Bead on a Wire Blog

I’m finally getting back into the crafting swing of things after the vacation. I made two gifts this weekend - one is a bracelet for my friend’s daughter who is graduating from high school this week; the other is a similar bracelet (different colored pearls) with matching earrings for a friend whose birthday is coming up.

The supplies I ordered for the new bridal set arrived this morning so I’ll begin a “draft” of that necklace for the bride to approve tonight and also a couple pairs of earrings for her to choose from. I’m excited about the possibility for this set. It’s simple but different from what I’ve done previously.

I have an unofficial commission for a long necklace for a friend from church. I’ve back-burnered this project while I collected interesting beads and thought out a design for her. She said there is no rush and I haven’t been paid yet, but I know that she’s good for it and even if she changes her mind the beads collected are cool and totally usable for other projects. I’m thinking about making this one more in a rosary style than simple stringing, but it will involve a lot more work to make. Fun, though.

OK, I need to go get my son, who is supposed to be napping, but is playing in his crib instead.

When I got married I did a lot of the printing myself. I printed our invitation envelopes and the maps/directions inside. I printed our wedding program, which turned into a little booklet since we sang 4 old hymns and I included the lyrics to them inside as well as the program/people information. I printed the rehearsal reminder notes to our bridal party to let them know of the date/time/location/other specifics. And I printed the tags for our wedding favors and for the gifts that I gave to the women in our bridal party. (The link is to my mother’s shop, she did our wedding favors and the ones pictured in the listing are from my wedding.)

Since Mom offers wedding favors in her shop, I get recruited to do the tags. So she has a new bridal client for 150 favors needed for an August wedding and I’ve been put into service. The colors are brown (mocha) and teal. The bride’s invitations were on cream cardstock. So I’ll be doing a few tag samples to include with the ribbon samples that Mom will send to the bride for final approval. I’ve ordered sample sheets of cardstock from the vendor I used for my wedding. Once I get those in, I’ll start designing and printing and cutting.

It’s a nice side job for my creative self. I have no plans to get into graphic design or printing. I don’t have the skills or capability for making that a full craft in my repertoire. But it’s fun to do anyway.

I have another bridal set to work on - necklace and earrings only. Just sent the invoice and once she has paid, I will order the supplies I need (she wants pure white instead of the cream rose pearls - I have a plethora of cream rose in all sizes; I only have a few pure white in 10mm, which are too large for what she wants), and then begin work.

This set will be different from the previous ones in style - she wants a simpler look to go with her really lovely dress. Pictures to come when I’ve got it done.

So I’m thinking that I should learn some new skills to increase my repertoire in bridal jewelry. Simple stringing is working well for me, but it might behoove me to learn harder things to increase my marketability to the bridal market. There is a small part of me that doesn’t want to get pigeon-holed into doing bridal jewelry almost exclusively, so I hesitate a bit. But I do like working with brides to come up with the accessories they desire for their big day.

I still need to perfect my technique, but I’m pretty pleased with my first attempts at wire wrapped rings. I made three this weekend - I’m keeping one for myself, partly because it’s not done well enough to sell, but also because I just like it.

Here are the two I will probably list in my shop. I call them Painted Desert and Purple Rain.

Painted Desert fits a size 7 and Purple Rain is about 7.5, maybe larger. I need to photograph them separately so that I can list them. I’m hoping to do that later today.

The lampwork bead in Painted Desert (on the left) is from Four Tails Lampwork at Etsy.com. It is part of a set of three beads - I have matching earrings made from the other two beads that I will photograph and list as well. I named the ring Painted Desert because the colors remind me of the Painted Desert in Arizona. And I’m really tempted to keep it and the earrings for myself since we spent our honeymoon in Sedona, Arizona.

[UPDATED 12:30pm]: The Painted Desert ring and matching earrings are listed in my shop now. Just click the links to see the details.

My dear husband bought some regular Dawn dish soap the other day. He was hilarious in the retelling of the search for it because apparently there are so many super powered versions of Dawn now that he despaired of finding the good old regular kind.

And so, with Dawn in hand, I set the tumbler to tumbling last night with nothing in it except for the mixed stainless steel shot, water, and a squirt of the Dawn. I had read that it was best to clean the tumbler before using it to actually clean your stuff. Funny.

The tumbler swirled around for about 90 minutes last night while we watched Survivor and I did other things. When I went to bed, I turned it off for fear of the machine “walking” off of the ledge that I have it sitting on (it is quite deep) or leaking of the soapy water onto my craft table. When I emptied out the sudsy water this morning it was the color of urine. Interesting. Yellow was not what I was expecting.

