My grandmother-in-law had a pair of beautiful jade bracelets that were just slightly too small to slide over her hand. In April of 2008 I made them into necklaces so she could still wear them.
I looped the leather and focals around the bracelets in a nondestructive manner, so if ever they needed to be returned to bracelet status, they could be. The necklaces are holding up well, and I saw her wear one at her recent 99th birthday celebration.
I made this necklace in March of 2008, and it was featured in a FireMountain Gems catalog. I always meant to write up detailed instructions on its construction, but didn’t, so I’ll give you a short run down here.
The 13 cylinders are made by doing beaded crochet as a tube with waxed silk thread. I assembled each section with a cylindrical turquoise bead at each end, and ran a 20 gauge wire sterling silver wire down the middle, securing each end with a wire spiral. To connect the sections, I ran the same gauge wire through the sides of the cylinders, making sure that I went through the stitching inside, and made a spiral at each end. The clasp is a custom add-a-bead barrel style clasp, and I did have to ream out the bead hole to get the clasp into the bead.
When my kids were young I turned to making more jewelry. The projects were usually quick (under a couple hours), easily stashed out of reach, and didn’t involve things like knives or torches. Wire is one of my favorite crafting media, and I still like this wire wrapped stone with braided wire necklace I made in July 2007. I feel the photography on this piece also shows skill improvement.
Ironically, when my kids were babies, I stopped wearing necklaces and earrings so they wouldn’t be targets for little hands. Over that time I developed a neck sensitivity and can now only wear a very light necklace for an hour tops before it bugs me and has to come off. Heavier necklaces like this one don’t last 30 seconds.
Happy Fourth of July, may your neighbors celebrate quietly and early, and may your animals be calm.
P.S. My apologies for email subscribers on a partial post yesterday. I started writing tomorrow’s post, stuck my phone in my pocket, and the post published itself, incomplete. The full post should go out tomorrow, barring more technology hiccups.
Critters and Craft 