Pearls

This past Sunday I took a little break from knitting and did some pearl necklaces.  I had picked up another strand of natural multi-colored pearls and gave the previous strand that I had turned into a necklace to my step daughter.  She is going to be interviewing for her Residency and I figured that she needed a strand of pearls.  As I told her, if you're wearing pearls, you can do anything.  I find cashmere and pearls or silk and pearls particularly powerful combinations.

When I bought the multi-colored strand I also picked up a white strand.

Once I had these turned into necklaces I tackled four strands that I have had in my stash for a little while now.  I knew that I wanted to use them together but I was really struggling with a design.  In the end I went for simple.

First I did some stringing of the pearls onto Soft Flex.  For all of these necklaces I used the 24k Gold Extreme flex Metallic Flex Wire, Fine (.014 inch diameter).  I separate the pearls with size 14 beads, clear for the white and multi-colored strands and a transparent light purple for the purple strands.  Then I had to figure out lengths.  The bead board I have only lets me do 3 strands at a time.

First I did the 3 inner strands, and then I removed the inner most strand, shifted the others and placed the outer strand.  Eight crimps later I have a multi-strand necklace.

A String of Pearls

Every woman needs a string of pearls, or three.  I love pearls, their lustrous sensual beauty, the way they feel against your skin.  They are classic, elegant, timeless, and you can't help but feel classic, elegant and timeless when you wear them.  The graduated strands I bought from A Grain of Sand, and the multi-color strand I bought from Artbeads.  All three are strung on Soft Flex 24k Gold Extreme Flex Metallic Flex Wire, Fine (0.014 in diameter).  Typically pearls are strung on silk, separated by knots, but silk needs to be replaced every few years, so I use Soft Flex.  I separated each pearl with a size 14 bead, transparent crystal for the white and multi-colored strands, and transparent pink for the pink strand.

Fun with Beads and Pearls

So I was sitting around this morning listening to NPR and thinking about colors for some of my lamp work beads and I was suddenly inspired to pull out my stash of pearls. Although this didn't end up being used with any of my lampwork beads, I think it is a sweet little bracelet.