How moving to Spain to study jewelry making totally transformed my life....

It was around 5 years ago I started learning silver smithing in Oxford UK. I always interesting in learning metal work particularly creating jewelry. when growing up I was always attracted to sparkly things, I always felt I wanted something special and I seemed to get pretty attached to things I would find like shells, beads, bits of sea glass, drift wood, bamboo to name a few. I feel like there is an inner magpie within me. Instead of hoarding I'd have this urge to try and exhalt these beautiful things as precious objects, I want to share them with other people and hope that others can enjoy their majestic aura too.
Silver is an antibacterial metal and has a conductive abilities so it works for enhancing the properties of gem stones, which I also like to work with from time to time. Other types of stones and other materials I've mentioned above also have their own subtle vibrations we can tune into, silver can enhance these too.

Learning to make jewelry helped me to set my roots more permantely in Spain. I came to Catalonia originally to continue studying jewelry design. I took a creative course in the centre of Barcelona. However I did not want to live the big city life, I was looking for a place in the country or by the sea. I was also looking into communes or alternative communities but did not find anything that had good enough connections into Barcelona so I could attend my course. Me and my partner ended up renting places up and down the northern coast line until we found a place that would suit us both in a little village one hour away from the city. It was a long commute but worth it, I really enjoyed working on my jewelry making intensively but eventually with all the moving around and renting places, I ran out of all my savings. I ended up having to quit the course to take an office job, which initially wasn't too bad, working on a Google android project. I'm obsessed with technology, I love talking with people and I definately could of kept it up longer until we were all made redundant. I tried to have several jobs since then but all of them were pretty awful, especially whilst this was happening I discovered steemit and all I wanted to do was blog all day. I got more into making food than jewelry, my diet suffered alot when I was studying and creating jewelry all the time. I had to make rushed meals and I went long periods without eating, I lost a lot of weight but I've put it all back on now and a little more. My food photography has come on leaps and bounds aswell.... My partner always encouraged me to document my food creations, he always loved the food I made but for me it was never picture worthy even if it tasted good. Steeming everyday forced me to try harder at it, looking and learning from others on social media really inspired me to find my own voice within the vegan photography community, a few @curie upvotes boosted my confidence and all the support I got from the steemit community in general.

It's funny how things work out and how many different ways there are to be creative. In hindsight I never needed to get a degree in fine art, but I did it because at that time in my early twenties that was what I had learnt: you need to go to university to do anything. Little did I realize then that life is one big university course that you must take control of your learning and keeping teaching yourself everything you desire. I'm still proud I got my degree at Chelsea college of art school but I could really see alot of flaws in the teaching and vibes in general, even when It comes to art courses it's still brainwashing after all and honestly I left the course feeling confused.

At the age of 31 I'm only just starting to see things coming together. But it's just the begining, I'm currently living hand to mouth, with no savings and no major possessions. Anything I own now are just tools and equipment to make my art, food or jewelry and of course my plants and small garden containers for growing food. Ive been giving alot of my other possessions away and instead of buying presents I will make things or pass on my belongings. Im moving towards a life of simplicity, exchange and giving.

Now with the opportunity to exchange my handmade work for SBD opens up a lot of new doors. Alot of people have said to me why don't you sell on etsy or other platforms but it is quite difficult if you don't already have social media clout and paid advertising. I also don't think etsy represents people like myself or other homesteaders as well as it could so it is perfect that there is now a platform specifically dedicated to us...

Thank you to @homesteaderscoop for making this possible.

And please check out my shop here: