This Week In Bracelets

Hi Everyone,
Spring really never sprung but it is surely summer here in Jersey today.  It is almost 80 degrees outside.  I am wishing the pool was open! I have been busy getting started on the summer decor around the house so that once it is time to get outside for power washing and pool opening I will be ready.  In the meantime the craft room has been buzzing as well. I have been making bracelets per requests.  I have been totally enjoying it as I really feel I am creating a one of kind piece for someone.  I am no kind of jewelry designer but I am one crafty good girl!  When this whole bracelet thing started I wanted to figure out a way to make my charm bracelets my own, meaning I wanted the bracelets I was making to be different from what one might buy at a local craft fair.  Starting off I know these bracelets are not high quality jewelry  but the fun trendy jewelry we wear for a season or so.  Back at Christmas when Rory and I started making the charm bracelets I made sure that the bracelet blanks we purchased were lead and nickel free.  So important!!!  I had settled on copper core bracelet that were plated in sterling silver. I liked the color much better than stainless steel. I have been wearing many of the bracelets that I made since the Christmas season.  You can clearly see that the copper starts to show after about 2 months of wear.  I am pretty hard on jewelry so another may get 3 months before seeing the silver plate start to wear.  Funny thing is that I liked the bracelet just as much even after the copper started to show. Someone else might not feel that way so now when I sell a bracelet I show the person the one I am wearing and let them decide if they still want to buy the bracelet. The second thing I tried to do was to create a "signature" for the bracelets.  Right from the beginning every bracelet had the following charms in addition to the "themed" charms. First the angel  My thought is that we all need an angel close by. Second is the 2 silver teardrops.  Water is the life force that goes back to everything.  Every bracelet I have made so far I can theme back to water.  I have made the following:
snowflake/snowman: snow comes from the raindrop
seashell/beach: the ocean water
runner bracelet: beads of sweat from the labor of the run
memorial bracelet: the tears at the loss of a loved one
gardening bracelet: the water needed to grow
generally speaking we can always have tears of joy, I see a new baby bracelet, wedding, etc. 
I could go on and on . . . .
The third charm that is on every bracelet is a "made with love" tag that is shaped like an envelope. You can buy this charm anywhere.  I like it because I want the person to know that I really did love making the bracelet.
The fourth item on each bracelet is a their initial hand stamped on a sterling silver metal tag. This is how they know I made it for them.  I have enjoyed learning metal stamping.  It is fun and noisy too!
The other thing I decided was the package needed to be specific to the bracelet.  I either made a graphic or used themed cardstock for the box. It makes a huge difference when I bring the person the bracelet. Plus it keeps me using all my papercrafting supplies. I really have loved making all these bracelets and I find I am using charms for all kinds of things.  I have added them to cards, made wine charms for glasses, added them to dress up candles.  Simply put, I just love playing with them.  Here are a few pics from this week:

Made 2 like runner bracelets - You go girls run like the wind!

Made 4 like memorial bracelet -RIP Leon G.

Thanks for stopping by and enjoy the weather.  I really think we are done with WINTER!!!
Lysa

Kumihimo! Yes To A New Love!

Hi Crafty Peeps,
KUMIHIMO, How ever did I miss the onset of this crafty goodness?  Just a quick post to say WOWZER, I love to braid!!  I had shown the little one (Rory) a video by the "Frugal Crafter" (here is the link)
https://thefrugalcrafter.wordpress.com/2015/03/19/like-the-ones-you-made-at-camp-only-better/
and I watched as her eyes widen. Perfect I thought for this summer.  Let's get braiding.  Now I am not FRUGAL in any sense of the word so even after watching numerous vids on how to make a braiding disk, I of course went out an bought not 1, not 2, but 3 disks so that all the girly girls in the HOUSE could get their BRAID on.  Here is my first pic of my set up with the disk.  A basic spiral thanks to the frugalcrafter!!

