An early project

This is one of the first necklaces I made.

It was inspired by a project in Creative Beads and Jewellery Issue 19, designed by Judith Hannington. I can't find a picture on the internet to link to, but it was basically made of seed beads and larger beads, strung on eyepins and linked together. The one in the magazine was in summery pastel shades of pink and blue, but I didn't have any of those so I made do with what I had.

 

The seed beads are a combination of orange, blue, green, and rainbow, that came from an old necklace I never wore, and the silver acrylic beads came from a car boot sale grab bag. I don't usually wear longline necklaces, but this is one of my favourites.

Introduction

Back in November, I stumbled into making jewellery.

Stumbled is the right word, really. I was browsing Etsy, looking for a Steampunk necklace. I bought one I liked, then somehow ended up buying some charms and findings as well. Before I knew it I'd added to the collection: beads, more charms, charity shop finds to dismantle. A couple of magazines later and I was making my own necklaces, bracelets and earrings.

This wasn't one of my first projects, but it's the one that means most to me so far. When I was eight or so I had a leaf charm bracelet. It jangled with metal and plastic charms in dark colours, bronze and purple. I loved it, but it was quite conspicuous and I was not a confident child. I stopped wearing it, and because I wasn't wearing it eventually got rid of it.

I've really regretted it, and taking up making my own jewellery seemed to be the perfect cue to replicate at least the feel of that long-gone bracelet. I bought some glass leaf charms...

... and some antiqued bronze charms from Etsy, and along with some charms taken from charity-shop necklaces I made this.

The chain is a shortened charity shop find in an antique colour. It's not the same as the bracelet I used to have, but it jangles pleasantly and I really like wearing it. It's a little heavy on the bronze charms at the moment, but I aim to replace sme of them as I come across other leaf charms I like. On the whole I'm very pleased with it though.