Festival Bracelets

Hi guys

As you might of guessed I'm going to V-festival this year and at any festival its always about the accessories.

I've also recently become addicted to Pinterest and have a board for things I want to make and this was on there. It originally came from Honestly WTF blog/website which is by two lovely american women called Erica and Lauren. I have to say they are amazing, have great style and there are loads of things to do and make that you would never guess of doing.

Now my decision to make my own bracelets was defiantly cost driven and I made these lovelies for the amazing cost of £1. Ok it may have cost a little more if I'd hadn't already had some things but even if you needed to buy everything you can still do it for under £5 for all four.

You can make these bracelets with any colours but I choose to use silver beads and black, pale pink, cream and pale blue embroidery cotton.

These next pictures are taken from the Honestly WTF website as their photography skills are much better then mine but I choice to re-write the instructions as I did struggle with a few parts.

 What you need is simple embroidery cotton a small button of a similar colour and beads in your chosen colour. The original instructions stated that you needed to use waxed linen cord but to keep costs down I used embroidery cotton even though I think that waxen linen would last longer.

 To start you need to cut two lengths of cotton, one at 26 inches and the other at 19 inches. You then need to line the two ends together fold in half so you are left with one short strand.

Next you need to knot the cotton creating a loop that will go over your button to fasten so make sure it is the right size for your chosen button. Then trim off the short strand so you are left with three.  

The next step is to start plaiting the three strands in the usual way and do this for about half an inch. The first bracelet I made I did the wrong length so consider the size of your wrist when doing this.

Now we can start to add the beads, the easiest way to describe this to you is similar to doing a French plait picking up the beads on the out side strands. You need make sure you keep the beads tight to the top before you fold over the stand and add the next bead. The best way to do this quickly is to thread on several beads onto each thread and moving them up when they are needed.

You need to continue doing this until you are happy you have done enough for you wrist size but not to much that you will end up with a loose bracelet.

Now you have measured the bracelet against your wrist and are happy with that length you need to finish it off by simply carrying on with the plait without the beads for another inch. Making sure you keep this tight all the way down or some of your last beads will become loose.

Now its time to add the button. Find the middle of the three stands splitting one of them in half I choose to thread the cotton through the button and back through opposite holes and then tie in a tight knot

And trim the left over cotton and your done. If you have made the bracelet slightly to long I tied an extra knot near the loop to make it fit better for my wrist.

For my first attempt to make these it must of taken me about 3 hours as I was threading the beads individually and I kept loosing my place. But now I can make one in about half an hour and will probably make a few for Christmas presents this year. I've seen a few other home made bracelets I like so if you have enjoyed this ill do more posts on future projects.

Thanks for reading and please share your home made bracelet projects.