Lessons Learned

I started with Intro to Jewelry Making class at The Artful Bead in Ft. Worth. Like many beginner's classes, you learn how to make a necklace, a bracelet and a pair of earrings.

The necklace and bracelet use beadolon thread thread, a clasp and ring, and a crimp bead on each side of the threat. The earrings are made with earring hooks, o-pins and eye-pins, and beads.

When I first started, I went and bought pre-made earring hooks and o-pins, but now I make them myself.

Then, the next class I took was the Wire, Bead & Chain class at Beadworks-Dallas. We learned how to cut a chain into small segments, and then using sterling silver wire, connect the segments to beads, creating a necklace.

The trick here is to wrap the wire consistently on each side of the bead. My wraps were always longer on one side than the other, and when I'd cut them, there was always this rough scratchy edge. It takes practice to get the wraps more even and smooth looking, and I'm still working on this.

I ran into two other problems as well. The necklace in the photo below is the first one I made. Can you tell by looking at it what the problems might be? ;-)

[PHOTO FORTHCOMING]

First, I had decided to use some large wooden beads that I thought would give it a nice Vintage look. But the bead holes turned out to be so large that when I tried using seed beads to plub the hole, the seed beads would slight right through. Finally, I found a bead that I could sort of wedge into the larger bead to anchor it on the chain.

The second problem I discovered was after the necklace's completion. The necklace should have a nice flowing movement. But when I used silver wire to join 3-4 beads together as a group, I inadvertently created a larger stiff non-flexible area that breaks up the flow.

To fix this latter problem, all I needed to do was take the necklace apart and either create smaller bead groups or construction the bead group in a way that the beads were grouped by a flexible thread instead of a wire.

By the way, one great thing about assembling the jewelry is that you can always take things apart and redo them again. All you lose are some wire and crimp beads.

Feeling a little more confident at playing with chain, I took another class at Beadworks-Dallas called Double-Link Chain. This was taught by Chuck Rodriguez who has has also taught Chain Maile and Viking Knit Chain there as well.

To make this type of chain, you wrap the chaining using a xxx and cut the chain so that you have lots of rings of the same size. Then, starting with a single row of three, arranged in a circle, you link these three rings by adding a second row, and so on... Very early on, as I get into row 6 or 7, I'm looking at 18-25 rings and it's hard to see where one row stops and where the next one should begin. So, to make this easier, I cut 2 colors of wire. I added silver rings for the first row, copper rings for the second, and so on. One thing I learned from this class is that making chain is very tedious and time-consuming.

I liked how the chain looked almost like fabric, and so, I was very quickly eyeing a class in Basic Bead Crochet (also taught at Bead-works Dallas).

For beginners, it was recommended that you use size 8 non-hex seed beads. I had to drive all over for this, and finally found them at Wild Beads in Arlington. Then, I had to find the right crochet hook... But the time I got all the supplies, there were just two days left before the class, and I received a phone call saying the class had been canceled. So, now I'm not sure if I should wait for another Bead Crochet class or try to fumble through Mary Libby Neiman's Bead Crochet Basics book.

In the meantime, I have signed up for two more classes, Knots About You and Viking Knit Necklace. And yes, didn't I just say a few minutes ago how chain making is tedious and time-consuming. Will I ever learn?