Hebe Cord Beads

A few weeks ago I received some samples of Hebe cord with the request, "what can you do with this?"  I love a challenge, as do all members of the Designer Crafts Connection, and 13 of us accepted.  If you're not familiar with Hebe cord, it's a thin parachute type cord - strong, shiny and easy to work with.  Unlike floss, or some of the other types of cord, it doesn't ravel - a definite plus when making things like Friendship bracelets.  You can crochet with Hebe cord and also knit with it, using very small needles......  I can knit and crochet and there's an overwhelming number of Friendship bracelet techniques on Pinterest, so I thought I'd try to make something different.

For a number of years I designed and presented projects for Hands on Crafts for Kids, a TV show that airs on PBS.  The second series featured crafts from around the world and I remembered showing viewers how to make a Temari ball.  If you don't know what that is, submit a search on Pinterest and you'll see where my inspiration came from.  This is my version - a lot smaller and not quite as time consuming.

 

 I had a variety of colors of Hebe cord to choose from plus I used a 1" Smoothfoam™ ball (available at all major craft stores), some sticky dots (from my scrapbook supplies), silver jewelry chain, 2 silver beads, 2 Rondelles, a 2" eye pin, a jump ring, craft knife and a large eye tapestry needle. 

My idea was to wrap the Smoothfoam ball with the cord to create a bead for a pendant necklace. Smoothfoam is so lightweight, you could also make matching earrings...

It's as easy to make as this:  Cover the top half of the ball sparingly with thin glue dots, then starting at the top, wrap the cord around and around down to the half way point on the ball. You'll see that there is a mark all the way round the center of the ball. Make sure the strands of cord are nestled closely together.  Cover the remainder of the ball with glue dots (you can also use a thin, even layer of tacky glue) and continue wrapping until the ball is completely covered.  Holding the needle with a pair of jewelry pliers, carefully heat the end in a candle flame then push thru the wrapped ball from top to bottom.  Now you have a beautiful wrapped bead to incorporate into all kinds of jewelry pieces.

To make my pendant, I added a silver bead and rondelle to the eye pin, added the Hebe bead then another rondelle and silver bead then created a loop at the end of the eye pin.  Using the tapestry needle, I threaded cord thru the links in the silver chain to add a little extra color, then attached the ends of the chain to a jump ring at the top of the eye pin.  I also made a tassel of short lengths of chain and attached them to the opposite end of the bead.

With lots of cord colors to choose from you'll have an easy time making a custom piece of jewelry for any occasion.  Enjoy!  Y'all come back now............

Yours truly,
Julie :)

KEEP CALM AND CARRY ON CRAFTING!