OTTBS finish-a-long

Following last month's OTTBS finish-a-long sucess, I thought I'd join in again this month. I have a bracelet that I started a month or so ago. It came about after getting some free twin beads from the facebook page of Preciosa. I decided that I wanted to join the twins with jumprings and finally settled on a design similar to 6 in 1 chainmaille. The twin beads take the place of the smaller 6 rings. Here's how it looked. (Please excuse the slightly goose pimple arms! Its a little chilly today and I don't put the heating on if its only me in unless it gets majorly freezing)

Now I like this look but the problem is, its not very stable. The twins flip and the rings slip under each other. A bit of a shake sometimes rights it but not always. I decided to live with it for a bit but it got on my nerves so I decided I would have to do something about it. Then I didn't!

So that brings me to this month's finish along project.... sort out this bracelet. I picked up some delica drops and size 8s thinking that popping some on the edges would solve my problem. I've started but am not sure. The drops weren't working so I've been adding 4 size 8s to the outer rings. It has not completely solved the stability issue, but it has greatly improved it and it might be even better if I carry on. The look is quite different though, much less open. Here's the bit I've done so far.

What do you think? I'd appreciate any thoughts or ideas. I'm torn at the mo. Do I: carry on with it and live with it a bit; try and find another way of sorting it; or just frog it and do something else with the beads?

xxx

EDITED to add this picture so you can get a better idea of what's going wrong with the whole stability issue!
PS. Its really tricky to take a picture of your right arm with your left hand when you're right haded. Soemone didn't think that through properly!!

February Crafting

Hello all and welcome to March! Hope your February was fun filled.

My February has been busy. There are maths exams tomorrow and over the next few days so I've done a load of tutoring recently. Crafting wise, its all been beading/jewellery making.

Here's a roundup of everything I made in February.

I finally caught up with the OTTBS earring challenge. Here are weeks four through nine:

Week four: These star earrings are made from a fab pattern by Jean Power. If you want to make your own beaded stars, you can get the pattern from Jean's website.

Week five: Crytal hoop earrings. I made these for me using 3mm fire polished crystals. I also wrote a free tutorial for these. It's here if you missed it.

Week six: I made these for a friend's birthday. They are made with dyed purple freshwater pearls and sterling silver wire in a herringbone weave.

Week seven: A quick little make as I'd gotten a few weeks behind again. These are lava rock and sterling silver. I'll probably list them in my Folksy shop at some point in the near future so if you want them, give me a shout.

Week eight: Another fairly quick make to catch up. These are facetted red aventurine drops and sterling silver. I decided to oxidise these. Again, these will probably end up in my shop soon.

Week nine: I made these to match my OTTBS beadalong project (see below). I used the same beads as in the bracelet but used abalone rounds instead of chips. Sorry for the not so brilliant photography! Too lazy this morning to set everything up properly! 

I finally finished my anemone cuff (based on a BWG project by Stephanie Burnham). Thanks to the OTTBS beadalong I felt compelled to actually finish off all that fringing. I used press studs as a fastening to give it an almost invisable join.



Really chuffed to have finally finished it but not sure when I'll actually wear it! Although I have got the earrings to match now too....

All my other beading this month has been curtesy of Gillian Lamb's beaded crotchet workshop I went to at Stitch'n'craft. It was my first time a their studio and I had a fun day. It was a little over an hour away but not a complicated drive. Becs of Bead by Becs fame was also there. It was great to meet a fellow OTTBSer. By the end of the day we had both gotten the hang of it and had two crotched ropes on the way. I finished off both of mine over the weekend.

The top one was the first I started at the workshop and is a necklace made using 3mm toho cube beads. The bottom is a bracelet made with three different colours of size 8s and delica drops.

My next crochet project was flourite chips. This was much fiddlier than the regular shaped beads but I love the result. Its a little big for me but I'm keeping it! I'll just have to be a little careful when wearing it!



And that's everything I made in February...well everything I completed. I did play about with some donut beads, as you may have read on my last post, intending to make something for the OTTBS February moodboard but it didn't go brilliantly so I didn't get round to entering this month. There were 36 fab entries though- you can see them here if you're interested. 

Creating aims for March? Well I'll be exam marking along with tutoring so not sure how much creating time I'll get. I want to keep up with the earring challenge plus I have a couple of UFOs I'd like to get done. I'd also like to sort out my Folksy shop. I've kinda taken a break from it and left it on its own for the past 2 to 3 months so I've got loads of delisted stock and, as I haven't been listing, I haven't had sales. Not sure if I'll get round to sorting that out though. We'll see.

Have a fun March everyone, whatever you're up to.

xxx