Friday, June 8, 2012

Jewelry Making for Dummies: Oooohhh, Sparkley...

Update at noon: So Phin just told me that our on-again, off-again family visit is now off again. So, it looks like the Craft Lounge will be mine-all-mine all weekend! Yay!

I'm not sure how much sewing will get done over the weekend since visiting family is inhabiting the Craft Lounge. Sigh. This project seems like one delay after another.

But I've been trying to find things to do with myself at night as I sit on the couch while Phin watches baseball or hockey. At the moment, I don't have any hand sewing to do and I've been undecided on what I want to knit next. So, I picked up Jewelry Making for Dummies to try making a few simple pairs of earrings.


Three pretty pairs of earrings!

Quite frankly, I'm always irritated at just how much a cute little pair of earrings can cost. Obviously, something that takes time to create and uses good materials is worth paying for. But I've bought too many earrings that turned out to be poorly made and used shoddy parts.


Venetian Glass earrings

Dyed jade with glass beads


More dyed jade


This project required little time and less talent. I only had to learn one technique - making a wrapped loop on a headpin - to make these three earrings. So, a good investment of an evening or two on the couch.

Since there's a whole strip of bead stores right near M&J Trim, it was easy to buy a few basic tools, beads and findings near my office. I fear this is a habit in the making; I already have a few projects in mind.

Hope you all have a great weekend! 

5 comments:

T. Sedai said...

First - yay for having the Craft Lounge this weekend - always difficult to stop when you are in the middle of a major project.

Secondly - I like to dabble in jewelry making too!  Although I don't wear much jewelry myself, my sister wears a lot, so I get to indulge my creative spark and it is used and appreciated by another person.  I haven't made too many earrings yet (I might do more in the future) but I mostly do bracelets and some necklaces.  If you look up Lauren's Hope Medical ID bracelets, you can see why I make so many of them for her...  The ID part stay the same, but the bracelet part can change with every outfit.  Also, after you make the initial investment in getting the ID, buying more of the "official" bracelets can be expensive.  $50 for a half bracelet!  Crazy.  I can usually make them for a fraction of that in any color combination we dream up.  Even using Swarovski beads.  And, let's face it, as a former skater she totally has a thing for Swarovski.  So I am excited to see what other jewelry you make up... but just a warning that bead stashing is every bit as addictive as fabric stashing!

Clio said...

 Wow, that is expensive! And it IS something you could easily do yourself!

HA! At least a bead stash is relatively small in comparison to fabric!

Lisette said...

I have made a few pieces here and there, I have some beads waiting for a necklace. It seems you escaped your family visit this weekend, but I did not...sigh. Very pretty earrings!

Clio said...

 It seems like once you do one thing, like sewing, other hobbies seem to land on your plate.

The Slapdash Sewist said...

Oooh, be careful.  Beads are soooooo easy to get addicted to.  They're small, and something that doesn't take up hardly any room is incredibly tempting to buy.