It is around 10 months since I started making my beaded bag - for the express purpose of using on my wedding day. I finished it two weeks ago.
I didn't spend the whole 10 months working on it... I've guesstimated that it has taken me around 300 hours. So, 300 hours, about £200 of beads and I'm left with something I'm immensely proud of. I can't wait to walk down the aisle to marry my wonderful man, and I can't wait to show off my sparkly bag, either!
This has been the largest project I've attempted, it's been challenging, and I now know I wouldn't attempt a project like this in the same way again... I won't go through the ins and outs of what I'd do differently, but there are a few things that would have made it easier.
I think the most surprising part of this project was how much thread it consumed... 5 whole reels of KO!
The really special piece on this bag is a cab made by my good friend, and wonderful artist/designer Donna Sanders with our names, and the date of our wedding on.
The bag is predominantly stitched in boucle stitch, which gives the depth to the bag. It also adds to the weight! This little beauty weighs well over half a pound.
The strap for the bag is made with bead crochet - which gives it real flexibility and strength, it can also be tucked into the bag to use it just as a clutch bag.
I'm looking forward to sharing pictures of the big day with you all, so you can see all the little beaded accessories I have made.
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This post is all about saying a big THANK YOU to all of you who have been reading my blog! I had promised myself that I would give something away to one of my readers when I reached 10,000 views... but between 10,000 views and now, I've reached over 11,000! So, a big thank you to all of you!
I made this bead crochet rope necklace, based on a pattern by Bert & Dana Freed, it's made using beautiful Czech seed beads in turquoise and crochet, and fastens with a ball and socket clasp.
All you need to do to win this necklace is to leave a comment below, saying you would like to be in with a chance, and make sure I have some way of contacting you if you win. At the end of May, I will use random.org to select a winner!
As I'm sure you know, I have a rather large stash of beads... so I joined a group on facebook dedicated to tacking your bead stash.. Little did I know that it would in fact end up at least doubling the size of my bead stash! This month, our monthly facebook group challenge was to make a kit entirely from stash, and make something with it.
Those of you who know me really well know that I have a serious affection for tiny, tiny beads, in fact, I own more 15s (super small beads) than 11s (the size beaders use most frequently). So I decided to tackle some of my 15s. I started off with 5 10g tubes of beads, which ended up as 8 10g tubes of 15s, along with a generous sprinkling of 2.5mm swarovski bicones.
I've been enjoying bead crochet a lot recently, and in fact, I will be demonstrating this technique at my local hobbycraft store tomorrow... so I thought I'd make a rather nice rope.
As the beads were so small, I decided to use my Grandma's old 0.75mm crochet hook, and C-Lon D thread, and started off with a six-bead circumference.
So, I beaded away for 12 days (while I wasn't working), an finally ended up with a rope which was 46.5 inches long... for those who prefer metric, that's 118cm. It's officially the longest beaded rope I've ever made. I would have got completely bored threading all the beads onto the thread before crocheting them if it hadn't have been for a friend of mine who swapped her bead-spinner for some of my ultrasude.
So here it is... my finished rope!
