Adventures in Jewelry Making

I never used to like jewelry. Now, within the last few years, I feel naked if I'm not wearing earrings and a necklace. Most of my 'nice' jewelry is starting to fall apart, is very heavy, or is the wrong color scheme for our wedding. What was I going to wear??

I scoured Etsy for ideas, and most of the necklaces I liked (omg fire opals) were either out of my price range, didn't come with matching earrings, or wouldn't go with the neckline of the dress I want. So, being the crafty person I am, I decided to make my own... with very little experience. I'd made earrings at Cody's "aunt"'s house before, and remembered a little bit about wire wrapping. I conveniently forgot how painful it was.

After some more research on jewelry making basics, I was ready to try it out! I went to a local beading supply store armed with a general idea of how many beads I'd need of each color, and how I was going to do things. This store is smart... in the evil way. They sell single beads, and I was immediately attracted to the Swarovski crystals. "They're only 10 to 25 cents apiece. That's not so bad!" ~90 beads later, it adds up! My design also called for a head pin for each of the beads, and those were a bit more expensive. Then I needed a chain to hang it all on. Originally, I thought I'd be able to go with the least expensive chain they had. Then I saw it, and it was so fine I wouldn't be able to loop the head pins into it. Oops, guess I'd have to go with a more expensive chain.

Taking into account the supplies for the jewelry itself AND the tools required to make it (pliers, wire cutters, crimper, other miscellaneous findings), I ended up spending more on my custom set of necklace and earrings than some of the pieces on Etsy I was drooling over not a few weeks earlier. Plus, I also ended up spending about 8 hours assembling them... which involved a lot of unhappy fingers playing with wire. Note to self: pliers are your friend.

Lesson Learned: DIYing jewelry is actually not as cost and time effective as I thought.
That said, I absolutely adore how they turned out.

The picture doesn't really do them justice. They're SUPER SPARKLY in actual sunlight (rather than the awful overcast light today), and the beads go most of the way up the collar in clear crystal.

Now that I have the tools, I've got half a mind to make a bunch more as Christmas gifts (but with fewer beads methinks)...