Beaded earrings craftermath

It feels like only recently I was planning a trip to Badrinath – the heaven on earth in June and it is already December. My days are long and dreary with end semester exams and juries. As a student you only have to attend a limited number of exams or panels but when you are a teacher, there is one, often two on every working day of the week. So when I get home, even making are little items like Beaded earrings and writing my blog posts seems laborious. The untimely demise of a student doesn’t make things easier. But then, I enjoy participating in challenges and I want to maintain my sixth continuous month streak with we’re all ears.

My couch – my craftermath

Regular blog readers or my social media followers would have seen my posts on the Mandala Jewelry workshop that I conducted earlier this month. After that craftermath, when I got home I realised that all the leftover beads from the workshop were mixed up. Plus, immediately on my return I had to start working on the few orders. Soon my sofa was full of bead packets, findings, pendant, wire, resin and all sorts of knick knacks that I soon lost count of what I have and what I need to buy to complete my projects. Recently, In a drowsy and tired state I even spilled hardner and alcohol ink on my sofa too. If that sofa cover was alive, it would whack me straight and abuse me for the way I torture it.

In one corner are my completed pieces which are buried by new ones as and when they are made. Everyday I make up a new excuse to not clean it. Tonight’s excuse – fever. Because, each time I clean it, I know that it is only a matter of days before it will get cluttered once again.  I am sure that I am neither the first beader to face this situation nor will I be the last. In fact Ms. Erin in her 3rd Annual Use Your Leftovers Challenge post at the earrings everyday blog wrote

“My studio perpetually looks like you pulled open one of those giant crackers and out popped all manner of beads, findings, leather, cord, clay, wire, metal and the like. When a bead rolls off my table (which they frequently do), I rarely bother to find out where it went. I just keep right on going. There is always another right there waiting. I imagine my studio is like an archaeological dig…strata of projects past are discovered as you dig deeper into the ever-growing pile.”

Not just me Ms. Erin, my mom too echoes your sentiments. I am sure, as she reads this post on her phone she would smirk, throw a disgusting glance at the beady leftovers and then ask me why do I have to always write about her.

My “right” over stash

This is a collage of just two of my crazy mixed up boxes. Now work your math skills and multiply them into maybe 5 no 6. It is a hopeless mess, isn’t it? In my book there are just two ways to clean up a mess. One, throw atleast half of it out and arrange the rest neatly or two, create something useful out of it. In this case I chose to follow the latter. I chose to right the wrongs and my leftovers become well – right overs. ( yup I made that up!) I made a few necklaces and Beaded earrings to go with them. Here are the Beaded earrings for you. The sets are for sale – find here on the Patinam collection page here.

Beaded earrings

The first pair seen at the beginning of this post was made to match a multi colour necklace with a floral rangoli pendant. I coloured the stud to match the bright neon pops of colour on the pendant.

The second one is a pair of chandelier earrings I made for a client who bought two Rococo necklaces of mine. These go with the purple version of the same. I really lovely the colour play and the way it sways when worn. I might make a pair for myself soon.

Then there are the Lotus studs with red center and little kolam charms that I made almost a month back. These beauties practically made themselves. I am still trying to make a pendant for them and eventually a necklace.

Finally, the red and blue beads (hiding under the yellow blob on my collage) were paired up with blue lotus studs and the matched another Rangoli necklace which was snatched up by my friend.

I did make more earrings and left them out of packages that I posted. But then these are the ones that I photographed as of date. Ms. Erin has a giveaway as a little end of the year reward. So hop over to the Earrings Everyday blog to find out more about it. If you have created earrings of your own, do join us by entering this blog hop (blog not required, you can link up your FB/ Instagram uploads too). Hop around the links to see what the other challenge participants have created. Looking forward to reading your feedback and comments.