CraftSpot: Jewelry

In my last post I mentioned the Craig Bachman warehouse sale I went to recently. I found a few things there that I thought I could use as parts for jewelry. The gold chain with amber leaves is about 4 feet long and cost about $1.25. Last year I bought the same chain but in silver with clear leaves. The wire multi-bangle bracelet from India cost a buck, and I had plans to possibly cut out a few bangles to use in other projects. The original purpose of the black and clear beads on silver rings ($2.50) is unclear, but I thought I could get 2 or 3 bracelets out of it.

Today I separated a few bangles and took about a 6-inch section of chain to see what I could do.

I cut one of the bangles in half, strung some beads on it, and closed off each end with a loop.

Here I used darker beads on the half bangle. I added some metal charms, keys, etc. to the chain between the amber leaves and used a split ring to attach the chain to one end of the bangle half. I added a lobster claw clasp to the other end of the chain to fasten to the other end of the bangle.

Here's the bracelet I made from the cluster of black and clear beads. It's quite lightweight and sassy!

I have accumulated quite a collection of metal charms and embellishments. A month or so ago Michaels had a clearance on their jewelry clearance items which took 70% off the clearance price (that was a lot of clearances in one sentence!). Most of the items, which initially cost $4-5, ended up costing about .50 a package. (When I got home I discovered 5 or 6 items hadn't been discounted correctly, but it wasn't worth the time and gas to go back and complain:) Here's a sample of what I got. It was the one and only time I've ever seen them discount their clearance items; the next time I went back the prices had returned to the regular clearance prices.

I love grungy, rustic looking costume jewelry as evidenced by some other pieces I've made, such as this necklace. I saw a similar one in Holland, MI that had a $65 price tag on it. I'm sure it was higher quality, but the idea is the same.

Sorry for the blurry photo, but you get the idea.

The photo charm of my husband on the necklace above was made using Tim Holtz acrylic charms. Unfortunately I had printed the photo on a laser jet printer, and it smudged and ran when I added the adhesive. These charms are fun to make. All you need is a photo, acrylic charm, and Glossy Accents.

When we were cleaning out my mother-in-law's things I kept some of her old costume jewelry to re-purpose. There was an old, grungy charm bracelet that I used as the base for this vintage looking one. Using a Graphic45 sheet of 1920's bathing beauties (some of the same girls I used in my Tags posting), I cut out some faces, glued them to the charm pieces, then attached them and a few other goodies to the grungy charm bracelet. These girls make me smile!