using nail polish on beads & 2 fun bracelets

hey ----- wait a minute, this was supposed to be auto-posted 26 days ago.... it was set up and it did not post?grrrrrrr, this has happened a few times and at first  I thought it was just me.


 I have been successful with using nail polish on beads.... it's really sticking on there! Hopefully I'll find the correct photos of the process of this before I publish this post. If you wash and dry most plastic beads, then using a good nail polish - Sally Hansen or wet n wild - the polish should last on the beads.

left plain black plastic bead - right after sponging on silver chrome nail polish

On the left, I used small black plastic beads along with silver embellished plastic beads. I painted the black beads silver, using the brush from the nail polish after I wired them. The polish dried very fast.

On the right, I used a craft sponge brush from Micheal's to apply the silver polish, I wanted some of the original black bead to show through. I also added 4 large clear faceted beads to this bracelet.

I haven't seen fancy plastic beads like this available in stores for a few years...... I would love to find more drum shaped and other squat round shaped plastic beads in the future. It seems like Micheal's is really into glass beads at the moment. I like plastic stuff! They are just as pretty to me.

o

New seed bead sample sets and some wire from and auto supply store

 I found these bead sets at my favirote dollar store in town, Loonie Twoons dollar store. they were $1.29 each, which is a good price for a sampling of beads. I have already whipped up a few pairs of earrings that I will photograpgh and blog tomorrow.

I have already transferred these beads into tiny zip lock bags.

browns / pinks / teals

white/black / purple / greens

 ...... and a few other things I picked up at Princess auto supply store - the small containers are very small

o

new walmart goodies and some stuff i made

here are a few pairs of earrings and a bracelet I have made recently, as well as some walmart bargains. I used copper earring bases from Micheal's, with seed beads and other plastic beads. and two pairs of copper chains and seed beads. These were all super easy to make; however I find coming up with a design I like to be the hardest part.

Whenever I try to copy a piece of jewelery I have seen in a store or online I don't have any problem - but when I have to whip something up with beads and findings I have on hand I often take a long time to find a satisfactory finished product.

 black, brown & copper bracelet, copper earrings and copper chain earrings.

 pretty silver bugle beads, smaller toggle clasps, earring set ( times2) not shown, copper head pins

the new toggle clasps i bought on the left and the regular sized ones I usually use

even at full price, this is a good deal; except Walmart has changed their packaging and jacked up all their prices - i hate it when companies do that - but it is cool to find the discounted bargains........

 i snagged 3 of these for $1.85 each..... i never noticed this smaller size before

the larger size and the smaller size

O

pretty teal bead bracelets & a few other bracelets

 Two teal coloured bracelets I have made in the last month or so. using some of the beads from a starter set of glass and seed beads from Micheal's..... a few plastic beads and some pretty teal plastic pearls ( also from Micheal's). The teal froggy beads ( on the left ) are taken from a necklace i bought 6 years ago and removed- but hung onto......

The bracelet on the right has a few real crystals, I also used the large jump rings with seed beads to 'beef' these up, i still think they are a little sparse but i have to try to not overdo stuff.

a few more button bracelets that I have made.... I am still into these and try to wear a button bracelet at least once a week..... they are just buttons.... so simple....

These are on large black jump rings on black chain

i found these bags of buttons at my favirote dollar store in town, Loony Twoons dollar store for $1.29 each.

 And a few other bracelets. Starting from the left, clear round faceted plastic beads that I made a cage with thin black wire - I would still like to add something to this one - no sure what.

The teal acid wash looking beads were found at a thrift store in my town for like, 25 cents.  I used black wire & small black jump rings to string them together

Third is a simple style. Large black wire jump rings with 3 to 5 copper beads.... so simple

And finally, black and copper seed beads on jump rings, some pretty copper design drum-shaped beads on a black chain.

 .... another angle

 that's it for today..... just a few more posts and I will get caught up

o

a few new things & blue glass bead jewelery

 small glass beads from the dollar store

boooooo-  one of the dollar stores in my town went out of business, so everything was 1/2 price. I grabbed these few things below. I appreciate the beauty of glass beads but I am a fan of uniformity, so I very rarely use these in jewelery making or even purchase jewelery with glass beads = unless it is just 1 special glass bead.

anyhoo- here are few bargains I had picked up last month. On top is stuff from the dollar store.....and below is a small bag of plastic pearl beads as well as a large chain that I will utilize for other re-fashion projects.

 I have successfully painted these types of plastic pearls with nail polish - notably the discontinued sally Hansen chrome polish, and using a normal kitchen sponge to add some colour as well = they end up looking somewhat antique - but i like that. eventually i would like to use the nail polish water marbling technique on these in the future ( which is messy but soooooo pretty )....

on the right is a bracelet that I made with odd shaped glass beads from a beginners set of beads from Micheal's craft stores ( the pail of beads ) on the left is a bracelet I made with the smaller blue glass beads. I fished out the lighter coloured BI-CONE beads from the dollar store package and made the earrings, which i used jump rings to attach to a chain.

I know i don't have to jam pack these charm/bead bracelets with stuff, but they seem sparse on my wrists...... so I might make some small colour coordinated jump rings to add to the below bracelets

 For the above and below bracelets I used some large blue plastic beads that I found at the thrift store (a year ago!!!!!) real crystal, smaller faceted pale blue plastic beads and long cylindrical plastic beads from the .99 cent store.... those I also purchased quite a while ago. I used jump rings to attach them to a piece of chain and toggle clasps ( or course ) for the closures.

i thought that adding real crystals would really showcase the fake plastic blue beads = but = it actually isn't that bad. I especially love the silver wire cage i made for the beads on the left....

