Pinterest Craft Creation #2- The More Realistic Beaded Bracelet

I am on a roll! Woke up this morning, and thought, "Hey. I'm gonna make a bracelet". So I did. Oh yeah.

Warning- I did this sitting on my bed, so you will see my sheets and comforter in the pictures. Donations are being accepted for the creation of a crafting room.

Here is my inspiration: http://www.trinketsinbloom.com/wearable-diy/beaded-wrap-bracelet-diy/

As you can see, this person started with like a million beads, resulting in a super long, beautiful bracelet. "Use old necklaces" it says. Well, unlike Suzy Crafty here, I don't currently have a billion beads sitting around, from 12 different necklaces, waiting to be combined into one, somehow perfectly matching bracelet.

I am more like a beginner crafter, buying the most meager supplies from the store, 1. because I don't want to have too much (I know that it I don't use it right away, the chance of my using it will go down), and 2. this stuff is pretty expensive! Here is what I started with:

I let my man pick the bag of beads, I trust his taste. We shopped at the main British hobby store, Hobby Craft, so each thing was a bit pricey. £5 for the bead bag ($7.50), £1 for the plain black beads ($1.50), and £2 for the wire ($3). Oh well, live and learn. Next time I will be scouring junk shops for other people's leftover beads. As for the wire, I choose that one because it matched, and it was cheapest. Also, I didn't want to get anything too thick, so that it wouldn't fit through the holes. Ergo, .6mm diameter. 

So to start with, I wanted to cut a piece of wire. Instantly, here is what happened:

 Does that remind you of anything from your childhood? Maybe what happened that time(s) you tried to wear a Slinky as a bracelet? Ohhh, memories.

5 minutes later, I had completely unrolled, then rerolled it all. Good thing it wasn't the thickness of a Slinky, I remember having to throw several away after attempting the same thing.

 As per the other website's instructions, I twisted the end of one of the wires. So far so good.  The master crafter said she didn't follow a pattern for her beads. Nope. Doesn't work for me. Created a pattern, no two beads of the same color or style in a row (except for one situation where the beads were stuck together). I then began threading the wire through the beads.

Not too long later, I was done! Twisted the other end of the wire, and Ta-Dah! My beautiful new bracelet :-)

Ok so yeah, it is shorter than hers. A lot. Too bad.

Automatically noticed a problem. A pretty major one. I used a skinny wire, remember?

 Yes, the beads were too heavy, and the wire was not strong enough to hold it's shape. Oh dear. I checked Suzy crafter's blog. She used 20 gauge wire. Whoa! Big difference! I realized, though, that the two loops I created both reach the back of my wrist-not close enough to be folded together, but maybe....

And it is fixed! Ok, this isn't the prettiest way to fix the problem, but it is easy, and works.. as long as I don't show people the bottom of my wrist, they won't know there is a problem!

So, that's it. Bracelet cost about £8 to make ($12), which is more expensive than it would have cost me to buy one, and it only looks good from one side of my wrist. Looks like I am not going to be making any money from my creations anytime soon.

See now why I named this post "The More Realistic Beaded Bracelet"?