Satin rope necklace tutorial…

First, thanks to those of you who wrote kind words in reply to my the verdict post.
Second, I'm having one crazy time editing in Blogger today...
so forgive my weird spacing!

Happy Spring (finally) to all those living in Ohio!
Today was just gorgeous…and I have a very Spring-like necklace for you to sport on a beautiful sunshiny day like today…

Do I think you can do it?!?!?!
As crazy a question as that is…
I’m actually going to validate it with an answer…

OF COURSE YOU CAN!!!
You can do anything you put your mind to… whether your inner self tells you it’s possible or not!

I didn’t time it for you today to give you a good rundown of each step, but I’ll probably come back and edit the timings in…

I made the necklace in a variety of springtime colors…just in time for Easter or Mother’s Day!!!

Pretty….no?!?!

I was inspired by this necklace called the Limitless Strands necklace I saw on sale at my favorite store (Anthropologie) and I’m kicking myself for not bringing it home with me!!!

So I’ll just have to recreate it on my own…

Well, here is what you will need…
- approximately 3 yards or satin ribbon (I just bought a spool)
- satin cording (found in the trim section) in a coordinating color
- 2-4 large beads (mine were from a bracelet that fell apart and was never fixed)
- corresponding thread
- needleCut 4 pieces of your Satin ribbon somewhere between 27 and 30 inches long.

(it depends on how long you want your necklace…I cut all mine at 28 inches)

Cut 16 pieces of your satin trim 6 inches long

With right sides together, sew 1/4 –1/8 inch seam straight up the sides and round the top edge at the end.

trim off the excess

Take your finger and poke that rounded edge inside the tube you now have.

Now, place one of your beads that little hole you just made by poking the rounded edge in and turn your tube right side out.

(I seriously tried WAY too many things to get my tubes right side out easily…this is the easiest way I found!)

Once you have them right side out…
Take out the beads and iron the tubes lightly on the ‘Satin’ setting (if you have one) or just a fairly cool setting (if you don’t).

PAUSE:
This is REALLY important!
Once you are done ironing…
put those beads BACK IN your tube!!!
They need to be in the end of your tube when you sew everything together.

PLAY:
Now, thread your needle
(I used blue thread hoping you could see it more clearly in the pictures…when you do it - make sure you use a corresponding thread color!)

Start threading HALF of your satin trim one piece at a time…like this:until you have them all threaded together.
(you should have 8 pieces- because you are threading HALF of the original 16)

Now, go back through the first piece you threaded and pull…you should have just brought them all together in a circle.
Now thread the other end together the same way…
repeat steps with the other HALF of your satin trim pieces.
You should now have something that looks like this:
You can leave them as they are, or gently twist them together like I did…
This is hard to explain…I basically criss-crossed my two bundles and as I brought the end on the bottom back to meet the end on the top I threaded it through…and did the same on the other side.

then, tack your two twisted bundles to make one bundle of pretty, pretty satin

take your Satin tube and place the end of your gently twisted bundle inside the tube.

Sew it in place.

Fold the Satin tube over itself and the Satin trim to cover up the sewing you just did.

Sew that together so it doesn’t come undone.

Now tie a pretty knot right over your little sewing job like this…

Remember those beads you hid in the end of your tube while you were sewing your Satin trim to your ribbon?
Time to use those little suckers.

Bring one bead down until it is touching the knot you just tied.
Now tie a knot above that bead.
Repeat.
(this obviously depends on how many beads you want to use. I experimented and I think I actually like the necklaces better when I used only one bead on each side of the necklace instead of two…you decide)

Do the same on the other side of your necklace…
And you are done!!!

Now, smile…sigh…and feel good because you just finished something pretty today!

linked up HERE and HERE