Back in August when we were in Greenwood, MS for a girls' weekend, my friend Sarah wore this cool necklace:
We all oohed and ahhed over it that weekend. Sarah said she found it at a craft fair (I think) and while she really loved the idea of it, she didn't like that it had cheap beads in between the watch faces. So, back in August, I offered to take it and revamp it a little and get rid of the plastic beads.
Here's a closer look. The clear and silver beads in between each watch face are very cheap and very plastic.
I got right to work shortly after the trip to Greenwood. I had decided to ditch the beads all together and hang each watch face from its own piece of chain. I had several different chain types from my jewelry making days, so I also decided to use different colors and styles of chain.
The biggest watch face, pictured above, was centered on its section of chain. The others I hung slightly off center so that instead of stacking up on top of each other, they'd lay side by side when the necklace was worn. It was tedious work. I counted links on each chain so that I could get my spacing right. In my head, this new layout for the necklace was going to be awesome!
In reality? Eww.
Yea, it looked bad. Once I put it on to model it, I already knew it wasn't the awesomness that I had pictured in my head. But if I had had any doubts about it, Doc's reaction when he saw it solidified it. This version of the necklace looked like part of an S&M outfit. Not to mention that it tangled up after any slight movement.
So what'd I do? I set it on a counter in our bedroom and walked away so I could think on it. And there it sat. And sat and sat and sat. The cleaning ladies cleaned around it, Doc and I stacked stuff on top of it, and it just got more and more tangled up.
A few weeks ago I decided to clean out our built-in bookshelves and the counter the necklace was on. I was tired of looking at it. Since I knew I was going to be seeing Sarah again last week, it was time to try again.
This time, I strayed from the original length of the necklace and decided to make it long. Instead of placing the biggest watch face in the middle like I previously had, this time I let it shine all on its own. I put it on one side of the necklace by itself, and kept the four smaller ones together in a group. I used a slightly bigger silver chain that I already had to attach them all together.
I forgot to take in-progress pictures. Sorry. But here's a shot (taken by Allison) of how the necklace looked when I finally gave it back to Sarah.
It may have taken me seven months (cue the "it's about time" jokes), but I think it turned out pretty cute. I personally prefer long necklaces to shorter ones. Hopefully Sarah does too and will get more wear out of it this way.
I was able to give the necklace to Sarah last Tuesday when we were both invited over to Allison's house for a birthday dinner. You should read this post of Allison's to see the awesome six-layer birthday cake she made!