"Merry Christmas Tree" earrings with sterling ear wires

"Visions of Sugarplums" necklace with memory wire, blue and green Swarovski Elements bicone crystals, and penguin Santas

"Snowflake Mittens" with hill tribe bells on blue cord necklace--this is very jingly!

Rings & Things

wonderful lamp work holiday-themed lamp work beads!

I don't know how I got so lucky, but I got a wonderful box full of lamp work beads, all holiday-themed, from Ring&Things ! As a Rings and Things blogger and design partner, I have had the pleasure of working with them before. They could not be nicer and they certainly got me in the spirit of the season with the beads I am sharing with you here, some of which I worked up last night into designs just so you could get an idea of the VAST choices you have offered to you from this great bead store! It's like a PLETHORA of jolly holiday happiness when you see what you can get from Rings&Things.
I decided to make a few different styles of things so you could see some (by no means all) of the beads available. The tree earrings on the top are slightly larger in size than many of the beads I was working with. All of these beads require a crystal or metal or glass seed bead on your head pin when you begin, because their holes are a tiny bit larger than average. This is to be expected.
I made the tree earrings last although I had my eye on them from the start! What a perfect gift for a teacher, or a best friend, or even a best friend FOREVER! Note: you could use a single bead of this size as a focal pendant. It would be great!
I topped each earring with a clear Swarovski Element round and that looked pretty to me--better than the green bicones I had thought I was going to use. The twinkle was more Christmas-sy.

The second piece was the one I made first. I made it purposely to show you two things:
1) how to "ground" a piece by using one bead repeatedly throughout a design--see the snowmen? They are used every other bead! They are my theme, or base, bead. They help you not get confused, as you look at the necklace!
and 
2) I really wanted you to see approximately half of the styles I received from Rings & Things, in one necklace.  Let's look at them!   I got the smiling snowmen which I have mentioned, adorable peppermint candies in green and red (I loved those and considered making earrings from them too, but I ran out of time)--you can see one of each of those at the ends of the necklace by the crystals; and now we will start from the left and go to the right, skipping over the snowmen. We will look at all the beads I chose! I picked a sweet red mitten with a white cuff, decorated with green, then one single selected bead from a terrific feisty bunch of Emperor penguins(note: many of these beads can be used way past the holidays if you are making gifts--they are so flexible that way!), a cool narrow-ish shaped tree which came from a pack I can envision using in a myriad of ways, starting with chain...let's see where are we? I went on to choose one fabulously cute gingerbread man who stole my heart, then a brilliant red stocking which is just as charming as can be, and a teddy bear Santa who sweetly completes the round up, to the final snowman and peppermint candy, before the crystals begin on the right. I wanted to use blue and green crystals because the necklace was SO joyful in color. Also I felt I needed to lighten the weight of the necklace. All glass lamp work beads would have been too heavy, I think. 
The dangles at the ends are my pride and joy: two penguin Santas. I crack up every time I look at them!
So as you can see I had a ball making this necklace with these great lamp work beads from Rings & Things.

The piece I made which is shown at the bottom is NOT for people who don't like a lot of cheery noise! I love the jingle of bells at this time of year, and these mittens were irresistible!!! to me. I interspersed the hill tribe bells (which I had here at home) with the WONDERFUL, colorful mittens--I love the little snowflakes on each one--don't you?  So cute! The cord just ties behind your neck. It is a charming, easy necklace!

Thank you so much! to Dave Robertson. What a marvelous store with such a huge selection of lovely beads for this time of year, and for all seasons as well!

Dave Robertson
Internet Marketing
Rings&Things

You Rock!--jean
Find Rings&Things at the link I put above in my entry, above, and also check these links out, below:

www.Facebook.com/BEAD.FANS
http://twitter.com/rings_things