borninwinter81

[borninwinter81]

I just got my first set of high-end high quality stone plugs!

Thus far all the stone plugs you see above have come from places like Custom Plugs, Stretch-it body jewellery and Urban Body Jewellery. There's nothing particularly wrong with any of them, I've never had any problems, but I've been watching a lot of Lynn Loheide videos recently and learning more about the high-end custom stone manufacturers, and as I had a little extra money available this month I thought I'd order some and see what the fuss is about.

I've been keen on the idea of getting a pair in petrified palm root (fossilised wood that has essentially become stone) for some time, and Urban Body Jewellery do stock those, but the problem with stone plugs from somewhere like UBJ is that as stone is natural the colours and patterns can be very variable and I've read reviews of people saying they've bought this material and it's been almost totally dark with no "wood" at all. It also sounds like the finish on them is often not great and they might tend to have cracks and chips in them.

These came from a manufacturer called Grit Lapidary. They make totally custom plugs to order in a variety of interesting stones, only open their books for orders a few times a year, and have a $400 minimum for those orders. That was far outside my budget, however they do also hold a small "ready to ship" line with detailed photos so you can see exactly what you're getting. These are the ones I chose - with postage to the UK they were just over £100, I'm not sure what the dollar amount would be.

These are incredible. You only need to see and hold them for a few seconds to know why they cost as much as they do. The finish on them is like a mirror, there are no imperfections whatsoever and the wood looks like flames!

Its not going to be something I can do often, but I would definitely like to order from them again, or from similar manufacturers here in the UK, there's one called Stonewolf Adornments that I have my eye on.....

Plug collection

I reached my goal size on my left ear a few months ago (right has been this size for ages), and recently I've discovered that I'm able to wear some of my double flares in it, though unfortunately not all of them just yet, so I thought I'd do a post where I show some of them.

I also had my forward helix pierced in February and I am now able to swap the ends, so I've got a couple of different ones of those here too. Any redness is just from changing the jewellery, nothing is irritated!

NOTE: some of these are resin, however as resin may be unsafe if worn in contact with skin for a long time, I only ever get ones that are inside a metal tunnel.

First pic, amethyst stud and a resin plug with real mushrooms and moss in it. Second pic, jade stud and dragons blood jasper plug. The stud in my lobe is quartz.

First pic real tiny shells and sand, second pic paper butterfly, both in resin.

And here are some of my right ear. First pic labradorite teardrop, second a snake hanger. The stone in the stud is onyx

First pic hematite teardrop, second real leaves in resin.

And because I don't feel like trying everything on, here's my full collection.

If anyone wishes to know where I got a particular item from feel free to ask! I'm in the UK so almost all of these came from UK sellers.

[borninwinter81]

I don't have any new big dramatic hangers yet, but I did get some new septum clickers this week to hang things from.

For reference these are the ones I've been using, 1.2mm thickness with an internal diameter of 12mm.

Theyre great, however I was thinking if I want to get some heavier hangers or even try making my own, I'd need something a bit more sturdy to hold the weight.

These are 3mm with a 16mm internal diameter. They're chonky! They also look really good when used with those labradorite earrings

Earring and ear weight collection

I have a post showing my collection of plugs and tunnels, so I thought it would be nice to do another showing all my hanging ones too. I'll probably also do a third showing all my labret studs but I just placed an order for some new ones so I'll wait for those to arrive first.

As my lobes are stretched I don't wear them on conventional earring hooks, instead I remove whatever findings they have and then hang them from my ears using a hinged "clicker" ring, the kind folks will often wear in a septum, through a tunnel.

I display them like this as it's nice to be able to appreciate my full collection even when I'm not wearing them, and I find I will wear them more often if I can see them rather than having them put away in a jewellery box. There's only one pair which I don't have out here and we'll get to those...

Most of these were thrifted, home made or are just charms that I've chosen to wear as earrings. I get a ton of compliments whenever I wear the crows with the crescent moon on them, but they're just some cheap charms that I think originally came from Ali Express or Temu (I bought them at a slight markup from a UK reseller).

Here are some honourable mentions that don't fit those categories. First has to be my wedding earrings. These are onyx and marcasite. When I first stretched my ears I was sad I couldn't wear these anymore, until I realised I could modify them. They look like they need a polish!

