Vintaj Embossing

Yesterday I went to a jewelry making class at the Museum at Four Squares in Cleveland, TN, which is about 40 minutes from where I live.  I always want to learn new things, so when I saw this class, I knew I wanted to go.  I make jewelry, but this is the first time I've tried embossing.  The teacher had a very upscale embossing machine called a Vagabond Embossing Machine.  It was great.  It was electric and I would love to have one, but it costs around $200, so I'll just have to admire it from afar.  She told me about another one that Hobby Lobby carries called Sizzix Big Kick.  This one is more affordable and I can see myself getting one of these in the future.  I was trying to think of something really affordable that I could buy and I went into Michaels and saw this one.  It's really cute and it looks like a purse.  I really think that it's designed to be used for embossing paper for greeting cards, but I asked the sales associate at Michaels if they thought it could be used for embossing metal and she said she thought so.  So, it was $29.99 and I had a 40% off coupon, which they let me use, so I ended up only paying about $18 for it.  Now THAT I can afford.  I wasn't sure if it would work, but I brought it home and it did work!  I was so excited.  I can use it for the short term, but I really want one of the Sizzix Big Kick's.  I don't know if I could use a 40% coupon on that one or not, but it's priced at $99.99, which I really hate to pay, but I could pay around $60 for it.  Anyway, after taking the class and saw how easy and fun it is to make these, I was hooked.

Here is a picture of the pendant that I made in class.  I love this Man in the Moon die.  It's from the Moonlit Night embossing folder from Vintaj.

And here are some pictures of some more things I made this afternoon.  The first one is another pendant that I made using a different die.

This one is another pretty die that I found.

The only store that I could find that carries the Vintaj brand was Hobby Lobby.  They had several things, but there are alot more dies and things.  I ended up ordering some dies from Amazon and Etsy.  I can't wait to explore this new technique some more.