Turquoise jewelry Southwest and Bohemian designs

Getting ready for the holiday season here at Gypsy Moon Designs. I love the colors turquoise blue and royal blue together: very watery. So, I have been in my studio working on designs in my favorite colors.

Loved making this beauty! It's a multi strand necklace with a real bohemian vibe. I've become addicted to antiquing metal. I hand patinaed the dragonfly charm and the copper chains. You can see close up photos in my shop. Multi strand turquoise necklace. Soon I will be working on more layered necklace.

Chunky and yummy is this southwest turquoise necklace. I really like disk shaped Turquoise stones. Large oval stones of Lapis Lazuli look great with the rich sky blue color of this natural quality Turquoise. chunky turquoise necklace I also created a limited run of turquoise earrings with some of these stones.

Every autumn I like to create earthy jewelry with Ammonite fossils. Ammonite fossil necklaces are very popular in my shop. This week I am busy creating more. This one is my current one with stunning green Turquoise. Red Tiger Eye stones are my favorite to combine with green Turquoise.Ammonite necklace

So that is what I have been designing the last few days. I have some new patina earring designs being patina-ed at the moment. (On my windowsill!) They should be in my shop in a few days.

Julie : )

Patina Jewelry

Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

I discovered this fun site Animoto where you can create short videos for free. : )

Magazine Feature ~ Bohemian jewelry

Exciting news for Gypsy Moon Designs! I am going to have my jewelry featured in a magazine called Meets Obsession.

They are a online magazine that is having their inaugural print issue come out this fall. Check out their online mag here.

I sent a dozen pieces of jewelry and am eager to see if they all will be featured. When I get my copy I will share with you all.

What is so cool is the editor contacted me via my online shop Gypsy Moon Designs. If you love art and fashion magazines you may want to order their first issue like I did. You can order their magazine here.

Locks of Love

Two years ago my then 7 year old niece Loni decided to start growing out her hair for the organization Locks of Love. If you're not familiar with Locks of Love they are a non profit that provide hairpieces to disadvantaged children suffering from long-term medical hair loss from any diagnosis.

Now at 9 years old, Loni was ready to donate her silky long hair. When they cut her hair it was 12 1/2 inches that she donated.

Of course it doesn't stop there. My sweet and very special niece announced she is going to grow it long again so she can come back in a few years and donate again to Locks of love.

I am so proud of Loni and amazed at her giving spirit at such a young age. (She is as cute as can be with her new hair style too!)

Greenough Park, Missoula

A magical place right in the heart of Missoula.

Greenough Park on a rainy spring day.

Rattlesnake Creek runs thru the park making it a perfect place to cool off on a hot summer evening. Today it threatens to flood.

Watch your step!

The Park is 42 acres of pristine beauty.

Earthy Ammonite necklaces and Ravens

Ammonite necklace

I love the organic, earthiness of fossil jewelry. Last night I photographed a few necklaces and got them online this morning.

Ammonite necklace

This bold chunky necklace is one of best sellers at all the craft shows I do. The bone pendant dangles from black leather cord.

Spiral leather cord necklace

It had poured down rain all day yesterday. As soon as the rain broke I went outside to shoot photos. All these ravens swooped in and were hanging out!

The whole driveway was full of them. But, I guess they are camera shy! When I started photographing them they flew up to the top pf this old Cottonwood tree.

With a few hanging around watching me as I worked!

Hope everyone is having a great week. : )

Summer shows

If you are in Missoula this summer you can find Gypsy Moon Designs at the Missoula Saturday Market every Saturday, May through mid October.

I will also be at the best show in town, the Missoula Made fair on Sunday, June 26th.

To see a list of vendors for the Missoula Made fair, check out their website.

Hope to see you this summer!

Bohemian Copper and paper earrings

feather and copper earrings

In the summertime I make these fun earrings. I make them in the summer because I use my torch on the front porch. Just to cold in the winter to torch!

Tribal Copper earrings African mudcloth

I hand shape copper wire to make funky frames for interesting paper. I love the pattern of these African inspired earrings.

paisley apple blossom earrings

What I like about these earrings is that they very unique, funky and super light to wear. They take around 4 to 5 days to create. I really enjoy mixing paper and copper together.

I have more styles in my shop:
Gypsy Moon Designs

Bohemian wedding jewelry

First, let me say Happy May! I love the month of May with all it's newness.

You are a casual, earthy kind of woman and you are getting married. Congrats! Now, what jewelry will your bridesmaids and you wear? Diamonds and pearls just don't express your bohemian personality.

Over the years I am seeing more brides turning to unconventional jewelry designs. Why not, it is your day after all!

bohemian shoulder duster chandelier earrings

round summer white earrings

white bellflower wedding earrings

These are some of the earrings I have sold recently to brides. There is just something special knowing that my designs will be worn by a bride. Makes me feel good! : ) Thank you lovely brides for expressing yourself with bohemian jewelry!

Songbird's Branch: Get Real: Montana Woman Moves Confidently away from Etsy.com in Business Website Launch

I was interviewed on a wonderful blog. Go check it out. It is full of wonderful info and I am tickled to have been interviewed!

Songbird's Branch: Get Real: Montana Woman Moves Confidently away from Etsy.com in Business Website Launch

I am hooked on patina jewelry

large patina hoop earrings


Last year I started experimenting with patina and I have become addicted to the process. So far I am using the cold process with Verdigris (turquoise blue) and Ocean Blue.

arabesque patina earrings

I find myself constantly looking for copper and raw brass charms to patina. It takes a good five or more days of applying the patina to metal to get the results I want.

orange bohemian chandelier earrings

When I was young I was a painter and I find patina a fun way to add color and texture to my jewelry. It fulfills the painter in me!

verdigris patina necklace

If you are like me and just love the rustic look of patina jewelry then please keep an eye on my shop Gypsy Moon Designs

Featured Etsy Artist: The Green Groovy

Love the bright colors and patterns that The Green Groovy paints with! I keep going back to this Etsy shop and admiring her work, so I thought I would share her bohemian style with my readers.

