Bead Soup Sale

I was supposed to get these earring listed on Monday and the past couple of days have just gotten away from me as I'm been rolling beads and glazing little things.

I've posted them on Etsy at the bargain price of $23.95. They're light on the ear but still tend to make a statement. Just over two inches in length from top to bottom and the disc is 1" round.

Back to the bead making....

Finishing Your Disc Earrings

On to the front of my BSBP earrings. Here is where you can go wild. You can finish your earrings off with a stamped piece of metal on the front (such as a round) – or just about anything that will cover the earring nut. In the case of these earrings I wanted to use the wonderful butterflies I was given. To do this I needed to make a loop to hold the butterfly charm in place. I wanted it in front of the earring nut and to swing freely.

Since I always want the earrings to hang at the same height I measure and mark where I’m going to bend the earring wire. You can also see in these photos where I have bent the catch in the back.

Bend the earring wire with bail forming pliers or across a dowel (ink pen, etc.) at your lines. Put the wire under the catch and adjust as necessary. Trim your wire. I usually go about 3/8” – ½” below the catch. File or use a cup burr on your trimmed ends, polish, and antique.

I hope you enjoyed how I made these earrings. The discs are ceramic and very light weight. And from the butterfly hang some nice pearls and antique glass beads. Now that the BSBP is over I’ll be putting these up for sale on Etsy, with special pricing. Look for the listing on Monday if you are interested. And be sure to make a bunch for yourself – I wouldn’t have put this tutorial on the web site if you couldn’t feel free to use it. Enjoy!

Disc Earring Tutorial

This is the first part of the tutorial for making the disc earrings. To make these earrings I used:

Round Nose Pliers
Chain Nose Pliers
Bail Pliers/you can use a 3/8" dowel.
19 gauge full hard sterling silver wire
Files /or a cup burr tool for the earring wire ends
Decorations to hang from your earrings
Discs with a hole of 3mm
White Rubber Earring Nuts.



Bend your wire at a 90 degree angle. Grasp with your round nose pliers and make your first spiral.



Change to your chain nose pliers and grasp the wire as shown in the photo. Spiral your wire around several times tightly. Note: For each earring since I wanted the backs to be a mirror image of one another I spirled each wire coil in the opposite direction. Also, I am using full hard wire - this wire is not easy to bend - this helps the earring keep it's intended shape. You can use a soft wire but then you will have to hammer or harden you earring wire when you get to that point.



This is the secret I alluded to when I was writing about the Bead Soup Party. If you purchase or create a disc with approximately a 3mm hole. Into that hole you wedge (and it wil fit very tightly, they should fit tightly or or use a different size nut) a rubber earring nut. These nuts are the type you purchase to keep your french hook earrings from getting nudged out of your ears. That always seems to happen with me when I'm wearing my favorite coat.

Tomorrow I'll continue on with this tutorial and we'll finish off these earrings. It's a very useful way to make these types of earrings if you want the disc to remain in a specific position and centered in your design.

Enjoy!