Remember the luscious tagua or beads from previous posts?  Here is another chance to win yourself a pile of them!  These all natural nut beads from Central and South American palms are lovely to work with and warm to the touch.


I received the beads above for review.   Last time I made a wire wrapped necklace using one of the larger tagua beads.  This time round I had a go with the crescent shaped naturally colored beads.  They were unusually drilled - side drilled and only on one tip.


I didn't think I could drill a similar hole on the other tip.  So I simply ignored the hole and started playing with the beads.


The crescent shaped beads seemed to be a good match for the round beads.  Since I cannot solder them together nor did I want to do any wire work,  the solution was to use 2-part epoxy resin clay!  This is the wonderful stuff you use like clay, has adhesive properties and dried hard without using an oven.


The original plan was to make earrings because the eye pins would be buried in the connecting clay.  But these would have been too heavy as earrings so I made a pendant instead.  


I used brown Apoxie resin clay, rolled it out flat and cut out a crescent shape using a round polymer clay cutter.  I then butted all the sections together.  Easy, right?  You don't need a full tutorial to get the idea!

See that blue handled tool in one of the above pictures?  That is a beeswax tipped stick to help me pick up the small Swarovski chatons and place them on the clay.

A little Gilders' Paste (Inca Gold) tarted up the brown clay.  After the clay hardened overnight, I glued a bail behind, threaded a ribbon and cord necklace and voila!


So this is just one way to combine crystals with natural beads and use resin clay at the same time!  Tagua beads are very versatile!

Giveaway
If you'd like to win the $40 worth of tagua beads to create your own awesome designs,  please make a comment below. Make sure you leave contact info if you do not have an online shop or blog.

Subscribers need to click on the post title to come to my actual blog. Scroll down and enter your comment. Pick Name/URL. If you don't have a store or blog, leave the URL blank.

This giveaway is international.

Extra entries if you become or are a blog subscriber or follower etc. If you also do shout outs about this giveaway, those will count as additional entries too! Please say so in the comments.

It ends in a week's time at 6 pm EST Monday,  July 1 , 2013. I will pick the winner randomly and announce the results as soon as possible after. So be sure to leave a contact email if you don't have an online link or make sure you come back and check! Otherwise I will redraw in a week. Good luck!


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Original Post by THE BEADING GEM
Jewelry Making Tips - Jewelry Business Tips