Now mind you I should be in Easter mode as we are here in the end of March but I just happen to have yards of orange and black 2mm satin rat-tail in my crafty stash (You go Lysa, Save Everything!! Atta Girl!!) Super easy and super quick I love me some KUMIHIMO!! This my friends will be the beginning of a new love affair with fibers, beads, and all kinds of crafty goodness. Shout out of THANKS to Lindsay over at her blog  https://thefrugalcrafter.wordpress.com/
because I now know my summer will be spent well poolside and at the beach with an awesome craft that Me, My Daughter and Granddaughter will be enjoying this summer.  Here is a pic of my first finished bracelet. WOW Halloween in March.  Somebody please send me a Bunny!!

 See you next week and thanks for stopping by,
Lysa

Busy In The Craftroom!!

Hi Everyone,
The weather here in Jersey is finally starting to break.  I still have my snowman collection on the mantle and was hoping to get them put away and all my Easter bunnies up this weekend but instead I hunkered down in the craftroom to play.  I completed 120 baby shower favors for one of the work peeps whose having a shower for her daughter. I have been making tons of bracelets too. First the favors: The shower theme is "Ahoy It's A Boy"  I had a lot of fun with this simple favor.  I used CraftArtist2 to print the tags and then cut them out with a Spellbinders label four die.  Each favor has 5 lifesaver candies that went into a plain candy bag from AC Moore.  The base of the topper is a 4X4 piece of cardstock, folded at the 2" mark.  I used a corner punch on the ends and a corner rounder on the top.  The label is popped up with SU stampin dimentionals.  Plain twine from the dollar store and an anchor punch to finish it off.  Simple and cost effective.  My friend from work saw a picture on Pinterest and they were super easy to duplicate.  Here are the pictures of them ready to go.

With the favors done and out of the way I could get back to some bracelet making.  I have been having a blast trying to use recycled products.  The first was the zipper bracelet.  I love, love, love this one.  I pulled the zipper out of an old pair of jeans.  I thought this would be a great summer bracelet and its patriotic too!  Here is a picture:

You can find instructions for these cuties all over the web.  I cut out the zippper and cut the binding as close to the zipper teeth as I could.  I sealed the binding along both sides with a lighter so that the binding will not fray.  I drilled a small hole right through the zipper bottom with my rotary tool.  I just added the clasp and some charms and called it done.
Then I wanted to make a bracelet for a friend who just got promoted to Court Administrator.  I picked up some law themed charms the last time I placed an order so I was ready to go when her promotion came through.  Here is a picture of the bracelet and the awesome box I made to put it in.

How cute is that? Here is the box:

She loved it!!!!
Then I got it in my head after seeing bracelets made out of guitar string online that I wanted to make one.  And don't you know the Hubs is a guitar player. Yup, he is and I have guitar strings all over the house.  So here is a picture of my first attempts:

 I made the Pink Floyd one for Samantha and I will be sporting the patriotic one this July.  I had a lot of fun with the guitar strings and will be making many more of them I am sure.
I have been complaining about my picture taking skills a lot lately so the Hubs went to the dollar store and for a grand total of $5.00 he made me a little portable photo booth.  Wow what a difference.  He bought 2 pieces of foamcore board, a sheet of white poster board, a roll of packing tape and a white plastic table cover.  He made 4 frames from the foamcore (3 sides and a top) He covered each frame with the white plastic and taped 3 side by side leave a little gap so they could fold up. He clipped the white poster board to the back with binder clips and rested the top in place.  I used my Ottlight for the lighting but plan to buy some clip on lights for each side.  It worked great and you can really see the difference in the last picture.  Oh yeah and I used a coupon at Michael's to get my hand.  At least you can see the bracelets now. And just to show one more picture, here is another summer bracelet:

Thanks for stopping by and enjoy whats left of the weekend,
Lysa

Charms, Charms, Charms! I Just Can't Get Enough!

