Double Snappin' Organizer Mega from JewelrySupply.com

Let´s first talk about how to organize the stash. This is a problem we all come across when we decide to start beading whether it is as a hobby or professionally. Some people find creativity when they are immersed in a big ocean of beads and like to have them all over the house, inside whatever imaginable, even old shoes. (I don´t wanna think about the smell of that jewelry). Others prefer to store their stuff in plastic bags sorted by type, which by the way, is a method we don´t recommend. Plastic bags are prone to snag and rip at times, not to mention how much of a hassle it is to pick them all up when it eventually does break.

Another way to store your beads is to put your stash in glass jars. We see two big inconveniences with using glass containers. Firstly if you need to work on your project somewhere else you can´t take them with you easily since glass is just too cumbersome. Secondly there´s always the possibility you drop the jar and it breaks to smithereens. What a drag! Some people use old mint or candy tins in order to avoid breakages. That´s good, but you can´t see what is inside so you have to label them which is double the job and no fun at all.

There are other ways to store beads. If you are one of those fortunate people who work cozily at home and have a designated space for beading, you can set up shelves or a bookcase, or even use a medicine chest.

Sorting the stash is never an easy task. We ourselves had decided to organize our beads and tools many times only to find ourselves later wasting time looking for that single bead to finish our project.

Before getting started to organize our materials we had to take in consideration sizes, colors, material, shapes and quantities. The more creative we become the bigger the variety of beads we needed. So, in order to give free reign to our creativite muscles and avoid hair-pulling frustration, we believe it absolutely necessary to plan out how to store the beads that have accumulated over the years.

Plastic Storage Case With Lid from Fire Mountain Gems

Also, having proper storage for your beads allows you to keep your most coveted pieces well preserved. Items like Glass beads, Semi-precious stones, seeds, etc. can change color if we don´t protect them from the elements like sun and dust. As we know now trends go in a circle (I shouldn´t have thrown those golden delicas away). Sometimes when we purchase a lot of beads that turn out not to be very successful, they make a very strong come back in the future. You must see your beads like a long term investment.

My wife and I have figured out throughout a lot of years of beading, designing and selling jewelry, that the best option is to use the plastic storage boxes with a lid, like this one, from Fire Mountain Gems.

They are highly affordable and you can find them easily anywhere.  I think most retail/craft stores have them as well. They come in different sizes and they are easy to manage and take with you if you need to work at your booth in a craft show. The translucent plastic facilitates allow you to see the content without having to open them up. This saves a lot time and effort when you look for an specific kind of bead. Believe me, it´s just incredible the amount of time you save having your stash in these containers. We could work on projects and handle customers at the same time. At different craft shows we’ve been to it has turned out to be our best option. Before sometimes we only had little space to work in our booth and we were forced to put our materials on our knees or on the floor. Having our beads in these containers, helped us to be more efficient and to avoid a big mess.

Of course, I am from Mexico and this kind of container is all you can get over here for a small budget, but I am amazed with the huge variety of plastic containers you can buy in the States and Canada.

Ink Cartridge Packaging Reused

We do also use plastic Ziploc bags but those are only for our wires, pins and metal stuff that don´t fit in the little compartments. In this way there is no need to bend the frail materials.

You can check discussions about this subject in almost all web sites related to beads and see that every one has different ways to store their beads. I found some very interestings solutions online, for example; Jill MacKay offers a smart way to store seed beads, and Cate Prato of Quilting Arts suggests a way to cut down on garbage by using packaging as storage solutions as seen here.

Be sure to read the comments too. There are good suggestions like this one:

Tackle Box from JewlerySupply.com

“Visit the fishing tackle and gear department or any sports store and you will see at least 20 sizes and shapes of clear (or milky) plastic boxes all divided into compartments just the right size for beading and embroidery equipment. They stack well too—a label on one edge and you are all set.”

I think she means something like this.

Hope these tips were useful to your jewelry making and make your job more pleasurable. But if you are one of those who find creativity with beads all over the place, let us know how you do it!

Before we get started, I completely forgot to mention that we are offering FREE SHIPPING for the holidays so order now!

I hope you enjoyed yesterday’s Christmas Tree tutorial ’cause here we go again! Its time for part 2: Christmas Wreaths!

Materials
- 66 green 18 gauge  3/16″ID anodized aluminum rings
- 5 yellow 3/36″ID anodized aluminum rings for decoration
- 1 red 24 gauge 1/2″ ID anodized aluminum ring (helps hold shape)
- 6″ green cord
- 4 red beads

Step 1:
Close ten green rings. Loop ten more green rings through the closed rings to make ten interlocking pairs as shown.

Step 2:
Connect your pairs together into a long strand. Use three rings to make each connection as shown in the first picture below. Now, add a third ring next to every other interlocking pair to add some stability to the final piece.

