In any design, there comes a point where I just have to put it together. I can imagine what it will look like if something goes here or there, but it's not the same as seeing all the components pieced together. In order to put the One necklace together, I had to make my own jump rings. Jump rings are those tiny circles of metal which hold links and components together. For some odd reason, circular copper jump rings are very hard to find in jewelry and bead catalogs. So, I hauled out the trusty interwebs, watched a bunch of videos, and figured out how to make my own.
First, you have to coil your copper wire on a mandrel. Of course, I don't have a mandrel of this size and I didn't put one in the budget. So I prowled around the garage and found a....a nail! That works. Then I put the nail and the copper wire in the drill chuck and slowly coiled the copper wire onto it.
Then, I had to undo everything, slide the coiled wire off the nail and use a jeweler's saw to cut the rings. This is a little nervewracking because I had to hold the tiny coil in my fingers. I was certain I was about to make "Saw IV: The Necklace" WITHOUT the fake blood. Fortunately, if you go really slow and use lots of CutLube (keep your minds OUT of the gutter, thank you) there is no cutting of fingers.
As I cut, the jump rings just fell onto the bench block. And my lap. And the floor. And there's one in the basket of stamping supplies...I think.
After the cutting is complete, the jump rings are all bent and not in one plane. That's not going to work well, so I patiently tap them all with a plastic mallet to flatten them.
Yeah for jump rings! Now I can start putting the One and Two necklaces together to see what they look like.
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