, with the fabulous Cosmo:

As it turns out, you don’t have to have a great body to prance around in a bodysuit. Stick anything in 2 yards of sparkly spandex and it’s fabulous. I got more attention wearing these than when I walked around naked.

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The outfits were interpreted in so many ways, as a fish/mermaid suit, as an astronaut, as an alien (especially when I was in the rocket), and a superhero. It was actually pretty cold at night and my silver fringed arm warmers didn’t do much, so when I wasn’t dancing my tushy off I was snuggled up in a teal robe.

I didn’t use a pattern on these but they fit perfectly. I loved being able to change the attitude by the height of the zipper (I did wear it around with the zipper completely open). Also I whipped up a silver utility belt, which was so useful! I kept food, a camera, toilet paper, a knife, and all sorts of little essentials on hand.

The blue one was second and came out much better. It only took 90 minutes from start to finish (excluding the sequins at the collar). Also on this one I figured out to use the 3-stitch zig zag, which worked so much better than the regular zig zag!

Since I didn’t get a lot of shots at Burning Man, yesterday I suited up again and played in the neighbor’s tree house.

For next year I am going to have a different color for every night. Also, I’m thinking about putting in a much longer 2-way zipper to go from the neck all the way to the back, so that using the porta-potties isn’t such a hassle.