Connect the strand to the large ring by looping a single ring through a set of three. Remember this connection is through the connectors, NOT the interlocking pairs, as shown above.

Step 3:
Once your strand of chainmail is connected all the way around the large ring, close the circle with three more rings and connect this set of three rings to the large ring. Add some cord with a few beads to one side and you’re almost done!

Step 4:
Add the small rings as decorations. Remember from the tree tutorial, these small rings only fit around a couple larger rings so you will likely have to force them in between some rings to fit them in.

All done!

Happy holidays!

Don’t you just love the holidays? My mom sure does and her spirit is certainly infectious.  This year she asked me to make some Christmas charms for her to give to our family on Christmas Eve. I really like what I eventually came up with and so I thought I would make a tutorial for any chainmaillers who celebrate Christmas (or want to give a small but handmade gift to someone who does.) These are also pretty fast so they make good last minute oops-I-forgot-someone gifts too!

I am working in more of an office situation with the rest of the team (as opposed to in my living room in my PJs) and I am having a hard time finding a place where the lighting is right for my incredibly finicky digital camera. I have honestly considered going back to my 50 year old Minolta SLR and buying a scanner just because I know it actually knows how to focus, but I digress.  And now that I have digressed I have an urge to go take some high contrast, black and white, late fall pictures in High Park… I think its the little bit of goth still in me that loves the look of gnarled, old, bare trees surrounded by their fallen leaves. ANYWAY – tutorial time. (Sorry for the wandering mind, I recently rediscovered World of Goo and have been playing a little bit too much… and far too late into the night!)

Materials
- 55 green 18 gauge  3/16″ID anodized aluminum rings
- 4 yellow18 gauge 3/36″ID anodized aluminum rings for decoration
- 3 red 18 gauge 3/36″ID anodized aluminum rings for decoration
- 1 large red ring to hang it from (the size of this ring doesn’t matter very much but if you like the look of these ones they are 1/2″ ID, 24 gauge)

Step 1:
Close eleven green rings. Loop ten more green rings through 10 of these closed rings to create 10 sets of interlocking rings and one little loner: (see below)

Step 2:
Connect one of your interlocking pairs to the large red ring.

Step 3:
Connect two more interlocking pairs to the first one with two green rings. Connect these two pairs together with a single green ring.

Step 4:

Now connect the loner pre-closed ring from before to both of these new pairs. You will now have a little diamond hanging off your big ring. Make it into a triangle by adding interlocking pairs to each side of the loner ring and connecting them to the row above. If you want to make these trees into earrings, skip to step 5 now, otherwise continue your tree by adding a fourth row. You will be running out of room to go through the center loner ring now so just use one ring each to connect the two middle pairs of the bottom row (see picture).

Before making it back into a triangle, connect the middle two pairs to the outside rings of the row above for extra stability.  Add two more pairs to the corners to complete the triangle shape as above.

Step 5:
Add the final pair to the middle of the bottom row to create your tree trunk. (This pair could be brown if you are so inclined.)

Step 6:
Add your decorations! These tiny rings will only fit around two of the green rings, and just barely around the interlocking pairs, so pick your locations for them carefully. Once they were closed, I turned them carefully so any tiny little open gap would be nicely hidden inside.

And?

Voila! All done your mini Christmas tree!

Tomorrow I will have a similar tutorial for the mini wreaths in the first picture. If anything is not clear or you have any other comments or suggestions, I’d love to hear them!

Happy crafting and happy holidays!

The first post will walk you through the steps for building a lightbox, a simple tool for getting great lighting in unlikely situations; the second talks about how to use your cameras settings to achieve the look you want; and the third is a discussion of composition and background choices.

Part 1: DIY Lightbox Tutorial
Part 2: Aperture & Other Camera Settings
Part 3: Backgrounds and Composition
Part 4: Best Photos From the Blogosphere

The posts below describe my experiments with wire as I seek to master this versatile medium, as well as some hopefully helpful tips I have picked up along the way. For guides featuring other media, click on over to our Tutorials page.

Part 1: Introduction & Pegboard/Wig jig
Part 2: Simple Wire Jewelry & an Easy tutorial
Part 3: Showcase!

The first photo demonstrates the lighting conditions that I had to work with while I was taking the second photo. Its pretty cool how nice of a shot you can get in such poor conditions, eh?. It was rainy and incredibly windy outside and I have the overhead lights on as well as the little lamp (which is standing on two six packs of beer stacked on top of each other, not the most elegant solution but it worked.)

If you’re been following our photography guide up until now, you have already made your own light box and know how to use your camera to achieve the look you want. The final step is composition; setting up your piece with a background that really sets it off  and makes the photo interesting and pleasing to look at, not just a clear photograph. This will help you stick out from your competitors, but be careful – you don’t want the background to be too much and overpower your jewelry. For example, the photo below is from the Ring Lord forums.

