#needleworkmonday :: Simple beaded interchangeable dangling earrings - How-to

The string

You may choose some lace yarns or embroidery threads, something that is thin but not too thin, sturdy and tough and can fit into the needle.

The needle

I used the cross-stitch needle that has a wider eye to enable the yarn to go through. It is very important to test that your needle can pass through the beads, stones and blings of your choice.
A needle that is the right size will make the stringing and assembly of the beads much faster.

Earwires

This is a pair of "earwire with loop and ball" which you should be able to find in an online store near you. I bought mine from a local online store. You can find something like this near you.
EDIT: You will need to make sure that you get something similar with the opening where ball is (or make one yourself using wires and pliers) so that you can easily attach and detach the earrings that you assembled.

Beads, stones and blings

You will need some beads, gemstones, crystals, bling blings, alphabet beads, anything really, to mix and match to your heart's desire.

For this tutorial, I will be showing you this assembly:

• The bottom will be a Howlite stone
• The middle will be a silver bead cap
• At the top, will be a dark red bicone Swarovski crystal
  Your choices can be anything you fancy. Just place them in the order that you would like them to be positioned (which stone goes first, which bead goes last, et cetera).
  

Insert the needle from bottoms up (start from the Howlite stone, then the bead cap and then the Swarovski crystal).

Then, you do a U-turn and insert the needle back into the Swarovski crystal, followed by the bead cap and finally the Howlite stone.

After the U-turn insert, you should have a loop at the top of the assembly. The loop will be hooked to the earwire later.

Repeat the stringing for the other earring.

Adjust the length for both the earrings and cut the ends. Be generous with the length of the yarn to make it easier to tie knots later.
Note: Knots are recommended for the bottom of the earrings and the top to secure the beads and stones so that they don't fall off. You can choose to add knots in between the beads and stones of your choice to keep them in place or you can leave them loose. Either way is fine.

Start the knot at the top of the earring where the loop is.
This is where you adjust how long do you fancy the dangle.
We start at the top because it will be easier to adjust as you knot the bottom and cut off the excess.
I also chose to knot in between the Swarovski and the bead cap, for the fun of it. But it depends on your taste. It looks nice without the middle knot too. I just wanted to secure the beads and stones.
Tighten all the knots and make sure the lengths for both the earrings are the same before you tighten the 2nd earring.

At the bottom of the Howlite stone where the strings are in excess, do a double knot for each earring.

Once the knots are done and you are happy with the length and the look of both earrings, you can cut off the excess yarn at the bottom of the Howlite stones.
If your yarn is the type (like plastic) that can be burnt to seal, you may do so. Mine cannot be burn because it is cotton which will just disintegrate and turn into ashes in fire.

Remember the loop where we did a U-turn when we inserted the needle to string the earring? That is the part of the earring where we insert into our earwire. Just place the loop in between the opening between the earwire loop and ball and press it down.

Done!😎

You can mix and match with other stones and beads and crystals and bling blings to create multiple of this earrings which you can then just attach and detach from the earwires as you please, i.e. you just need to buy maybe 2 pairs of the earwires and you can have like 10 pairs of different colours and shapes and sizes dangling earrings. Isn't that funky?!

And in case, you got confused along the way, I hope the following schematic diagram can help explain a bit more:

I hope you will give this a try 😊

Thank you again to @crosheille for starting and hosting this wonderful community and to @crystalize for co-hosting it! If you love any craft that uses needles, come and join the fun with us here every Monday at #needleworkmonday! Or if you would like to share your needlework on other days, you can do so with the tag #needlework!