Zodiac Keychains

I've been meaning to make a gift out of these pieces that I saw at Michaels, but I've never come up with a good idea until today.  I decided that I was going to buy some Swarovski crystals in the colour of the girls' birth months, add some silver spacers, and make some fancy keychains out of them.  I know everyone has millions of keychains, more than they know what to do with, but these are home-made and I hope that they can make some use of them. 

Here's a picture:

A present for my cousin.

I made this necklace and earring set for my cousin for her birthday.  She seemed pretty pleased with it.  I thought it came out beautifully, even if the bad lighting and bluriness in these pictures don't do it justice.  I really need to find a better way to do this!

They were done with clear, black, and smokey gray glass beads, and gunmetal-coloured findings.

So I went hog-wild...

...and made quite a few pieces this evening.  Granted, they didn't take long to do, but it is a lot all at once.

The black and pink ones I made for my mother, copying ones I've made before.  Then I figured I had beads the same shape as the green ones in clear and purply-burgundy, so I made those too.

The blue chandeliers I made for the same lady that asked for the green chandeliers, and I was feeling bad about neglecting all the left-over blue goldstone and blue lace agate chips from the necklace I made with them, so I made some matching earings.

The bracelet and matching earrings I made with some connectors I bought at Michael's, and some glass beads that are half clear, half shiny-coated.  I have a few beads like that in different colours and I like the way they sparkle.

Earrings for Sale

I finally got around to making a pair of purple chandeliers a couple weekends ago for someone in our Marketing department at work who asked me for them a month and a half ago (they take a while to make, and I didn't have enough time until then).  I didn't take a picture of them, but I used the same Swarovski crystal beads that I used for my cousin's earrings that you can see a few posts back.  The only difference is the base I used to hang the beads from.  If you look even further back at the purple and pearl chandeliers I made, you'll see the same base I used for these earrings.

Anyhow, another lady in the same department noticed her earrings, loved them, and asked me to make her some in green. 

I didn't use Swarovski beads, but the effect was the same. 

A lady in my department asked me to make her a couple of pairs of earrings, one to match a necklace, and another to replace another pair, one of which she  lost.

The necklace was a beautiful gold and black glass heart on silk and cord ribbon, so I bought some dyed freshwater pearls to put together with the black glass beads I had left over from my pink necklace, copying the earrings then too.

The earring on the left was the original, but I could not find any beads to match that exact colour, so I used a redder blue (That makes sense, trust me.  My dad works with printing inks and I hear him say this stuff all the time).  I also used etched bugle beads instead of the plain ones to jazz them up a little.  I even bit the bullet and bought some seed beads, which I am terrified to work with because they're so small.  They came out a little longer than the original too.  I liked these so much, I made myself a pair, but without the little jump ring in the middle.  I just won't wear them to work!

My First Commission: Update

As I said in my last post I will give my cousin the necklace and earrings in Jewellery Class #6, but she did buy some purple Swarovski beads for me to use, so I made her some chandelier earrings that she can use if she wants to:

I had a few beads left over, so I mixed them with some little purple glass pearls, and made a bracelet she could use or give away if she wanted:

She also brought me a three-ringed pendant that she might have wanted on the necklace, but I didn't use it for that, so I put it on a bail so the rings wouldn't move around and strung it on some cord:

Hope she likes everything!

My First Commission!

I have finally received my first request to make a necklace for someone!  My cousin wants me to make something to match a shirt she bought, and she's already bought some beads she likes for it.  I haven't seen them yet, nor found out what she'd like it to look like, but I'm glad that someone's starting to trust me enough for this!  I hope I don't let her down!

I'll definitely take a picture and post it once it's done.