Hi Everyone, (or anyone who is still pit stopping my neglected corner of the Web)
One small humble post over Christmas! How sad is that? Please know I have been crafting away every single spare moment I have.  I just can't seem to get back into posting.  I think it is because I am in a "gear shift" phase. I have become obsessed with charms and charm bracelets. Bad pictures and all, this post will show you just how obsessed I am.  With that said here we go: So the bracelets at Christmas went over so big that peeps were asking me "What's next?" and my first thought was a Valentine's Day bracelet and after careful thought and consideration I decided that the cost for a give-away for that holiday was just over my budget.  I soon realized that my next "big" time of year was summer.  I get into summer big! I love the beach and my pool.  I love 4th of July and all the patriotic themes and the whole red, white and blue. I decided that the first bracelet I was going to make was the "beach" theme bracelet.  I set off to ESTY on my quest to find beach themed charms that would be cost effective so that I could make a slue of bracelets to pass out to my peeps.  This time round I threw in some wine charm wires because I know a lot of people who just don't wear bracelets.  This way I could make a little some'in some'in for everyone. Now here is where I get a tad crazy obsessed . . . So I am on ETSY and I return to a favorite shop called Loretta's Beads.  Here is the link to her ETSY shop:
https://www.etsy.com/shop/LorettasBeads
I just love her shop and have made multiple purchases from her.  She is located in California. Oh boy, did she ever save me at Christmas when I was making the music themed bracelets for the music teachers. Loretta had the best music note charms I could find! So of course with her great customer service and fast shipping I headed back to her shop for some beachy goodness.  Well right from the start I fell in love (that's love with a capital "L") with the open scallop shell #SC1909. 50 qty for $8.50.  OH BABY! that's a deal for sure! As soon as I saw them I knew I wanted them so without hesitation it was "add to cart"!!  They arrived fast.  Here is a picture of a few of them:

Are they not AWESOME!!!

So cute, right?  Yes, Yes they are perfect, but I knew I wanted more.(here is where the obsessed, she has to much time on her hands comes in) See the little silver ball that is the pearl.  Well, I thought lets get a real pearl in there. As it happens I had a broken bracelet of my Mom's in my crafty stash and I thought why not get out the ole Dremmel handpiece and get rid of the metal and add a real pearl.  By now you all realize this is a charm has a value of about 17 cents, but what the hay, I want to play with my craft supplies.  So I grabbed the E6000 glue, cleaned up the pearls from Mom's bracelet and there you have it . . . a real pearl in a .17 cent charm.  Here are some more pics:

Drilled out and ready for a pearl!!

Glued and ready to squeeze closed:

I squeezed carefully as to not snap the shell and it worked out perfectly. Here is a picture of the finished bracelet:

Now as you can see I can't take a picture to save my life, but I think you get the idea and the idea is when you spend your money on awesome craft supplies do your best to take it just one step further because that is what being crafty is all about.  Oh and check this out here is my other new crafty good mojo "Metal Stamping"  Yeah!, now all my bracelet include a tag with the recipients intials! Here is a pic:

Yup, this first beach bracelet is going to my daughter Samantha, simply because not only do I love her she is the best daughter EVER!!
Not all the charms on this bracelet came from Lorettas Beads but I highly recommend that if you are in need of bead she has the shop that can assist with all your needs.
Now I have to think of the perfect box for these bracelets.  Hope to be back soon with more bracelets to show you all.  Thanks for stopping by,
Lysa

Package For Bracelets, DONE!

Hi Everyone,
Just a quick post to show off the way I packaged the bracelets.  I just love how they came out.  All that is left to do is for Rory to add the To - From tags. I decided that a pull up package would be perfect for the bracelets and I think the girly-girls will love it too! The graphic and paper is Stampin' Up and the pull up fold over was easy peasy. Here are the pics:

How Cute are they?? I Just love this awesome SU stamp set!  This fold over was so simple after scoring it I hand colored the stamps and they look awesome. I really think these bracelets will go over big, I have been wearing one for a few weeks now and I have gotten a lot of compliments. I see A.C. Moore and Joann's are now selling completed bracelets for $14.99.  I think Rory and I did a great job and brought them in for less.  I bought the charms at retail, mostly from Oriental Trading and Joann's and when I did the math the charms worked out to be just under $1.00 a charm. If you add the in the retail value of the bracelet, which is about $3.50 and the fact that there are 9 charms, the cost is $12.50. So in my book we made an awesome gift from the heart that was affordable and nicer looking than the $14.99 bracelet (because of the amount of charms) that was being sold at the craft store.  Our theme was snow and the theme carried through from the bracelet to the package.  I am so happy with the way this all turned out that I have made them for my work peeps as well.  I also now have a new addiction for charms.  I have already been buying Halloween themed charms for next year!  Hope you all are having a festive weekend.  Thanks for visiting,
Lysa

Christmas 2014 - We Making Bracelets! How Charming!!

Hi Everyone,
Now that Thanksgiving is behind us and Christmas is in full swing at our house it is time to get our craft on.  I have been working like a mad woman trying desperately to stay one step ahead of things.  Truth be told I am racing just to stay in step let alone a step ahead.  The house is now decked from top to bottom, outside lights are glowing and the "big giant wreath" is hanging. The wreath is a story in itself as it takes a team of three people to get it in place and wired to the house via bedroom windows in two different rooms!  The Christmas/winter dishes are cleaned and in place so that we can enjoy all the caloric holiday frenzy on festive snowman themed plates. They surely make everything taste even better.  In order to clear the decks for the decorations my craftroom is a sight to be seen.  There is a line of boxes dividing the room in two.  Stuff is just piled everywhere and you have to move boxes just to get into a drawer or cabinet.  It really is awful and not a creative space at the moment. This bit of mess can't stop me from having a some crafty fun with the Granddaughter.  Rory and I had decided about a month ago that we wanted to make some charm bracelets for her friends as this years gifts.  Rory and her Mom love their Alex and Ani bracelets so we decided  that was the style we wanted to make. At first I looked into bending the wire bracelets myself.  I was able to find the wire and the mandrel that was needed but the start up cost was a to much for me for a craft that I might only make once.  I have to keep reminding myself  "I am a papercrafter, I am a papercrafter" This is why I am out of space in the craftroom.  So with a bit of searching I found some bracelet blanks online.  Actually I found a lot of sources for the blanks.  Some high end in precious metals and some in coated brass, stainless steel, etc. that were reasonable in the pocketbook department.  I chose to order from a lovely Etsy shop.  The name of the shop is The Jeweled Box and you can fine it here at this link:
https://www.etsy.com/shop/TheJeweledBox
Anne is the owners name and she is located in Georgia.  My order arrived quickly and everything was as pictured.  I even placed a second order because once I made the first bracelet I knew I needed to make a lot of them!!
I bought most of the charms from Oriental Trading but there are charms all over the place online and in stores.  I saw many at AC Moore and Joann's.  Rory and I sat online at Oriental's website and she chose the charms for her friends.  Then I hit Joann's and chose some too.  Here are some pic of the bracelets that we made.  The pictures are not the best but you can get the idea of how great they came out. I also had to add pics of Rory at work.  I just love my little crafty good bud!

Not the best work surface I know, but like I said the craftroom is one hot mess!

Look how many we made in just part of an afternoon

Each bracelet has 9 charms. Can you see the angel and the made with love heart? So cute! Now I can't wait to make the perfect packaging  for these cuties to go in.  I was amazed how easy it was for Rory to work with the jump rings and the pliers.  It did not take her long to get the hang of it.  This project would be an awesome fund raiser for a Girl Scout group or other community group. These charms are all cheap alloy metals and can be purchased in bulk.  I saw everything from book themes to medical themes.  I think I need to make a cancer ribbon one for the girls in the Oncology office where my daughter works.  I don't know you guys . . . it just might be time to buy the wire and the bracelet mandrel so I can start bending the wire bracelets myself, oh but remember "I am a papercrafter, I am a papercrafter"!! Thanks for visiting and enjoy getting your Christmas craft 2014 on!!
Lysa