These are from Katie Whittle, an etsy seller who I've also met a number of times at conventions. They're wooden, handpainted, and although they're large they're extremely lightweight. Flies might not be for everyone but I love them 😁

These are from a seller called Deviant Angel Emporium. All their stock is great and very reasonably priced, but Bram Stoker's Dracula is one of those movies from my formative teenage years that is very important to me, so I had to have them.

These ones were bought at a comic con and I'm really annoyed I didn't save the sellers details as they had a lot of great stuff. Christmas isn't really something that I care too much about, but I love Krampus.

I did a post about these not too long back, but they're worth sharing again - my labradorite hangers. At 12 grams they don't really qualify as weights, but they're my heaviest "earrings". These would probably be extremely uncomfortable if they were worn in regular pierced lobes, but I can wear them in my stretched ones all day with no problems at all.

And lastly, the big boys that live in their own box: my white brass bat weights. Again I've shared these before, but I wouldn't miss an opportunity to share them again. These are my only true weights, at about 75 grams each. I bought them from my body piercer, but I've since discovered the original seller is a company called Symmetry Body Jewellery who do tons of really beautiful weights. Yeah they were a bit pricey, you can get cheaper mass produced bat hangers, but when you see and feel these you can tell where the extra money went.

I can wear these for a couple of hours with no discomfort, although having that much weight hanging from your ears does feel a little strange at first!

Heavy weights and hangers are only intended to be worn for a few hours at a time, and not every single day, you need to have breaks or you can hurt yourself or over stretch your lobes (weights arent supposed to be used for stretching because they put all the pressure at the bottom, causing stretching to be uneven).

There are many folks far more experienced at wearing weights than I am who can wear much heavier ones than this for a long time, but you have to work up to that!

I am currently on the lookout for some slightly lighter mid range weights, but as I said above the good quality ones are expensive and my bats have kinda spoiled me for the cheaper alternatives. I will reblog when I've found some that I can't do without!

[borninwinter81]

Labret stud collection

As promised, the companion to my previous posts showing my plugs, and my earrings and weights, here are all the studs I currently own.

I've worn flat back labret studs in all my ear piercings since my teens, just because they're way more comfortable and a lot more hygienic than butterfly back earrings. These are all 1.2mm or 16ga if you use those measurements, and they're all made from titanium.

Back when I started wearing these in the 90s there was almost no choice for piercing jewellery, you just got a ball on the end, maybe with a coloured stone in it if you were fancy, but nothing like the range of options there are today for internally threaded ends. I'm still getting used to being able to wear interesting ones!

This is my right ear which is currently vampire themed! We've got the bat, the blood drip and the ankh at the bottom and a coffin at the top. I just need something different for my rook now.

My left ear doesn't have a specific theme at present. The discs in my faux snug (two separate piercings made to look like a snug because I don't have the right ear shape for one) are because those piercings are quite fresh and still healing, but my body piercer has managed to source some labradorite ends from an APP approved supplier, so those will be switched out eventually.

For the rest we've got a rose, a quartz, and a spider in the lobe, and a scythe in my forward helix. The scythe is a fairly new one, when I first put it in I wasn't 100% sure if I liked it there, but that same day I had compliments on it from two people 😊

Then these are the ones I'm not currently wearing:

Goat head

Skeleton hand

And an assortment of different semi precious stones - green onyx, amethyst, black onyx and lapis lazuli.

[borninwinter81]

Earring and ear weight collection

I have a post showing my collection of plugs and tunnels, so I thought it would be nice to do another showing all my hanging ones too. I'll probably also do a third showing all my labret studs but I just placed an order for some new ones so I'll wait for those to arrive first.

As my lobes are stretched I don't wear them on conventional earring hooks, instead I remove whatever findings they have and then hang them from my ears using a hinged "clicker" ring, the kind folks will often wear in a septum, through a tunnel.

I display them like this as it's nice to be able to appreciate my full collection even when I'm not wearing them, and I find I will wear them more often if I can see them rather than having them put away in a jewellery box. There's only one pair which I don't have out here and we'll get to those...