I refilled it with the shot, water, and soap and set it to tumble again before I attempted to tumble anything. A couple of hours later, more yellow water and suds came out. The next refill included my wedding rings - a couple of hours later they came out with less yellow water and suds and super sparkly.

I like this.

Hub said, “I don’t think that’s how they clean it at the jewelers.” To which I replied, “But it’s cheaper than the jewelers.” No further argument.

While the rings tumbled themselves clean, I worked on my sister’s bracelet-key fob. Here is the finished item with which she seemed pleased when she saw the pictures and has already purchased!

It’s funny how things come. For instance, my sister asked me to make a beaded bracelet style key fob for her. We swapped messages so that I could get in my head what she wants - I’ll start work on something tonight for her.

And then yesterday morning when I was dropping my son at my mother’s house for her day to watch him, her good friend (who is in from out of town to visit) mentioned that she has this beaded bracelet key fob that she loves. But it broke and she wondered if I could fix it and have I considered making something like that before?

Isn’t that slightly freaky? That within a day or two I would get two requests for identical things?

So our friend is going to send her broken fob to me to repair and then I think I will make a few to list in my shop since she indicated that there would be interest in them. If not from others, then definitely from her at least - she wants to give them as gifts to friends.

I’ll try to remember to post pictures of the one I make for Jaynee.

Almost.

My new tumbler arrived the other day. My mixed shot arrived over the weekend. Now I just need a small bottle of regular Dawn dish soap and I’m ready to start tumbling all kinds of things.

First up will be my wedding set, which I’m told will clean up well.

I’m excited!

Long time bath and body products makers may already be aware of this site, but I thought I would share it anyway. It looks like a good resource for discount bath and body supplies - take note, Jaynee! I’m making note, too, since I’m still considering getting into making soap.

Elements looks like a cool company - they are family owned and seem to have everything you need from containers, labels, essential oils, and herbs. Mom, they have heat sealable tea bags that you might be interested in. And the ultimate help for any newbie - recipes!

I thought jewelry making involved a lot of supplies. Now I have a better appreciation for what goes into making soap! I had no idea of all of the supplies involved. But at least I have a good place to start if I do decide to start a new craft.

Or should I say the steel shot?

With my meager profits from the open house I bought a tumbler and the mixed steel shot needed to go with it. I debated whether or not to spend the money on a Lortone, knowing it’s one of the best brands, or to go with a cheaper model. I opted for the cheaper model since I’m really only using it for burnishing and hardening earwires and headpins. I’m a long way from heavier things that need tumbling, although I really do want to learn more metalsmithing in the future. But for now, I think my inexpensive tumbler will serve my needs adequately.

I bought 1 lb of the mixed shot and also some anti-tarnishing papers to put into my storage bins to slow down the tarnishing of the my finished pieces. Now I need to get either burnishing compound or a small bottle of regular Dawn to use in the tumbler. Apparently there’s debate on the merits of the Dawn - it can leave a sticky residue? I’ll start with that, I think, and if I don’t like the results, I’ll get the burnishing compound.

Next up in the quest to continue learning - oxidizing silver. I’ll try the egg method before I buy any caustic chemicals since I have an active toddler, I think.

The spring open house was definitely successful. Even with a small turnout, the sales were brisk. Even my mom did well in sales. There is no doubt that jewelry sells way better in person. Women are tactile anyway, so giving them the chance to fondle the beads, to see the sparkle and glimmer, to hold a pair of earrings next to their head will guarantee that your work will sell.

I have determined a few things for my next open house, though:

1. Do not do Sunday again. Besides being the Sabbath, there weren’t enough people to justify working on that day. Especially since I work full time and had to go back to my day job on Monday. I need that day of rest to recoup. Because today? I’m tired.

Instead consider doing a Friday night for the second day option. I thought about this, but I was worried about the parking in our neighborhood in the dark. Or do two Saturdays in a row? Or just take a Friday off to do two full days.

2. The spring open house needs to be a couple of weeks later to really garner more traffic - early April is too soon for Mother’s Day and prom sales.

3. Have more pairs of basic pearl earrings of all colors and sizes. I had at least three people buy simple pearl earrings and mention their desire for similar for gifts for other people. While I offered to make them right then, no one took me up on that offer. Having them made and ready to show will get the sale, I think.

4. Have more leverback earwires handy for the switch out. Reconsider the tiny kidney earwires - they are secure, but older hands have troubles with them.

5. Get a better guest book for folks to sign for the mailing list.

So my next open house won’t be until the fall/winter. I’m debating doing a craft show or two this summer. We’ll see.