A French Affaire - Pearls for the Girls!

Over the next month I'll be working with glass pearls a lot. You see, my youngest sister will soon be celebrating a milestone birthday and I'm so excited to be organising her party. She dreams of one day travelling to Paris but as that's not on the cards just at the moment, we will be bringing France to her! To help make it an affair to remember, there will be a handmade pearl bracelet for every female who is attending, made by moi!

So here's the first one, classic black and white:

Ideally, I'd be using 1mm stretch elastic to string the glass pearls for this bracelet but because there is only a single hole on the back of the rose and I'm stringing a double stranded bracelet, I'm using 0.5mm.

Finished size: Internal diameter 65mm (2 5/8") approximately

So here's what you'll need:

• Six 4mm, four 6mm and thirtyeight 8mm white glass pearls
• Four 2-hole silver and diamonte rhinestone spacer bars
• Black resin rose (mine is approximately 35mm across)
• 0.5mm Stretch Magic
• G-S Hypo Cement, clear nail polish or other adhesive to secure the knot
• Bead stopper
• Scissors 

Cut two 20cm (8") lengths of elastic and pre-stretch them to minimise overstretching from wear. Place both cords in the bead stopper and then thread them through the rose. String one 4mm pearl on both cords. Separate the cords and thread a 4mm pearl on each one.

String a 6mm pearl on each cord followed by three 8mm pearls and then thread each cord through a hole in the spacer. String four 8mm pearls on each cord and a spacer, then string five 8mm pearls on each cord and the spacer. Finish stringing the bracelet by reversing the stringing order: four 8mm pearls and a spacer, three 8mm pearls, two 6mm pearls and two 4mm pearls. Bring the cords back together and string one 4mm pearl.

Remove the bead stopper and tie the four cords together using a surgeon's knot. Tighten the knot by pulling both the knot and the cord. Secure the knot with your choice of adhesive. Once it's dry, trim the ends and slide the knot inside the rose.

This is a generously sized bracelet so to make it smaller, just adjust the number of pearls between each spacer.

I'll share some more pearl bracelets with you over the coming weeks. Please stop by and see what other designs I make!

 'Til next time.......

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