Most of these were thrifted, home made or are just charms that I've chosen to wear as earrings. I get a ton of compliments whenever I wear the crows with the crescent moon on them, but they're just some cheap charms that I think originally came from Ali Express or Temu (I bought them at a slight markup from a UK reseller).

Here are some honourable mentions that don't fit those categories. First has to be my wedding earrings. These are onyx and marcasite. When I first stretched my ears I was sad I couldn't wear these anymore, until I realised I could modify them. They look like they need a polish!

These are from Katie Whittle, an etsy seller who I've also met a number of times at conventions. They're wooden, handpainted, and although they're large they're extremely lightweight. Flies might not be for everyone but I love them 😁

These are from a seller called Deviant Angel Emporium. All their stock is great and very reasonably priced, but Bram Stoker's Dracula is one of those movies from my formative teenage years that is very important to me, so I had to have them.

These ones were bought at a comic con and I'm really annoyed I didn't save the sellers details as they had a lot of great stuff. Christmas isn't really something that I care too much about, but I love Krampus.

I did a post about these not too long back, but they're worth sharing again - my labradorite hangers. At 12 grams they don't really qualify as weights, but they're my heaviest "earrings". These would probably be extremely uncomfortable if they were worn in regular pierced lobes, but I can wear them in my stretched ones all day with no problems at all.

And lastly, the big boys that live in their own box: my white brass bat weights. Again I've shared these before, but I wouldn't miss an opportunity to share them again. These are my only true weights, at about 75 grams each. I bought them from my body piercer, but I've since discovered the original seller is a company called Symmetry Body Jewellery who do tons of really beautiful weights. Yeah they were a bit pricey, you can get cheaper mass produced bat hangers, but when you see and feel these you can tell where the extra money went.

I can wear these for a couple of hours with no discomfort, although having that much weight hanging from your ears does feel a little strange at first!

Heavy weights and hangers are only intended to be worn for a few hours at a time, and not every single day, you need to have breaks or you can hurt yourself or over stretch your lobes (weights arent supposed to be used for stretching because they put all the pressure at the bottom, causing stretching to be uneven).

There are many folks far more experienced at wearing weights than I am who can wear much heavier ones than this for a long time, but you have to work up to that!

I am currently on the lookout for some slightly lighter mid range weights, but as I said above the good quality ones are expensive and my bats have kinda spoiled me for the cheaper alternatives. I will reblog when I've found some that I can't do without!

[borninwinter81]

Went thrifting today and found a (partial) skull! Judging from all the toothmarks (probably mouse & squirrel), I'm guessing it was found in the woods.

@shiftythrifting

[borninwinter81]

I forgot about these in my original post but they're one of my favourite sets that I own, and my only wooden pair.

I bought them separately when I just had one ear stretched - the one on the left is Yew, the right Oak. They're made from burl (the knotty bits that sometimes form on trees) hence the interesting pattern on them.

When I started stretching my other ear I looked up the seller to see if I could get matching ones, but unfortunately they'd gone out of business. However, recently I realised that there's no reason I can't wear them together as a mismatched pair.

Plug collection

I reached my goal size on my left ear a few months ago (right has been this size for ages), and recently I've discovered that I'm able to wear some of my double flares in it, though unfortunately not all of them just yet, so I thought I'd do a post where I show some of them.

I also had my forward helix pierced in February and I am now able to swap the ends, so I've got a couple of different ones of those here too. Any redness is just from changing the jewellery, nothing is irritated!

NOTE: some of these are resin, however as resin may be unsafe if worn in contact with skin for a long time, I only ever get ones that are inside a metal tunnel.

First pic, amethyst stud and a resin plug with real mushrooms and moss in it. Second pic, jade stud and dragons blood jasper plug. The stud in my lobe is quartz.

First pic real tiny shells and sand, second pic paper butterfly, both in resin.

And here are some of my right ear. First pic labradorite teardrop, second a snake hanger. The stone in the stud is onyx

First pic hematite teardrop, second real leaves in resin.

And because I don't feel like trying everything on, here's my full collection.

If anyone wishes to know where I got a particular item from feel free to ask! I'm in the UK so almost all of these came from UK sellers.

