Free Beaded Beads Tutorials

If you're like me, beaded beads look really intricate and beautiful, but I can never figure out how to make them from just looking at the finished product.  Beadiferous to the rescue!  In my internet wanderings, I stumbled upon this website that has some free tutorials for some beautiful beaded beads (as well as some other neat earrings too!).  My personal favorite is the O Pendant, which I think could make neat earrings as well if you used smaller beads.  Check out the photos below to get the tutorials for each of these beads.  Also, don't forget to enter the contest for a free copy of my Shimmering Beaded Leaves tutorial.  You have until December 9th, 2011 to enter : )

The Filled Net Pendant

The O Pendant

The 12-Bead Base

Embellishment of the 12-Bead Base

Free Bead Weaving Tutorial!!!

As I mentioned before, to celebrate my 1000th page view, I am having a contest.  Well, we made it!  Time to find out what you can get.


Win a FREE copy of my Shimmering Beaded Leaf Earring Tutorial which I announced to you here and is for sale here.  However, right now, you have a chance to get it for free!  All you have to do is leave a comment on this post saying what you would like to see more of on this blog.  That's it!  The contest will be open until December 8th, 2011 at midnight EST.  On December 9th a comment will be picked at random and the person who posted it will get the tutorial for free.  One comment per person please.  I'm excited to see what you have to say!

New URL

In an effort to consolidate my 'brand', I've been unifying everything associated with making jewelry under one name:

Crossed Wires Jewelry

As such, the URL for this blog has been changed to www.CrossedWiresJewelry.blogspot.com.  My esty store has now been updated to www.CrossedWiresJewelry.etsy.com and you can contact me via my profile or at CrossedWiresJewelry@gmail.com.

Stay tuned as we're only a few page views away from a contest!  Who doesn't like free stuff?!

So close to a 1000!

I checked my blog stats today and realized that I have had 974 views. I can't believe that so many of you are coming and taking a look at my little corner of the internet. To mark my 1000th view, I will be having a contest. I will post it once that milestone number has been reached. Stay tuned for details.....

DIY Earring Displays and Organizers

If you're anything like me, you have piles of earrings that you love and need a way to store them. However, I find that when I put things away in a jewelry box, I forget that I own them and don't wear them. I found a couple of neat earring display ideas that are easy to make and are really neat decor as well.

The first is a new take on an old picture frame. You can find the tutorial here. The tutorial includes instructions on how to knit or crochet the lace, however, I would just make a trip to the fabric store and buy some. You could make this in any combination of colours. You just need some paint for the frame and backing, and a coordinating lace colour. If you bought the frame from a thrift store, you could probably make the whole thing for under $10.

The second is quirky and cool all at the same time. I love it! The original came from here, although there is no formal tutorial. To make this you will need
- one cheese grater (which I suggest getting at the dollar store)
- 4 hooks (the kind meant to screw into the ceiling would likely work well since they have a straight base to glue into the cheese grater corners)
- 4 larger beads for the hook ends
- glue (something like epoxy or the gel crazy glue should work well)
- paint or spray paint
- creativity!






The options are pretty much endless. You could paint multicoloured designs, stencil on patterns, glue on rhinestones, add lace trim, or anything you can come up with to make it your own. Again, by getting your supplies at cost efficient places, you could make this whole thing for less than $10.

These two ideas are great ways to keep your earrings out in the open without making a clutter. The organizers themselves are cool pieces of art too!

Beaded Paisley Wire Wrapped Earrings

So it's been a while. Summer fun definitely stole me away from my beading and away from my computer. To welcome the first day of September, I sat inside after work and made a pair of earrings. It helped that I have a birthday party coming up this weekend for which I offered to contribute some jewelry as part of the gift. Having a deadline definitely gave me that extra bit of motivation! I ended up combining both wire work and beads to create some fun earrings. They kind of remind me of a paisley pattern.

When I had finished the first one I wasn't quite sure if I liked them but once the mirror image pair was complete, I was really happy with the results. The wire frame is made of 20 gauge silver round wire which I hammered to stiffen it once I had shaped it. The inside swirls are made of 24 gauge square silver wire. Some mauve frosted glass seed beads on the outside and a dangling 4mm swarovski bicone crystal completed the look. Everything was woven together using 28 gauge round silver wire. Hopefully the recipient will enjoy them too!