Henna design jute clutch

Los Angeles artist Sowmya is the designer of these wonderful hand painted jute purses, wine bags and lots of other cool items. Her style is exotic, colorful and dreamy just like the Pisces she is.

jute burlap wine bag

You can follow The Green Groovy on FaceBook as she follows her bliss.

Indian Design Clutch

Big Cartel and ArtFire experiment

Three weeks ago I set up a shop on ArtFire and Big Cartel. When I set up these two stores I told myself I would watch and see which preformed best by April 1st.

ArtFire is a community based handcraft site and BigCartel is a shopping cart for indie artist. So, one would think you would have more traffic on ArtFire. I have 31 items listed on ArtFire and have had 900 views in three weeks. BigCartel has 25 items listed and has had 1400 views.


Chunky yellow necklace

Also, tonight I made my first sale on Big Cartel. I believe the customer found me via my Facebook page. I don't promote my ArtFire shop on Facebook, just my Etsy and BigCartel shop.

So, my experiment is over. Tomorrow I will deactive my ArtFire shop and add more to BigCartel. The ArtFire owner is very friendly and the forums are helpful. It's easy to set up shop there too. I find that BigCartel visually looks better if you buy a theme to install or know how to code.

Thought I would share for those considering one of the platforms.

Big Cartel theme

I feel like a little kid today!


Artwork courtesy of Ireland Brady, Happy Little Girl Hooray.


I have my Big Cartel website theme completed. Me so happy! At first I did some CSS coding to enlarge the tiny 10 px font that for some reason Big Cartel uses. After searching around I found this clean theme called "Sunday Drive" by Tonka Park.

So far the whole experience with Big cartel and Tonka Park has been great. Customer support answers emails within hours. With a bit of easy coding you can track where views are coming from with Google Analytics.

If you are using Big Cartel as your shopping cart check out my shop theme to see if you too want to upgrade your theme.! Gypsy Moon Designs

Big Cartel and ArtFire

Last week I signed up with the handcraft website ArtFire and listed 30 items for sales. I also joined Big Cartel with 25 items listed so far.

Well, after a week I can say that Big Cartel has had many more views than ArtFire.
That actually surprised me a bit. Big Cartel is a shopping cart and not a shopping mall like Etsy or Art Fire. I expected more views from ArtFire.



Chunky ammonite and turquoise necklace

I will watch both sites traffic for a few weeks. But, I think I will be focusing on Big Cartel.

I can't say enough good things about Big Cartel! They have excellent customer service. I have emailed them twice with a question. They respond back in a very timely manner and always have the answer you are looking for.

Gypsy Moon Designs is now on BigCartel

I'm expanding my online venues this month. After researching venues and playing with site-builders on sites such as Homestead.com and Big Commerce I found Big Cartel to be the easiest to launch.

So many sites claimed they were easy to set up. I think if I was a 12 year old in this day and age I could have done it! But, after days of playing with these so called easy site builders I still find BigCartel the easiest to work with.



BigCartel even gives you links on there site for easy CSS codes and uploading background images.

My first site design was going to have a earthy look to it. I liked it but it lacked a polished finished look. I used the banner and background you see above.



Last night I woke up and thought I really should keep the same branding as my Etsy shop. So, I redesigned it in minutes. Once you learn a little code it isn't to difficult.

I would love for you to come check out my new shop; even shoot me a email thru the "contact" form if you like!
Gypsy Moon Designs

Happy Spring!

Artist Kevin Gadomski and his Manitou totems

Last week on Etsy I found myself in a shop that amazed me with such unique talent. Having been raised in Michigan and being proud of my Potawatomi heritage I was thrilled to discover the Manitou carved sculptures by artist Kevin Gadomski.



The Algonquian people, Ojibwe/Chippewa,Ottawa,Potawatomi,Cree, believe that everything has its own spirit or manitou that is inseparable from the Great Spirit or Kitche Manitou.



"What is a sacred place, I wondered, except one that makes you feel humble and insignificant in the face of nature? And what is a manitou but the power of a place to move you to those thoughts?" — Greg Breining; The Power of Rock




Inspired by the Ojibway heritage of his children, Kevin began creating the Manitou pieces many years ago. His interest in all things esoteric has led him to explore shamanism, totemism, mysticism, Taoism, Zen, Sufism, Animism, nature, reality, dreaming, metaphysics, Kevinism as a life path which are all more or less reflected in his work.



You can explore more of Kevin's amazing work on his website freedom gallery

Kevin can also be found on FaceBook Kevin Gadomski

Off the beaten path...Artist Bill Ohrmann

Today the temperatures rose above freezing so we jumped in the car, popped in a Grateful Dead tape and drove to a small town called Drummond in western Montana. We headed to Bill Ohrmann's gallery just south of Drummond in the Flint Creek Valley.



Bill is 91 years old and still a working artist. When he retired from ranching at the age of 71 yrs. old he took up painting and sculpting.



Bill is a self taught artists and considers his work as Outsider art. When looking at his work you know how he feels about nature and mankind's affect on nature.



I enjoyed how he has quotes from Buddha, Kipling, Thoreau...above his paintings. Some of his work even has the quotes painted right on the canvas.



Bill said "What is in my heart when I paint a picture, is as simple as hoping we can save part of the natural world."



Bill is such an inspiration! It shows you are never to old to be creative.



If you are ever in western Montana make a point to find your way to Drummond and Bill Ohrmann's gallery.