[borninwinter81]

Art by Glyn Smyth

[borninwinter81]

Evening murmurs.

[borninwinter81]

18th century graffiti and a graveyard with a secret

Yesterday I took a day trip to the town of Shrewsbury with my husband and a friend.

The building which now houses Shrewsbury library dates back to the 16th century. One of the rooms in it was once a school room and centuries of young boys have carved their names into the wooden panels and benches. These were the two oldest we found:

And the most fancy. I've no idea who CF was, but he was clearly a cool guy:

Charles Darwin also went to school here and there is a statue of him outside.

My other favourite spot we visited was the graveyard of St Chad's church. This is now disused and in somewhat poor repair, with many of the graves around the sides being almost totally covered with plants. I took about 60 photos, here are just a few of them

The best part was when I noticed this at the back. At first I thought it was just another flat marker, but then I saw the writing on the edge of it...

"Entrance to vault". That means there are (or were) underground burial chambers here. There was also an iron plate on the ground very close by which might be an alternative means of access.

I did some searching online but unfortunately there isn't a great deal of information about the graveyard. An adaptation of "A Christmas Carol" was once filmed here, but that's all I could really find.

So, I emailed the church to see if they know anything about it (how large is the vault, is it still accessible, stuff like that).

I will reblog if they reply with anything interesting!

[borninwinter81]

Earring/ear weight mod

Ever had the experience of buying something online, then when it arrives it's not quite what you wanted? I'm sure you have.

I ordered these ear hangers from etsy because I thought they were gorgeous and I love labradorite. Unfortunately when they arrived they were way too big in relation to my face/head, they hung a bit weirdly, and just didn't look good on me (pic not mine, it's the etsy one as I didn't photograph them before I started messing around. Mine are silver coloured).

This was very disappointing as I was really excited about getting them, they were a little pricey and the seller doesn't accept returns.

However, each one was actually in two pieces: the front part with the labradorite (my favourite bit) was attached to the medallion (the part I wasn't so keen on) with a pair of large jump rings.

So, I dismantled them, grabbed some chain and extra jump rings from my craft box and...

I think this looks 1000% better on me, and now I will absolutely wear them (in fact I'm wearing them today!)

The medallions can be put away until I find a use for them.

Always remember you can mod anything you buy to make it better, even if it's brand new!

[borninwinter81]

Self-reblog as I've decided to wear these around the house for a while this evening to break them in/get used to them.

They don't hurt (though they might depending on how long I keep them in) the extra weight just feels quite strange.

Bat ear weights/hangers

Oh wow, I just got my first set of ear hangers. I honestly never thought I'd want any, but I saw these when I visited my body piercer on Saturday and I couldn't stop thinking about them after I left, so I had to go back and get them.

They were not cheap but I never buy expensive jewellery (all my stuff is thrifted and home-made) and I was helping a small business so I feel as a one-off it's OK. And just *LOOK* at them, even the backs are super detailed and beautiful. I've seen a ton of bat earrings online, but never anything quite like this! These are not temu/Ali Express/wish rubbish, they're super high quality.

I will definitely have to train myself to wear them as they're pretty heavy (75g each). I have no experience of wearing heavy hangers or weights and I know you need to work up to it - maybe only wear for an hour at first then don't wear them again for a few days, increase the time you wear them very gradually etc.

I might make myself a necklace or choker that I can attach them to so I can wear them even when they're not in my ears.

Edit: when I showed them to my husband he immediately said he'd give me the cash for them as an early anniversary present 🎁 🥹💜

[borninwinter81]

I didn't have any clear idea what this was supposed to be when I started it. I've been watching a lot of Bob Ross videos the past couple of days and was wondering about giving his art style a try, but I wasn't sure I wanted to invest in a set of oil paints. So I tried to adapt some of his techniques for water and cloud to the media I do have.

The lower half of this was done with charcoal pencil, the upper with a charcoal pastel. Like the last one I posted its somewhat abstract, so draw your own conclusions about what's going on here.

[borninwinter81]

Chernobog - art by Matías Bergara

[borninwinter81]

Coming Home, acrylic painting by Jason Limon

[borninwinter81]

lil diy earringy thingys

bits and bobs from old jewellery made into new jewellery hmhm...

