It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas?

It's never too early to start thinking about Christmas, especially if you like to do hand-made gifts or decorations.  These glittered Christmas lights could be used in decorations or as embellishments for mixed media projects or in this case for jewelry.

For this project I used:
Pardo Jewelry Clay in Ruby, Peridot and Gold
Art Glitter - Ultrafine Opaque - #1 - True Red, Ultrafine Transparent Neon - #241 - Fresh Lime, and Ultrafine Opaque - #65 - Old Gold
Antique brass spacer beads from Metal Gallery
Antique brass eye rings
Antique brass chain and toggle clasp
Art Glitter - Designer Dries Clear Adhesive (DDCA)

Begin by cutting one ball of Pardo clay into fourths.

Roll each of the quartered sections into a ball and then pinch and taper the end to form a teardrop shape.

Trim eye pins to about 3/4" long so that when they are inserted through the spacer bead and into the clay, they will not come through the bottom of the clay.  Insert the eye pins to secure the spacer beads to the fat end of the teardrops.

Roll the clay in glitter corresponding to the color of the clay.

Repeat with the other two colors. Bake according to clay instructions.

After baking, pull the pins back out of the clay, dip the pins in DDCA and re-insert into the clay.  To keep the glitter from shedding, brush on a layer of gloss acrylic sealer and let dry.

To finish, add jump rings and attach the "lights" to brass chain.  Attach a toggle claps to each end of the bracelet chain.

Please visit my blog for more glittering holiday fun:  http://kc-distractedbyshiny.blogspot.com/

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