Jewelry to scrap metal

In sloooowwwwly cleaning up my studio, I'm always on the lookout for scrap metal.  Metal is very expensive nowadays, so I'm extra careful not to throw anything away since I can sell it as scrap (to be refined and used again in making new pieces). 

This chart shows what has happened to the silver price from 1995 to 2010.   The numbers are small, but basically, it started out at $4.90 per ounce in January 1995 and ended at $30.50 in December 2010.  Yeah, the take home message here is that you can't afford to waste it, and what you do waste, you had better save it to resell for scrap.  (In case you're curious to see more of what the metals prices have done over time, you can see historical precious metals charts at kitco.com.)

In cleaning up, I've found some older style jewelry pieces that either I never got around to selling, or didn't sell at shows.  Want to know what I  did with them?

I removed the stones and the silver went into the scrap pile.  Hubby walked through my studio as I was doing this and thought he needed to invoke the Baker act to get me immediate mental health attention.  Then I showed him that chart above.  "Carry on, dear."

This is my pile of scrap waiting to go back to the refinery.  All my metals have to stay separate in order for me to get the most money possible.  (e.g., gold is in another container, copper is in another, etc.)  I also found some old "practice" pieces that went into the pile as well.  Now, onto my jewelry box....