How to: Simple Beaded Earrings

Here's a tutorial on how to make some gorgeous but deceptively simple earrings! The key is having all the materials and tools you need to create them. The other important factor is having some beautiful beads to work with! This will hide any imperfections in the finished result. You don't need to be an expert to create these, and they make really good gifts!
All the supplies can be found at The Warehouse, Spotlight or your local craft store. There are also numerous specialist bead shops around, however I have not found them to be the most cost effective way of getting beads. 


What you will need is:

Assorted beads (I used some glass beads from the bargain bins at Spotlight, and beads from an old necklace)
Jewellery findings, i.e. earring hooks or posts, jump rings, metal or tiger tail (more on that later) and crimpers
Assorted jewellery pliers or similar small pliers
A flat surface to work on, table or desk

Here are some pictures of the things I am talking about about!
Beads:

Bargain glass heart beads from Spotlight, they are clear with coloured streaks in them. The hole is in the centre of the bead length-ways. 

For this post, I will be showing you how to make the earrings using these beads. I will write a follow up post on how to make the second pair. 

Jewellery findings:

This is actually a really great pack you can pick up from The Warehouse (doesn't seem to be only sorry!), for around $3 and has everything you need to create 2 sets of earrings and a necklace. 

For this project, we are using the earring hooks, the little gold rings (jump rings), the tiny gold bead looking shapes (crimpers) and both types of posts/metal, pin end and ring end. 

These little mini pliers are extremely useful. I think I picked up a pack of three for around $10 at Spotlight, I know they also sell some of the round nose ones at The Warehouse. The ones in the bottom right corner I inherited from my mum's supplies, and they are a little bigger, which does come in handy. You do really need pliers with different nose shapes. The round nose ones are good for wrapping and making circles, the flat nose ones are used for opening and closing jump rings and also crimping down the crimpers. The purple ones are optional, but they are helpful for cutting wire. You can use some really sharp scissors though and it will do the same thing!

So now you have all your materials and know what tools you need, lets start!

First I will show you how to make the heart earrings. You will need 4 of the same kind of beads to make these. 

Take your first bead, and thread it onto the pin end wire. Using the round nose pliers, make a circle of wire at the top like this:

Make sure the circle is closed completely. Then open one of the jump rings (with the flat nose plier if you have them), and thread it through the top of the circle you just made, and close the jump ring. Then you should have something that looks like this:

It's important that both the circles are closed so they won't fall off when attached to the earring hook.

Next you want to thread a bead upside down onto the metal with the loop at the end, and create another loop at the top like you did with the first bead. 

Sorry the pic is a little blurry, but just shows what your second bead strand will look like, and how the open jump ring will look before you close it. 

Next you want to select a larger size jump ring and put the bead strands with the smaller jump ring on. 

Now the really easy part to finish off! Select an earring hook and open the loop at the bottom, add your bead strands to the loop and close it. Voila! A completed earring!

Now all you need to do is repeat the same thing so you have a matching pair! 

Now that you know some basic techniques, you can easily make all kinds of earring with this method. You're only limited by what you have!

 Stay tuned for the next post where I will show you how to make the green beaded earrings! 

You can see Part 2 by clicking here!