Silver square bracelet with multi-colored square crystals

I've been thinking a lot about where I get my jewelry making abilities from. Almost everyone in my family is musical, so it's easy to trace back that talent: my mom is a pianist, my dad plays guitar, my grandfather played violin and my great uncle was a jazz composer. However, as far as I know I'm the only jewelry maker.

My married last name -- my husband's -- is Edelstein, which actually means "precious stone." So someone on his side made or sold jewelry. We have no Edelsteins on my side, to my knowledge.

I suppose I get some of my artistry from my grandmother, who's a seriously talented knitter. I told her that it's a shame that sites like Etsy didn't exist in her youth because she would've made a fortune! She mainly knits for family members or friends, but has rarely sold anything commercially.

Meanwhile, my dad also has some artistic talents. For a while, he was making stained glass projects, but hurt his hand and was unable to continue. Still, he's very handy and you can see his work all over my parents' home. He designed a dining room table out of European tiles and put together the brick work in the living room.

I guess it doesn't matter where I got the talent from, just as along as I enjoy what I'm doing -- which I am! Today's featured item is my silver square wire bracelet with multi-colored square crystals. I'd originally made a version of this with blue squares for my friend's sister. I gave it to her for Christmas and she loved it; she put it on right away and then wore it the next day, as well. I wanted to try the same pattern, but with more color, so I chose crystals of blue, purple orange and green. I think it looks really cool -- fun and funky, but the colors aren't overwhelming.

I'd actually forgotten that I'd made this until I dug some stuff out to photograph yesterday. Now I'm debating whether I should sell this or keep it for myself...

To purchase my jewelry, head to Naomi's Designs or Naomi's Studio.

Gold bangle bracelet with green crystals

Whenever I make a new piece of jewelry, I like to experiment with interesting color combinations. One of my favorite ways to do this is to simply take colors from the same family and mix them. When I was a kid, I used to like to do this with paint cards when my parents were at the store choosing wallpaper. It amazed me to see just how many shades of purple or blue or even white even exist. We may only see seven colors in a rainbow, but there are probably millions of colors between each band.

For this bracelet, I went with a green theme. I'd gotten new gold wire that I'd never worked with before -- 16 gauge square -- and really liked the combination of the yellow with green. But I didn't just want to go with one sjade of green, so I went for several and chose crystals of forest green, kelly green, grass green, yellow green... you get the idea. I then made a simple bangle bracelet, alternating the green cubes, but in the end, they look like one unit.

Though I'm not Irish, I'll probably wear this for St. Patrick's day this year because this bracelet is the perfect accessory to wear when welcoming the spring. And remember, when looking at a color, note that there's more to it than meets the eye.

To see or purchase my jewelry, head to Naomi's Designs or Naomi's Studio.

Silver and Swarovski crystal wire bangle bracelet

It's hard to go wrong when combining silver and clear Swarovski crystals, but there were some challenges involved in making this bangle bracelet.

For starters I decided to experiment and use a softer wire than what I normally use. Most of the time I work with 14-18 gauge wire and then use softer wires (22-28 gauge) for wrapping purposes. However, I envisioned a bracelet that was very thin and delicate and went with 22 gauge. It held up a lot better than I expected, but I then had to deal with the round Swarovski crystals. Most of my other bracelets contain square or faceted crystals, which are easy to work with; they stay in place and you just shape the wire around them. But the round crystals kept spinning and moving, and wouldn't stay in place. I finally gave up and secured them as much as I could, but still let them have some "spin."

Overall, I like how delicate this bracelet is. It's not too chunky and because it has the crystals woven into it, isn't too thin either. Since it's silver and the crystals are clear, it will match pretty much anything; this is the perfect type of bracelet to wear with a stack of other bangles.

To see or purchase more of my jewelry, head to Naomi's Designs or Naomi's Studio.

Silver wire bracelet with turquoise beads

Okay, so I'm finally going to talk about the piece that's featured in the huge photo on my blog's home page. That's my very cool pentagon bracelet.

When I was teaching myself how to make spirals, squares and triangles, I wanted to see if I could try a more complicated shape. I successfully made a pentagon and just thought that it looks cool, kind of like a rose. That said, I decided to make an entire bracelet featuring them. I like the way that silver and blue look together, so I added the turquoise beads as an accent.

I used 20 gauge wire for this, but my next challenge is to see what kind of shapes I can make with a tougher gauge. That's what I love about making jewelry; there's always something new to experiment with!

To buy my jewelry, head to Naomi's Designs or Naomi's Studio.