Confessions of a Crystal Hoarder Blog

First things first…it’s late July/early August. I live in the south. Which means it’s hot. Which also means that I am cranky. 

As a team building exercise at my other work we built wire sculptures of our hands. We were “encouraged” not to pose them in rude gestures…so I must not be the only cranky one.

But it did get me thinking about how much I use my hands, but how little I adorn them. See, I’m a fiddler. No, not a musician, but someone who fiddles with stuff. In my case, hangnails are like mortal enemies. So I try to avoid attracting any attention to my hands.

Why does this even matter? I (as I’m sure you’ve noticed) make a load of necklaces. But I don’t often make rings. So I figured that with my current cranky mood, if I’m going to be tempted to show someone the finger…it should be wearing something.

I got destructive with the gold links from our July boxes. Perhaps that’s too strong a word…I got creative with the gold links from our July boxes. I liked the little loops on the back, and wanted to use them to build some funky chain. I started hoarding Hoard Chain before the Bead Hoard Curiosities Club began, and yet I still feel compelled to have more. The odder, the better. I clipped the links apart, and re-linked them to form a bracelet. I used a magnetic slide clasp, because it was the right color and width for the new chain. Unfortunately it also sticks to the new chain!

Then I got wild with the packet of vintage corrugated beads. Dapping the roundel to make a pillow wasn’t my original idea, but the ring would have been crazy high. The brass ball is a dangler from the Hoard, so once the corrugated bead had been smushed I used the loop as a shank for securing wire for the band.

As with collecting, once you’ve started, it’s hard to stop. My corrugated beads were such great colors; they reminded me of aluminum holiday decorations. And they were bold enough to hold their own when paired with some hot pink wrapping wire. That rather Seuss-like coil of pink wire is the middle of my length to give the wrapping more holding power.

I very gently dapped the center of the purple bead just enough to nest the blue one in it. The black one however, got a wallop from my mallet that sent my dog shuffling off to another room!

Yup, I had to take the dapping one step farther. Could I form a deep cup without distorting the corrugations too much?

Well, sort of. The metal itself held up well, the plating, not so much. I went back over the bead with silver nailpolish, and once that had dried, hit the highlights with a copper paint pen. The pink center was a half-drilled glass ball from a box last summer.

That’s me modeling…when I tried to use my dinky little hand model the ring looked absurd! I don’t understand why those things are so tiny.

Just short of one year ago I went on a bracelet rampage with findings from our boxes. One of my Bakelite pieces was a nifty link, and it reminded me of all those hinge forms I’d made. I inherited a length of steel pattern wire, and oh my word is it stiff! Again my hammer blows send my dog from the room. I blame the metal mandrel for most of the racket. But it sure keeps its shape well.

I’m going to leave you with a photo of this link as it was originally intended. An Yves Saint Laurent Bakelite belt. Yeah, I thought it was impressi