Bead Embroidery Necklace - Mother's Day Gift

Go ahead, call me the "lazy blogger" because I haven't posted in a while. I just wanted to show you guys the finished piece from my earlier posts. This was for my mother for mother's day this year.

I have many projects in the works... at least three. I need more beads to finish them.

... and you will certainly see more bead embroidery from me to come.

I Need Color - Bead Stringing

My mother says when you get older you tend to be attracted to bright colored things. I wonder if that is why you see little old ladies with blue and purple hair.

I made this necklace last night because I was craving some color. These cold and cloudy days with no outdoor floral displays can make anyone gloomy.

This necklace was inspired by another necklace using colored lampwork beads and complementing seed beads in the book, "Creative Beading: The Best Projects from a year of Bead and Button". This is a great book. It has over 80 projects for you to try. You can also use it as inspirations for new ideas. Stringing, Wirework, Beadweaving (Stitching), Bead Crochet, Embroidery, and Macrame projects are all included in this 256 page book.

This multi-strand necklace uses lamp work beads with complementing size 10/0 seed beads. Maybe you have some lampwork beads in your bead collection you can use to make your own.

Christmas Bracelet

Here is a bracelet I made in November to give to my sister for Christmas. It is from a kit called, "Wisteria". It uses glass seed beads and flower beads. Fringe technique and bead stringing was used to make this bracelet. I hope she likes it. She doesn't know I have a blog yet... this is why I can post it here.... he he

All my Christmas shopping is done now! Yeah!

Thrift Store Shopping for Beads

It's really cold tonight. I think 22 degrees for the low tonight. Brrrr.

I love to find bargains at Thrift Stores. I love bags of jewelry with lots of vintage pieces in them. I like to be able to give beads new life. You can buy bags of old jewerly at thrift stores or online. Ebay.com is certainly one place where you can buy vintage jewelry by the pound. Shopgoodwill.com is another place to find goodies.

These earrings were made from vintage beads found at a thrift store. The turquoise beads are just wonderful. I added some new beads to the vintage ones to complete these earrings.

Stringing Vintage Beads

I want to at least include a picture with every post, so I will post stuff I have already made for a while. My grandmother gave me a vintage bracelet that I loved but I never wore...so when I learned how to make jewelry, I wanted to make a necklace out of this bracelet. After learning how to crimp and put on clasps, here is the finished product. The picture does not do the vintage beads justice. They are all vintage beads (most are glass).

I haven't got my Christmas shopping done yet, have you?

Still Learning!

Here are some additional pieces I made at Michael's. (see previous post) After these classes, I wanted to venture out and design my own treasures.

Picture 1: Chandelier Earrings: strung blue seed beads. Fun Blue Bracelet: Stretchy cord and strung fun blue jean beads. Woven Bracelet: Freshwater pearls and found beads. ( found in my stash - notice It is now broken) Picture 2: Necklace using wired glass beads.

Bead Stringing!

I first started taking classes at Michael's. They have some great classes that teach you how to make basic jewelry. This was a basic bead stringing class. Here is a necklace I made in a class.

From these classes, the bead love began!