New Items Up On Etsy!

I finally got around to photographing some pieces I had intended for sale.  Mostly fused glass pendants, but there are a couple wire wrapped goodies in there too.  These are all now up for sale at my Etsy store. Hope you enjoy :)

A New Wire Wrapping Tutorial Site

Just wanted to share with you a new website... well, new to me website that I stumbled upon the other day: http://www.wire-jewelry-lessons.com . I've already purchases the Solitaire Faceted Ring tutorial. It looks so much more delicate that a lot of the other prong ring tutorials I've seen and will be perfect for some of the smaller stones I received in my bulk stone orders a little while back.

There were also many other beautiful patterns that caught my eye. Some I can figure out how they were made just by looking at the pictures, but some have got the "I need to know how they did it" part of my brain going!

Back From Vacation

It's been a little while since my last post, partly due to the fact that I just returned from a wonderful week in Costa Rica. I also brought back some sea shells with me. I am hoping to incorporate some of them into some pieces. They would add a nice natural element. More to come soon after I finish unpacking and get settled and caught up with everything that I missed while I was away :)

Wire Wrapped Rings 'n' Things

I have been dabbling in wire wrapping for about a year and a half now.  I tended to focus mostly on pendants though as I have always found it easier to wrap around a relatively large focal object (stone, bead, shell, etc.).  Rings have never been my forte.  I have made a few here and there, but I find weaving on such a small scale quite awkward.  I challenged myself last night to overcome this avoidance of rings and to make a ring without a pattern or directions of any kind.  After a couple hours of fiddling, bending, twisting and binding, here is what I ended up with.

I'm quite pleased with the outcome. Very free form and asymmetrical. Depending on which angle you look at if from, or which way you wear it, it looks like a different ring. I've decided to put this one up for sale, and if you really like it take a look at my Etsy e-store. My ultimate goal with ring is to figure out a cool method of setting stones. I've got so many small ones that would look awesome in a ring. Now I just need to figure out how to do it.

Beaded Leaf Earrings Tutorial Now Online

Some exciting news!  My application to become a Teacher on jewelrylessons.com has been accepted, which means I can now post tutorials for some of my designs.  The first one is a smaller version of the shimmering beaded leaf earrings from my earlier post.

You can find my Shimmering Beaded Leaf Earrings Tutorial at http://www.jewelrylessons.com/tutorial/shimmering-beaded-leaf-earrings.  I like these because they tend to lay flat when you are wearing them, where as I've found that the larger ones I made earlier tend to fold in the middle.  Hope you enjoy the first addition to my tutorial library!

Christmas.....in March.....that I paid for myself

Today I had two packages of jewelry stuff arrive in the mail.  Isn't checking the mail so much more fun when you know fun stuff is coming?  I got a whole variety of seed beads as well as mixed lot of semi precious stones for wire wrapping.

So I ordered a 'mystery' lot of stones and I was very pleased with what I got. Lots of amethyst and labradorite, some moonstone, and many unknowns. I am going to have to go researching to figure out what they are. All in all, I am very pleased with what I got and will be dealing with that seller again.

OOOooo! Beads! So many colours! I finally broke down and shelled out for miyuki delica beads. They're consistent size will add a nice polished look to my pieces; especially those that have repeated stitch patterns. I'm excited to make something with them, I just have to decide what!

This is my favorite stone of my entire mystery lot. It is a large labradorite teardrop that reflects a beautiful blue-green colour. I don't know whether I'll keep the finished piece for myself or sell it. It's just so pretty I don't know whether I will be able to part with it!  It will end up making a beautiful wire wrapped pendant.

Shimmering Beaded Leaf Earrings

The finished product!  I love the way they turned out.  Pretty  yet not over the top.  I especially love the 'frillyness' of the leaf edges.

 The design was based on a diagonal peyote stitch.  I used faceted size 11 cylinder beads.  I think the faceted sides add a nice sparkle to the finished product.  These earrings measure about 2 inches long including the ear wires.


I really like the look of these so I want to make some variations on the theme.  I have a whole lot of miyuki seed beads coming in the mail... I went on a bit of an ebay bead binge.  Including some nice size 15 ones is multiple shades of green.  I think it would look really nice to have a cluster of smaller leaves so I'm going to give it a try.

