JEWELRY Findings, BOX Parts, CLOCK Stuff and Crafty Things

The things in this section are mostly metal and glass components, which are incorporated into jewelry items. Findings are the structure upon which ornamentation is glued, soldered or fused. The ornamentation can be fused glass, gems, beads, insects, pebbles -- whatever items you deem "ornamental," and are lightweight enough to do the job. Findings include jump rings, ear wires, tie bars, and bails, to name a few.

Don't let anyone accuse you of having a drab jewelry box. Using some of our accoutrements, you can create stained glass boxes and things fit for even the most solemn of ceremonial occasions. Mr. R. G. "Tiger" Euphrates of Klamath Falls, Kansas writes: "This addition to your Gimcrack line has come along at just the right time to breathe life into an otherwise humdrum jewelry box season. Keep up the good work!" (Thank you, Tiger!)

SOLID OAK FRAMES FOR STAINED GLASS PANELS. After equipping one of these frames with hooks for hanging, you will be able to cause a mild sensation by displaying your favorite stained glass panel in front of a window or other light source. Deep rabbets allow you to install leaded glass as well as foiled work. Solid oak, sanded and ready for stain, varnish or polyurethane. All of these frames are perfectly suited for use as mirror frames such as one would find in a Victorian style decor. An oak mirror frame would fit right into the decorating scheme in one of those brass and oak accoutered bathrooms with the claw-footed bath tub.

The illustration show two ways to make hinges with brass tubing. The first method uses a piece of copper wire, or a brass rod, listed below, instead of the inner tubing. The second method uses the two diameters of tubing.

BRASS TUBING. Two diameters which telescope together so that you can make your own hinges for jewelry boxes, terrariums, cigarette cases, or very small coffins. Can easily be cut by scoring it with a single-edged razor blade and breaking it at the score mark.

SOLID BRASS RODS A rigid brass round wire which can be readily soldered onto lead or copper foil for special effects. Spars and rigging for ships, skier's poles, antennae for butterflies, crabs lobsters and shrimp, stems for flowers, legs for marsh birds, struts for airplanes, bars for bird-cages or crew cut hair-dos for retired army generals. All are 12" long.

The pressed flower department is back in business again, after finding a new supplier. Our previous supplier ran into production problems because his presses just didn't have the required capacity. Our new supplier also runs a "diet ranch", out west, where extremely overweight people go to unburden themselves of surplus poundage. The specially constructed beds there have two sheets of plywood beneath the springs, and early each evening the matrons load up each bedstead, and by the morning, your johnny jump-ups are as flat as a crepes suzette.

Put one of these between two pieces of clear glass, or between a bevel and a piece of clear glass, wrap the resulting sandwich with copper foil or lead, and you will have a neat little piece of work. These are real flowers, not your imitation crepe paper and wire stuff. They were grown in the good old U.S. of A. and are 100 percent American. Each package contains from 3 to 8 flowers, depending upon their size.