..... that's it for now, hopefully i will get the rest of my photos on here b weeks end to make up for the MONTH AND A HALF that i did not post stuff.

 above; a pretty pink beaded bracelet. there are glass oval beads, plastic pink beads, some of which i darkened with nail polish, clear faceted plastic beads and a pretty pink fake crystal bead....... I am really into these simple beaded bracelets with toggle clasps. I haven't broken any nails putting these on yet.

I don't have may bracelets that are this vibrant of  pink, so making this was a big deal. I thought I would hate having the wire loop sticking out verses the head pins, but it is kinda handmade looking, so I don't mind it so much

I used a piece of kitchen sponge, and a few drops of polish on a piece of tin foil to add a darker colour and texture to these plastic beads..... 

 the pink glass/plastic/nail polished beaded bracelet & 2 other red bracelets I finally made

 I finally used these red beads i purchased last summer for .50 cents at Micheal's that I found in the bargain bin. I didn't make something that I would buy in a store because red is not my colour and i was not inspired to create something so I just whipped these 2 bracelets up. They did turn out pretty and now I finally have some red bracelets.

here is the package they came in below-  even though I used quite a bit of seed beads for the bracelet of the right i have barely made a dent in the little package of seed beads that these larger embellished beads came with.....

 i love the look of seed beads on jump rings - just larger simple wire rings that i made by wrapping wire around a wooden spoon, snipped into rings & added seed beads.... and then linked together.....  Here are two cuff bracelets; the one on the left is from a re-worked necklace that was too long, and the the one on the right is rings with seed beads, I added smaller jump rings randomly throughout the bracelet to link the chains together. When I add the clasps I will post a better model photo. This is very simple and very easy, although it felt like it took me forever to make.

I will have to time myself the next time I whip one up ( in teals/blues )

the seed beads are from the dollarrama, i had the translucent pink beads that are on the connecting wire from my stash. hopefully that photo is enough of an explanation of how I made that bracelet because honestly I suck at describing how I create these types of things..... I will try to take step by step photos when I make the teal seed bead cuff with the beads from above.....

Thats it for now. I miss my old way of photographing jewelery it was much easier and i need to figure something out......

Micheal's plastic beads, earrings and bracelets

so much for up-dating every few weeks -lol! I have been busy with all sorts of crafts and making jewelery etc. in my spare time. I have quite a few things to share but will be breaking it down into individual posts.

here are a few things I have made in the last little while. I found these pretty plastic beads at Micheal's for $2.99, there was 2 packages and they were sitting there forever. I wanted to buy them both, but just grabbed the 1 package = big mistake ext time i am buying EVERYTHING!!!!! I always regret it when i don't snap u these bargains.

I loved working with these coloured plastic beads..... they are very pretty and easy to work with.

Not sure what fashion caps refers to, but i love these watery colours.... the pearls do not seem to go well with their matched colours, though.



i totally regret not buying more of these. it seems that these types of clear plastic beads are hard to find.





for $2.99 ( reg. $5.49 ) this was an awesome deal and i have already used these in quite a few pieces of jewelery.









I used silver ovals from a 'too long for me' de-constructed necklace and the clear beads and pearls from the package. I painted the purple beads with Sally Hansen Chrome polish on moonstone chrome.... that polish sticks to beads like no-ones business. I don't really like the loops showing but I ran out of silver head pins..... I might get all anal retentive and change out the silver with I used for proper head pins.

I like this aqua colour with silver - it is very summer-ey to me

these definitely need to be re-worked, with proper head pins for the dangle gem in the middle. I also painted the large clear bead at the bottom middle with nail polish......

and some dull/matte silver chain and head pins with the purple beads.....

 not sure why this photo is so fuzzy.......


I painted some plain white plastic pearls with sally Hansen chrome nail polish..... that polish is really sticking to the plastic beads - which I washed and dried first. I affixed these beads to wire and then added them to a 1 3/4" chain and ear wires. To the clear faceted plastic beads I added a seed bead to keep them on the wire.

and a few bracelets I made. I haven't added the toggle clasp to these yet. I used beads I had in my stash, and the purple beads from the package of $2.99 beads from Micheal's.

.....and another angle

the big square beads that came in the package are odd.... I don't really know what to do with them. For the center bracelet I just made loop wires and attached them to make a bracelet. The other two bracelets are a mix of the Micheal's beads, some seed beads, silver beads from the .99 cent store and some black round beads from a necklace I didn't wear anymore and re-fashioned. The bracelet on the far left has some real crystal beads as well....

and here is a project I hope to finish before summer is over. seed beads with that Black Nylon stuff I found at my favirote dollar store in town. My goal is to make every colour of the rainbow in seed beads..... these dont take long but as you can see in the last photo.... are a little hard to maneuver all the rings to get it aligned perfectly. I used masking tape to co-ordinate all the rings to lay flat.

thankfully i found that bargain package of crimp beads a few months ago and i plan on painting them over with wet n wild black creme nail polish anyway..... so that they blend into the black nylon string =oh and these definitely need a smaller silver jump ring to attach the ear-wire to the actual earring.

lol on the left - i will probably have to re-make quite a few of these if i plan to create this design in all the colours of seed beads I have..... using masking tape to flatten and align these earrings helps alot.... when I start on this project i will add better ( non-fuzzy lol ) photos with tutorials. This is an awesome idea for someone who makes jewelery to sell as it would be cheap and easy.

o