Okay, so I finally got around to confronting the dead coral snake, also known as my latest Fail in the bead necklace department. When the thing fell apart, only about half the beads shot off and scattered all over the floor. Only about a third of them rolled under the freezer. Since the thing was about three times too long, this was not the end of the universe. Nor of the coral snake.
Spent a fair amount of the day pulling hundreds of seed beads off the broken strands of upholstery thread and stringing them on wire. Added some grayish glittery Swarovski beads here and there. This helped a little to mute the reptilian look. Instead of trying to make it one continuous loop, I attached a craftsy-looking clasp, mooting the how-to-run-it-all-together headache. And then I added a little “tail” to the thing, with a little silver dragonfly at the end.
These ministrations resulted in a pretty versatile affair: you can wear it in one long flapperish strand or wrap it twice around your neck, and you can let the dragonfly dangle seductively down the back of your neck or turn the beads around and wear the charm in front.
Not such a ridiculous disaster now…maybe it’s even good enough to offer at the upcoming silent auction. Will have to think about that.
Then it was on to experimenting with designing the proposed Anglican rosary, now that the pretty little Mexican cross is in hand. The various mounds of jasper I’d ordered from Fire Mountain hadn’t arrived, but I had an old cross that predates my last period of apostasy.
For the beta version of the rosary project, then, I used the old choir cross, which looks kind of like pewter, five 10-mm beads of aventurine or amazonite (not sure which it is), 28 rondelles of African jade, and heaven only knows how many 6-mm beads of gray feldspar. The color combination went pretty well with the pewtery cross. I used silver- and gold-toned glass seed beads as spacers.
Not a bad effect, but way, way too long. I’d strung three feldspar beads to function like a “chain” between the actual prayer beads, and that was just too many. Eventually I’ll take it apart and rebuild it…am thinking it should have no more than one feldspar spacer between the aventurine and African jade pieces — but maybe not even that. Maybe none. It may be that the silver and gold glass beads alone will suffice.
Along about the time this got finished, the mail arrived, bearing the new jasper beads. The variety called “fancy jasper” is really very pretty. I expect I’ll use the ten-mm fancy jasper for the cruciform beads and the “invitatory,” and then fill in the “weeks” with autumn jasper, a lovely, warm stone. A hundred sterling silver beads came in package, too; they’ll make very classy spacers.
Thanks to the beta version, I think one of these silver things between each bead will suffice. 🙄
I’ve got some turquoise rondelles and tubes laying around in there, liberated from long-defunct pieces of jewelry. I’m thinking one or two of those could decorate the dangle from which the crucifix is suspended, highlighting the Southwestern effect.
My friend Carol came up with two really cool old stone crosses. Since I’ll have enough beads left over to supply the entire parish with these things, I may make those into rosaries, too.
How d’you like these gladioli?
$1.99 for five long stalks of these things, at Trader Joe’s yesterday! Hot diggety!