HOW I WORK WITH: Half drilled beads

I picked up a bagful of these beads from the downstairs clearance section of Fun2Bead in NYC. I've talked about the basement before, it's one of my favorite places. Basically you walk to the back of the store down this staircase to a room FULL of bead strands, a wall of seed beads, and in the middle are open containers of beads/charms/etc and you can fill a baggie of plastic beads for ~6.99. They have a ton of silver/pewter charms, those and more expensive beads are about $14.99 a bag. If you're looking for plastic beads, this is the place to go.

I've only see one older gentleman down here working it, so when he's on break or upstairs they have the area closed off. Try not to go during standard lunch times and I've had luck politely and sheepishly and apologetically asking to go downstairs :)

Last time, I went a little nuts over these beads because I loved the shape. I'm not sure what they're made of, some kind of plastic I'm guessing. I went a little bonkers over the fact that they're center drilled! I prefer my drops to be center drilled then side drilled.

I didn't realize until I got home that they are actually only half drilled on one end. (That's what I get for getting too excited about filling up a small bag for $6.99. I cleared them out.)

No matter, I won't be deterred!

The things you need to make this work: wire and glue.

So instead of pulling a headpin through, I ended up cutting up lengths of wire and using E6000 to glue them into place.

I let it cure overnight.

Now comes the loop.

Then you're done. I like the smooth look of not having a headpin on the bottom, but I personally don't care either way.

There is a beautiful little shop back in my Virginian hometown that is actually a house, every room being a different 'store' from various sellers. One of the rooms is full of baggies of beads $1 each. I have an absolute blast going through the baskets and buckets. I bought these earring holders for $1.50.

Thanks for reading!