Whoops Blog Hop

Ordering beads on the internet can be tricky.  At least for me it is.  I have difficulty visualizing mm sizes when I order beads and I've ordered beads that when I got them they were so tiny I was floored (no misrepresentation was involved in the seller - it was me and my inability to visual the size). I've also ordered beads that were much larger than I anticipated.  Well recently Cynthia Machata of Antiquity Travelers had one of those moments.  Cynthia ordered some grey pearls for a project and when she received them, they were ahem lets just say a lot larger than she anticipated.

Cynthia used the pearls in her project and because of the size, was left with an over abundance of these beautiful pearls.  Cynthia decided to have a blog hop and send out six of these pearls to six people willing to play around with these beauties for a blog hop, count me in.  Now I have no business signing up for any blog hop at this time of the year and I've been scrambling as I'm sure everyone else has been with their busy schedules.  I came up with an idea awhile back for these gorgeous pearls but as I'm prone to do, I waited until almost the last minute to execute.  I actually thought the hop was last weekend - the same weekend as my jewelry open house.  Scrambling around, I put together the focal for my piece.  

Awhile back I was rooting around in my stash and I found some sterling silver wire that I forgot I had.  I also discovered some sterling silver squiggles that I bought some years back that I also forgot about.  I made a structure for my piece with the heavy gauge sterling wire, wire wrapped the pearls and added them to the structure.  My first attempt wasn't working out as I had planned - the pearls and squiggles were too close together and didn't stay put on my structure.   Also stashed away in my stash of beads, tools and long forgotten gems was a coiling gizmo.  I used some of the thin gauge wire that I discovered in my stash and made some short coils to use as spacers between the pearls and squiggles.

I am pretty pleased with the finished focal however I'm still unsure as to how I want to finish off the necklace.  Having an extra week for the reveal allowed me to order some soft grey seam binding that I thought I would use but I'm not sure that's what I want to do.  I'm also toying with using some black leather for the back portion but of course I don't have black leather to use so my project in incomplete. 

Big thanks to Cynthia for allowing me to participate and please check out these other participants to see what they came up with for the hop. 


Cynthia   http://antiquitytravelers.blogspot.com/ (our hostess)

Linda    http://lindysdesigns.blogspot.com/ (you are here)

Bobbie     http://www.beadsongjewelry.com/

Christine   http://onekisscreations.blogspot.com/

Hope    http://www.craftyhope.com/

Therese  http://theresestreasures59.blogspot.com/

Val  http://missvalscreations.blogspot.com/