The snake is beautiful but pretty distracting, eh? Its hard to even notice there is jewelry in there. As the original poster said, and we all agreed, it makes a pretty picture but its not the best way to sell your creations.

Not everyone likes a plain white background tho, so, what to do? Personally, I am an avid reader so I chose to use one of my favorite books to break up the monotony of the dreaded empty white space.

I like the look of this background but some people might find it a bit distracting because they can still make out the words and try to read them.  In that case, you might want to try sheet music, it has a similar appeal to a book in that it is also black and white, but its slightly less distracting than words.

One of the most important compositional tool is the Rule of Thirds.  Basically, your picture will look better if you divide your space, vertically and horizontally, into thirds rather than in half.  This diagram helps to illustrate what I mean:

By positioning your picture so that the focal points are aligned with where the lines cross, you can create a more interesting and pleasing photograph.  For example, examine the above photo with the book.

Notice how the necklace is off-center? This splits the space into one third with lots going on in it and two thirds with not much, this is asymmetrical balance and is a great way to use the Rule of Thirds.

Also notice how the necklace itself divides the photo into three sections vertically, the chain is one third, the wire diamond the second, and the bead flowers hanging off the bottom make up the third section. By placing the blue flower right on the cross-section of the two dividing lines, it really pops out of the picture and draws attention down, from the eye-catching silver pendant, to the more subtle pink beads below.

I hope this had helped you in photographing your awesome jewelry creations! Coming soon we will have tips for those interested in selling their work including packaging ideas as well as how to write interesting descriptions and decide on prices.

So the first one (the most challenging one) was making bats and ghosts out of paper Mache. It was a challenge because the finished product takes a very long time to dry and a lot of patience. It took us about 4 days to finish 3 bats and 1 ghost (only 1 because we failed miserably with 4 other balloons). I don’t know if any of you have ever done any paper Mache crafts but it’s fun, easy  (not so easy for a 3 and 5 year old) and you can create pretty much anything  with a little creative thinking and imagination. So for this project we used:

1. Balloons
2. A mixture of warm water and flour (about 2 cups of water and 2/3cup of flour) to act as adhesive
3. Newspaper, ripped into small pieces
4. Acrylic paint, nothing too expensive since most of it will end up on the floor
5. Paint brushes
6. String
7. Tissue paper
8. Eyes (plastic) and glue
9. Construction paper or painted cardboard.

You blow up the balloon to the desired fatness. You slap on the newspaper (shredded to smallish pieces) coated in the warm goo, you cover the balloon, every millimeter of it except for the tied up part.

You wait for about 1 day, maybe longer. When its dry you paint it black if it’s a bat, or white if it’s a ghost, or orange if it’s a pumpkin, then you stick on the eyes, you cut out wings for the bat, you make a “Sheet” for the ghost, out of tissue paper and voila! You have a small ensemble of things to hang from your ceiling.

The next project was a much, much, much simpler one that we performed (at least I did) with more patience. We made a wreath for the front door. I always mean to buy a frame for one that I redecorate for every season but I haven’t been able to find one that fits all my needs, so we decided to make a very simple one to welcome guests into our house. And all you need for this are 4 things:

1. Construction paper
2. Paint
3. Little hands
4. Scissors

Draw an barely there circle on a big piece of construction paper and ask the little hands to do the rest, stamp a circle of hands on the paper, then cut it out and hang it on your door! Have fun!

These are pretty easy to make and don’t take much time. All you need is some wire and some creativity!

Materials
- leather cord
- wire
-clasp

I started by wrapping some black 24g wire around a piece of green leather that was the right length for a necklace. Then I finished it up by making a loop of leather and wrapping it tight then adding a silver hook to the other end.

You can leave as much space as you want between each coil of wire, whatever looks good to you. Or you can cross the wire over each other by wrapping it from one end and then the other, making sure to keep the spacing equal as I did on this treble clef pendant:

To complete my necklace, I made a couple of different pendants by wrapping the same leather in wire and molding it into shapes (as seen above and below). The wire around the leather makes it hold its shape quite well and it has a fun, chunky and colorful look! To make it even more customizable, I attached a clasp to the front of the necklace so that I can easily swap the pendants. (This is a great trick for any necklace you want to be able to customize on the spot.)

Here are a couple other pieces I made while playing around:

The first one is a braid of leather pieces, one of which has been wrapped in red wire. This necklace holds its shape really well and is actually a little bit stiff.  The second one was a bit harder as the leather keeps wanting to move closer to each other but once you get the hang of bending the wire in even sections around the leather, it goes pretty quickly.

As you can see, there are lots of possibilities when working with wire, and there are lots of things you can combine it with! Its easy to form the shapes once the leather is wrapped, just don’t forget to hammer it lightly under a towel once you have it the way you want it, this will keep it from being easily pulled out of shape.

I hope you enjoy playing with leather and wire as much as I did!

Happy crafting.