!: Making Earrings With Beads, Ear Wire, and Eye Pins

It is quite easy to make earrings to coordinate with other jewellery pieces by using similar colours and beads. The hoop earring is the easiest, all you have to do is tread on the beads and attach the hoop to the ear wire. The dangling earring means making loops, but is also easy with a little practice.

You will need...
* Beads

* Earring hoop

* Ear wire

Step-by-step for hoop earrings

1 - Gently pull the wire at the top of the hoop until it clears the metal clasp and thread on the beads.

2 - Carefully replace the wire into the metal clasp at the top of the hoop.

3 - Open the loop of the ear wire and thread on the hoop. Close the loop of the ear wire.

Dangling Earrings

You will need...
* Beads

* Eye pins

* Head pins

* Ear wire

Step-by-step for dangling earrings

1 - Decide on the pattern of beads to be used.

2 - Thread the beads onto an eye pin or a head pin (an eye pin if you are going to attach another bead to it, a head pin if that is the last bead to dangle) and form a loop.
To make a loop
* Thread bead onto eye pin or head pin
* Using the flat nose pliers, bend the open end of the eyepin at right angles, as close to the bead as possible.
* Using the wire cutter, cut the bent end of the eyepin leaving approximately 6-7mm of wire. The length needed to form the loop depends on amount of wire needed to create a loop to match the loop already in place, at the other end.
* Using the round nose pliers, grab the very end of the bent end of the eyepin, about 5mm from the tip of the pliers. The exact position on the pliers depends on the size of loop required to match the loop already in place at the other end.
* Holding the tip of the wire, roll the pliers along the wire, forming a loop which is centered over the hole in the bead.

3 - Attach beads, in the chosen sequence, by opening the loop of one bead and attaching to the loop of the next bead.

4 - Finish by attaching the beads to the loop of the ear wire.