For the Bead Hoarders Blog Hop at Pretty Things we have to create jewelry using our own stash – our hoarded beads without buying anything new. If you ask me, this was one God sent opportunity to clear out my stash before buying new beads.
The thing with working with old hoarded beads is that – they are boring. Mainly because they are “Old” or already “Seen”. Also they might not be full strands but mostly leftover – again something that doesnt really let you picture a new fabulous design.That is why its a challenge to create something pretty out of them. I too have some pretties I hoard, as I think I wont do justice to them but for this particular hop I decided to go the bead soup way and create pieces that take up lots of old beads but are very quick to do and easy for everyday wear.
The first one is a double strand bead and chain necklace that has been inspired by Neena Shivlock’s Isabella. I followed the concept of using chunky crystals but replaced the normal beads with chains and limited the strand to two. Neena makes fabulous bead and wire jewelry incorporating supplies from all over the world and blogs about them at Caprilicious Jewellery
I named it “Lights” as today is Karthigai the Tamil festival of lights, where we light earthen lamps and place them all around our houses to dispel darkness and these blingy crystals remind me of the different color effects created by the flicker of wick flames
I am a big fan of messy wrap when it comes to wire and have done many variations of birds nests and messy wraps over the years. I decided to do it once again with these dark sea green stones I have been hoarding for a couple of years. They are glass but have a lot of glitter and shine in them. I paired them with yellow brass wire and left them in the open to oxidize and they have a lovely patina now.
Then I have my Wire Paisley earrings. The design came to me in a workshop after I was bored of teaching the same pattern of earrings in wire wrapping. I used these pink stone beads ( left over from the Bead soup blog party) for the demo along with some crystal beads and my student made a stunning pair in green. I think that I’ll be making more of these as they are so quick to do and look big and fabulous when worn
So those are the three designs that I made, how do you like them? I Thank Lori for challenging us to use up our old and hoarded beads, it was great fun. Maybe Someday, I use use up the “expensive pretties“ that I hoard. There are nearly a hundred bloggers participating in this blog hop, so do visit their blogs and enjoy all the beady goodness. I will try and visit a few this weekend as I’ll be very busy monday onwards as its exam month at college and I am on 15 different Jury panels 🙁
Find the full list of participating blogs here
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