Beady Wreath Tree Ornament

I thought I'd pop this tutorial on my blog - having just spent the last hour looking for it on my pc it will be good to know I can find it more easily next time, won't it?

I hope you like it and feel inspired to have a go - it doesn't really matter what beads you use and any scraps of wire that you can curl into a circle can be used as you don't see the wire once the ornament is finished.

Bead Wreath Tree Ornament

I made this tree ornament in about 15 minutes.  Because I didn’t have much time I made it easy for myself by using the same size Swarovski crystal beads, but any beads will do and they don’t really need to be all exactly the same.

For the pictures for the “how to” I’ve used bigger beads and my finished ornament is about 6cms.

 

Materials:

Wire

Thread

Ribbon

Beads of your choice

Tools:

Wire cutters

Fine tipped pliers

1.  Cut a length of wire about 24cms long.  If you have a tub or something near to hand that looks about the diameter  of the circle you want to make, use that as a guide  - wind your wire around it and give yourself a few cms extra before cutting the wire.

2.  In one end of your wire make a small loop.  To do this hold the end in your fine-nosed pliers and twist the pliers and wire around on itself.

3.  Start threading your beads onto the wire however you fancy, don’t fill up the whole wire, you need to leave enough wire to make the second loop and its much harder to do this if you’ve only left a small free end.

4.  Keep checking to see how big your circle will look when you pull the wire ends together.  You may find that it looks better smaller than you thought – this depends on the size of your beads.  My crystals are 6mms and I found that a finished diameter of about 4.5 looked just right, but with bigger beads a larger circle would probably look better.

5. When you’re happy with the number of beads and size of circle make the second loop.   

Keeping the beads fairly close together – but not so tight that the circle is distorted,and using the pliers take hold of the wire quite near to the final bead and twist the spare wire around to form the loop.   

Cut off the excess wire.

 3.  Pull the two loops together by twisting or tying with finer wire or thread.

4.  Thread ribbon through the two wire loops and make a neat bow in the front.

5.  Thread some thin braid, crochet cotton, or another length of fine wire through the loop at the back of the bow to make the hanger,

That’s it, all done

Now you just need to make enough for the rest of the tree! 

Thanks for visiting - don't forget to let me know if you make one of these.