Braided Steel Wire Bracelet

I love to show you things I make.

I love to show you the things my daughter makes as well.

She has a great creative mind.

A few years ago, the whole family was playing around with my husband's oxygen and acetylene torches.

We were cutting cans and balling steel wire.

My daughter took some of the wire and made these incredibly cool braided bracelets.

She actually did these photographs as well.

I love jewelry photographed in natural settings.

I think it makes them look magical...

That's all for today.

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Feeling Puzzled Earrings

Today is just a quick share of some earrings my daughter makes.

She uses puzzle pieces and wraps them with wire.

Simple and fun.

Each puzzle design lends a different look to the earrings.  

These are more sophisticated due to the subdued colors and design.

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Workbench Wednesday...

This week I decided to show you one of my actual work areas and what is on it this week.

This is the table next to my spot on the couch.

There's my laptop, my newish wooden unit and the looped beads I have been playing with.

I bought a one step looper, which I love.

I can make my own beaded chains easily.

I made some into chains.

Others are just the beads with the loops on each end, ready to be bulit into designs.

I apologize for the photo quality. 

 It is rather dim and the lighting is not ideal for photography.

The looper is pretty versatile.

I tried seed beads and larger glass beads to play around with it.

 These are not the tiny seed beads.

They are the "E" size.

The glass beads are from one of those glass budget bead containers.

I love those for the variety.

Here are the loopers.

They are supposed to work for wire 18- 24 guage.  

I used 20 gauge.

I wanted to share my new organizer as well.

It holds essentials and some other fun goodies.

I recently splurged and bought some silk strips so the colors are arranged in the top slots.

I have some of my specialty pliers in their own slots.

My tag punch is where I can find it.

And those little glass jars have hand forged steel findings.

I spent Sunday morning hammering them so I could fill all the little jars.

Kleenex, sewing supplies and chocolate are essentials.

There is always a magazine from Stampington in that slot.

Next to the wooden organizer is a little basket with some pliers and clippers.

Behind it, is a poster my daughter bought for me when we went to Lucketts this spring.

It was a great day.

So that is what is new on the workbench this week.

What are you up to?

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The GREAT BEAD ORGANIZATION PROJECT

This spring I decided I wanted to redo my garage studio.  

I wanted to move some of my storage pieces around to better utilize my space.

I did a lot of thinking and planning.

Then I told my husband.

He suggested going and getting new shelves to better utilize the space.

We measured and researched options.

Then we went and bought some heavy wire shelves.  

I will show you where we put those later but for now I want to show you my bead shelf.

This is the area before.

I had a lot of this and that piled and stacked.

When we got the new shelves, an old shelf I already had fit perfectly in this spot.

So I cleaned out the old space and moved this shelf over.

I also moved an upper cabinet over.

This is still during the moving process.

This is after.

Tah-Dah!

I love that everything is here in one place for making jewelry.

On the top are all my jewelry books and magazines.

I sorted them all and only kept the ones I use.

The three bins on the top of the wire shelf are my husband's idea.

Those are my holding bins. 

 When I buy new supplies or bring something out and don't have time to put it away, I put it in one of the bins.  

When the bins are full, it is time to sort.

Time to sort....

My drying racks are ready to go and I finally sorted out the trays that fit on the taller skinnier one.

I keep projects I am working on on these trays as well.

In the upper cabinets, under the books, I have bins holding wires, elastic, jute, seed bead tubes, etc.

The bins are easy to stack and remove.

The holding bins are full...better get on that.

Under them are larger bins of bangles, bracelets and headbands sorted by materials.

Then there are the beads.

It took me a week to organize the beads.

My old method involved putting them into these little compartment boxes by when I bought them. 

That is a horrible method for trying to find anything.

So I sorted out every single box and reorganized by color and type.

Types include things like wooden, metals, pearls, whimsical, vintage, and handmade components.

I also have many boxes of hardware goodies like nuts, washers and such.

My label maker got quite a workout.

I love my label maker.

There are some empty boxes for future finds. 

 I have a bunch of stuff in the studio that will go in these too.

I also really loaded each box by combining lots of bead types into each compartment.

I realize that would make some people crazy but it utilizes the boxes so much better for me.

On the side of the shelf are all my chains and necklaces.

These are sorted as well by finish and length.

It makes finding a chain so much easier than my old system which also went by when things were purchased.

I buy chains at yard sales, thrift stores and the mall when they are deeply discounted.

Many of them I will distress and completely change the finish.

Necklaces with beads and dangles get disassembled so I can use them in a different way.

So, this is the GREAT BEAD ORGANIZATION PROJECT.

The capitalization of the project helps to show the magnitude of it.

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Star Fish Napkin Ring for a Beach Wedding: A Quick DIY Tutorial

Summer always makes me think of weddings.

Today I wanted to show you a very quick and easy beach wedding favor.

You can use this as a napkin ring at the wedding and as a take home favor.

Your guests can use it later lots of ways.

You will need:

Rope

Starfish

Hot Glue Gun

Glue sticks

Paper towel tube

I got my rope at Lowes but you should be able to find it at any hardware or home improvement store.

Decide how big you want the rope ring to be and find something you can use to wrap the rope around.

  I used a paper towel tube.

You could make yours smaller or larger.

Wrap the rope around the tube twice and tie.

Cut your rope, leaving short tails.

Get your starfish ready by turning it upside down.

Add a drop of hot glue to the center of the starfish.

Turn it over and press it onto the knot.

Slide the ring off the paper towel tube and press the rope firmly into the hot glue.

Let it cool.

Use it as a napkin ring that can be taken home as a favor.

I used flour sack towels for napkins.

I bought a large pack of them at Sam's Club.

They are laundered but not pressed.

I like them soft and supple.

 These would look fantastic on your table with a sprinkling of sand, shells and stones.

These can be made in less than 5 minutes each.

It actually took me longer to wait for the glue gun to heat                    than it would take to make one.

If you can't find starfish, you can use seashells instead.

Guests can take them home and use them there as napkin rings.

Or as a tieback for curtains.

It would dress up a bathroom in the summertime on a towel or washcloth.

Slip it over a wine bottle to dress up a gift.

  

Or just use it on a table or shelf to bring in a touch of the beach.

I love the way these turned out.

For other fast and easy wedding crafts, hop over for the Wedding edition of Craft Lightning.

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