Easy Peasy Bracelet

I made a bunch of these very easy little bracelets at Christmastime as gifts for my clients this year. Each takes about 10 - 15 minutes to make and uses about $1.50 worth of beads. They were hugely popular and generated sales for extras and necklace versions. I expect there will be more orders in the coming year sparked by these inexpensive give-aways.

They can be worn singly or in combinations: multipule strands might work too. You will need about 45 size 8/o Delicas and 44 size 11/o seed beads. This will stretch about 6.5 inches. Add an inch for the crimps and clasp and you have a 7.5 inch bracelet. Make it 8.5 - 9 inches and
you have an anklet; 18 - 20 inches, a necklace. The necklace can be threaded through a medium sized bail for a pendant. Wow! A triple threat.


Let's use this simple pattern as an introduction to stringing on wire and attaching clasps.


Stringing materials include thread, ribbon, rubber, leather, string, wire and more. This time we will use Softflex fine wire which comes in 30 and 100 foot spools. There is a worthwhile saving if you purchase the 100' spools but that's a lot of wire... more than 100 bracelets, if
you're careful. If you never use it up, there goes your savings. A 30' spool should be good for up to 35 bracelets or about 15 necklaces.

To attach the wire to the clasp we will use Tornado (twisted) crimps. Wire attachments come as crimp beads, crimp tubes, screw tightened crimps, twisted crimps plus bead tips and more. Crimp beads or bead tips would be less expensive and I will demonstrate them in future discussions. (We're using Tornados since that is what I used in these bracelets.)


I used a plain silver plated lobster clasp and tab. I won't attempt to list all the different kinds of clasps but we'll get to them all... eventually. Lobster clasps are popular: they work equally well for necklaces or for blacelets. They are secure and, if you select the right kind, you can avoid jump rings. Yea!


Using Beading Wire


For stringing, I use beading wire way more often then thread, even
though it's more expensive. The fine weight wire "hangs" as nicely as
thread. In fact, for light beads, it adds more weight that in my
opinion makes them hang more nicely than thread does. It is stronger
than thread so I don't worry about a bracelet or necklace thread
letting go and the beads getting scattered all over the floor. I prefer
SoftFlex fine but most multi-strand, nylon coated brands are good
products. Tiger Tail does have more of a propensity to "kink" if bent
during assembly.


You can even knot fine beading wire although I don't. I don't trust the
knots to stay, um, knotted.


To begin, pull about 18 inches of wire out of the spool and replace the
"C" shaped keeper. This will lock the wire and prevent more wire from
unwinding. Leave the wire attached to the spool. This will prevent the
beads from falling off the end and it saves wire.


Beginning with an 8/o Delica and finishing with an 8/o Delica, string
alternating 8/o's and 11/o's to the desired length, (6.5 inches for a
7.5 inch bracelet). Make sure you can fit two thicknesses of wire
through the last 11/o.


There are two main reasons for the seed beads between the Delicas. One,
they look nice. Two, they allow the bracelet to bend. If you string
tube beads end to end (snugly enough so that there are no gaps), the
bracelet won't bend. This is true also for all beads that have flat
ends where the stringing material enters and exits. Try it and see. In
a way each seed bead, along with its neighbours, forms a ball joint.
String a Tornado crimp and the "tag" half of the clasp. After the tag,
thread the wire back through the crimp. Leaving an inch or a bit less
of wire exiting the crimp, pull the wire snug so that there is only a
small loop of wire going through the tag.


You should be holding both wires in your non-dominant hand now. - Make
sure the wires do not cross. - Flatten the crimp with your pliers.

NOTE: I have difficulty squeezing the crimps hard enough, especially the genuine band "Tornado" crimps which are heavier weight than the "no names", so I use the ends of my crimping pliers. This is a very small area thereby allowing me to exert much more pressure per square inch.

Now, push three beads along the wire towards the tag and thread the end
of the wire back through them and snip off the end. This is what the
"tag" end should look like.

You are now ready to attach the "lobster".
Slide all of the beads together against the tag you just attached and hold the wire up so the bracelet dangles. Give it a shake or two. This allows the beads to settle against each other. Snip the wire off the spool leaving 1.5 - 2 inches to work with. String a crimp, the lobster
and back through the crimp and the three beads closest to the end.


Pull the wire to snug up the beads so there is no gap and hold onto the end with your non-dominent hand. Flatten the crimp as you did before. For the lobster part of the clasp. You will need a slightly larger loop of wire else the clasp will not align straight with the bracelet: it will tilt off at an angle which although functional dosn't look very professional. To finish snip off the end of the wire.

Ginger