Also, my favorite recent discovery: thread protectors.  They're the little metal loops at the top of the leaves that the ear wires connect to.  I'm always afraid of thread at important connection points, where there's going to be the most wear and tear, fraying over time and one just breaking such that I lose an earring.  These solve that and make it much easier to connect other components to beaded pieces.

Next post: exciting things that arrive in the mail!

Autumn Leaves Inspiration

Tonight I plan on making a pair of earrings inspired by the Autumn Leaves necklace patter in the book Creative Beading Vol.4. I love the natural motif embodied by this necklace, however it is far to extravagant to wear on a day to day basis.

I plan on using a variation of the leaves to make earrings. Also, the bead colours in the original pattern don't go very well with my colouring, so I plan on using some deep green beads accented with some medium green beeds. Depending on how they turn out and what size each leaf is, I may just use one per earwire or attach a small cluster. I'm more of a go with the flow kind of beader rather than planning it all right from the start. I'm excited to see how they'll turn out!

The Urchin Bead

My first beaded bead.  How exciting.  It was based on the urchin bead pattern from Marcia Decoster's Beaded Opulence.  The goal was to achieve something like:

 Eye catching isn't it?!

The pattern is based on embellished right angle weave with a variety of bead sized.  I had to improvise a bit as I didn't have the exact sized recommended in my seed bead stash so it was a bit of a gamble on how it was going to turn out.  Specifically, I used cylinder beads instead of the largest seed beads, and delica beads instead of the crystal embellishments.  Step 1: lots and lots and lots and lots of right angle weave stitches.  My goodness!  I spend an entire evening making this thing when I estimated it would take a couple hours.  So many tiny stitches!  After telling my friend about my many hours of bead stitching, he gave me the nickname 'the bead surgeon'.  I approve, haha.  So how did my bead turn out?

Not  to bad for a first attempt.  I will definitely be giving this another shot with the exact bead sizes specified in the pattern.

This one is quite large... about an inch and a half across.  I am also going to try making one half the height and with only three spines.  I hope that the results will be small and light enough to make earrings out of.

My biggest lesson from this experience is that beaded beads take lots of time!  It's amazing the amount of effort it takes to make something so small.  The results all worth it though!

My Newest Addiction - Beaded Beads

First of all...welcome to the first post of my blog.  I hope that this can be a way to share my hobby and creative endeavors, share my inspirations and just put my creations out into the world.  Now onto the actual subject of this post.

My jewelry making focus for the last year or so was wire wrapping and glass fusing.  I had pretty much put strict bead work aside.  A few months ago I was organizing all my supplies and I rediscovered my seed bead collection.  A box full of little shiny beads of all sorts of gorgeous colours.  I wanted to use them, but how?  I sometimes incorporate small beads into my wire wrapping designs, but it had been a while since I had made anything that showcased small beads.  Christmas was also approaching and my mom was asking for gift ideas. I scoured the internet and settled on two books that really caught my eye.

The first was Marcia DeCoster's Beaded Opulence.  Just looking at the cover I was impressed.  A beautiful complex piece made completely from seed beads and other small beads.  I looked through the available preview and I was hooked.  So many intricate patterns that were way beyond stringing beads on a thread.  The patterns looked challenging!  I find that I am disappointed with a lot of books these days because they don't push me to try something new.  That is not the case with this one.  I have decided to attempts the 'urchin bead' as my first project from this book.  My success or failure to be reported in my next post.

The second book that caught my eye was Creative Beading Vol. 4.  This book encompasses a wider variety of techniques and skill levels that Beaded Opulence does.  However, there are still many patterns in here that look like they will be challenging and rewarding to make.  I think my first project will be based on the "collecting leaves" pattern.  The one on the book is for making an embellished necklace, however I plan on incorporating the leaf 'bead' design provided into a set of long draping earring.  I'm excited to see how they will turn out.

Though I have rekindled my love affair with beads, I don't plan on leaving my wire wrapping ways and glass fusing ways behind.  I'm looking forward to producing a wide variety of pieces in the near future.  I always seem to have design ideas bouncing around my head.  I just need to force myself to sit down and take the time to bring them to life!