Category: Jewelry

Wrapped Jewelry: Fidget Rings

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Unfortunately, on Tuesday, I didn’t do any crafting. Crafting is an excellent way to decompress and alleviate stress, even when I don’t think I have any.

Wednesday, I made fidget rings! These are practice rings; however, my daughter saw the copper ring and asked if I could make one in silver.

Yes, I can! The first silver ring I created was too soft, so I swapped it to stainless steel. The steel was stiffer and not as easy to work with as copper or aluminum. All the wire used was 20 gauge wire. However, I created the ring for her. Results? She loved this ring and promptly placed it on her finger after I’d filed down the end cut wire.

Wire Weaving: Copper Heart Pendant

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I’ve been practicing my wire-wrapping techniques for the past few days.

Yesterday, I used 30 gauge wire as the wrapping wire and tried pyramid weave. My wrapping is getting neater; however, it still needs more practice, and I think I’ll move back to 26 gauge or try 28 gauge.

I didn’t do too much wire wrapping today.

I may have worked on this heart for about 15 minutes early this evening, which will eventually become a pendant.

I was following Back to Earth Creations: Wire Weaving Master Class: Wrapped Heart tutorial. I enjoy Yvonne’s teaching style. She has many free tutorials on YouTube; however, I enjoy her teaching style so much that I purchased a membership. Since I’m not thrilled with my wrapping techniques with such thin wire, I’ll remove the 30 gauge wire wrap and replace the wrap with 28 gauge copper wire. Since I don’t have any 28-gauge wire, I’ll have to wait until it arrives. I ordered a few rolls at the end of last week. It should be here later this week.

Later this week, I will finish knitting some socks I started a few years ago. I started them before my parents got sick, so that must have been at least two years. Once finished, I’ll have a brand-new pair of hand-knit socks. I’ll have to post a picture of the socks sometime this week.

Wire Wrapping Jewelry

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For the past few months, I’ve been thinking about jewelry. I love creating. My go-to craft is knitting; however, I haven’t knitted anything (continuously) in the past several months. I occasionally go through crafting droughts where I don’t feel like knitting, so there’s no surprise. I have not done too much crafting. I have kept my hands busy with the organization around the home for the past few months. I have been tumbling rocks to incorporate into jewelry-making at some point; however, that’s about it.

Over the past month, I’ve slowly added to my jewelry supply stash, and at the end of last week, I started wrapping jewelry. Have you heard the expression, “It’s like riding a bike?” Meaning once you learn, you won’t forget. Wire wrapping wasn’t like that, at least not for me. Now that I think about it, I have not done any wire wrapping/weaving since my daughter was in elementary school, so at least 13 years.

My sloppily wire-wrapped copper ring.

Last evening, I decided to work on a ring. I used 20 gauge copper wire for my base and to wrap I used 26 gauge copper wire. Results? I still felt clumsy, and although I wanted to redo the ring last evening, I figured it might be wise to get to bed since I worked today. I could not help but laugh at the failure of simple weaving and braided technique. So, returning to wire wrapping was not “like riding a bike.” I’m taking the basic steps to become proficient, and that’s perfectly fine.

I used my wooden jewelry making vise to assist with my wire wrapping
Wire wrapped copper ring

Today, I decided to work on a simple wrap technique and focused on keeping the woven wire tight.

I was very pleased with the results, although many flaws still exist. I was delighted with my progress. I plan to remake both rings this weekend.