[borninwinter81]

Self reblog as I love my t-shirt mods and I feel that this hasn't been seen by enough people yet

William Blake quote t-shirt mod

I found this shirt at a charity shop yesterday for £5, and it has a quote from Augeries of Innocence on it. Anyone who's read my previous posts about Blake (here and here if you're interested, the second one will make more sense if you're a fan of the Good Omens TV show) will know I couldn't just leave it behind.

A couple of issues: the Blake quote is on the back, whilst the front says "Complicité". Upon googling I found this is the name of a theatre group, which is fine, but I have no connection with them so would feel strange to have it on me.

Switching the back and front around is just a question of altering the neckline, and I was pretty sure I could do something to disguise or get rid of the "Complicité" print.

First step, crop, cut the arms off, and reshape the neckline so that I can switch the back and front.

Then resize using Madame Absinthe's method (I'm sure there are many other people who do it this way too, but this is the vid I learned from). I prefer to draw my waist and bustlines on the shirt and measure and draw where I'm gonna sew rather than just pinning and sewing like she does, but she's a professional seamstress and is good enough to eyeball stuff. I feel the need to be a little more precise.

The shirt now fits me perfectly, and the back has become the front:

So now to remove the print I didn't want. My first thought was to cut it out completely and make this a halter top, but I didn't really want to have to fasten the neck every time I wear it, and I also thought the back might sag in the middle.

So instead of a halter I thought "why not just make full shoulder straps and attach them to the back so it doesn't sag?". I still had the piece I cut off the bottom, so there was plenty of fabric available.

First I drew out the shape I wanted on the shirt so that I could use this as a pattern to cut the straps to the right length, and position them correctly, then just cut those pieces and sewed them together. I decided to make the straps go to the middle rather than straight down as I didn't want them to slip off my shoulders when I wear it. Also I prefer the way this looks.

I went back over my sewing lines three times on the machine to make sure they were secure.

And this is how it looks when I'm wearing it:

Yeah you can see my bra straps, but you can in a lot of my tops, it's no big deal. More importantly, you can see my back tattoo!

Another mod I'm very happy with 😁

[borninwinter81]

William Blake quote t-shirt mod

I found this shirt at a charity shop yesterday for £5, and it has a quote from Augeries of Innocence on it. Anyone who's read my previous posts about Blake (here and here if you're interested, the second one will make more sense if you're a fan of the Good Omens TV show) will know I couldn't just leave it behind.

A couple of issues: the Blake quote is on the back, whilst the front says "Complicité". Upon googling I found this is the name of a theatre group, which is fine, but I have no connection with them so would feel strange to have it on me.

Switching the back and front around is just a question of altering the neckline, and I was pretty sure I could do something to disguise or get rid of the "Complicité" print.

First step, crop, cut the arms off, and reshape the neckline so that I can switch the back and front.

Then resize using Madame Absinthe's method (I'm sure there are many other people who do it this way too, but this is the vid I learned from). I prefer to draw my waist and bustlines on the shirt and measure and draw where I'm gonna sew rather than just pinning and sewing like she does, but she's a professional seamstress and is good enough to eyeball stuff. I feel the need to be a little more precise.

The shirt now fits me perfectly, and the back has become the front:

So now to remove the print I didn't want. My first thought was to cut it out completely and make this a halter top, but I didn't really want to have to fasten the neck every time I wear it, and I also thought the back might sag in the middle.

So instead of a halter I thought "why not just make full shoulder straps and attach them to the back so it doesn't sag?". I still had the piece I cut off the bottom, so there was plenty of fabric available.

First I drew out the shape I wanted on the shirt so that I could use this as a pattern to cut the straps to the right length, and position them correctly, then just cut those pieces and sewed them together. I decided to make the straps go to the middle rather than straight down as I didn't want them to slip off my shoulders when I wear it. Also I prefer the way this looks.

I went back over my sewing lines three times on the machine to make sure they were secure.

And this is how it looks when I'm wearing it:

Yeah you can see my bra straps, but you can in a lot of my tops, it's no big deal. More importantly, you can see my back tattoo!

Another mod I'm very happy with 😁