Ah, summer. The sun on your face, the pool in full swing - it seems only natural that our minds should turn to.. Christmas? Yup! Our first entry on the be creative! blog is dedicated to the ladies of the Episcopal Church of the Good Shepherd who will be churning out hundreds of creative, useful items for the 2012 Christmas Bazaar this coming November.
Let's look at some jewelry items to be offered next fall. Each is simple to make with components easily found at your local crafting store or eBay.
The first item is the feminine snowgirl. She is made with two pink rhinestone-encrusted beads, approximately 6mm and 8mm in width, divided by a pink rhinestone-encrusted spacer bead for a "scarf". These items were purchased at our local Hobby Lobby, and can also be found at Michael's stores around the country. If you do not have a hobby shop convenient to your home, I have also located all of the beads and charms used in this blog on eBay.
The second item is actually a set of items - earrings and a pendant - featuring snowflake charms. It's important to note that these charms, sold under the name "Tibetan Silver", have little to no silver content. They are an alloy of metals, similar to pewter. How did I find out? I had this great idea of making cute little cards to accompany each snowflake, identifying it as being made of authentic Tibetan silver. Going to the internet was a real eye-opener. One site had a number of items claiming to be Tibetan silver analyzed for actual silver content. It was disappointing to see that the highest content among the items was less than 2%. Sooo - guess what isn't going to be advertised at our bazaar as silver? You guessed it :).
The third item is a pair of beaded snowman earrings. Easy to make by stacking the beads upon a special finding shaped like a seamstress' over-sized straight pin. More on the construction later.
The fourth item, and last for this evening, is a close-up pic of a pair of snowflake earrings. Notice that all you'll need is a pair of wires, one small jump ring for each earring, and a charm. Very inexpensive and simply designed.
Well, that's it for this evening. More tomorrow - but as for tonight, I have a corned beef brisket calling my name from the kitchen.
'night!
Naj
