Costume Jewelry: Rhinestone Rings

Rings have always been a staple in my collection, I love them big and flashy as well as small and conservative. I tend to buy more costume rings than precious metal rings because they are a lot cheaper which means you can add more to your collection. Flea markets are a great place to buy costume jewelry and rhinestone rings are always a popular selection, you can usually find nice size rhinestone rings of all colors and styles for under 5 dollars. I know many women think costume jewelry is cheaply made therefore it doesn't last long and not worth the money but that is not always the case. I've had costume jewelry pieces that have lasted for years and still as pretty as the day I bought them, its all about taking care of your jewelry no matter how cheap or expensive it is. Learning proper storing techniques will also increase the life of your jewelry and keep it looking sparkly. Also picking the best days for wearing your jewelry will help keep it like new. If its a very hot day silver tone jewelry especially rings are not your best bet, when you sweat it will cause the material to break down and eventually turn your finger green this is also true on rainy days or days when you want to go swimming. There are many ways to increase the life of your costume jewelry so you can keep them looking like new for years to come.

Glass and Crystal Beaded Bracelet

I love working with glass and crystal I would guess the majority of my pieces of jewelry feature glass, crystal or both. Summer in my opinion is the best time of year to wear crystal or glass because once the jewelry catches a ray of sunlight it will sparkle and be very dazzling grabbing the attention of those around you. I guess you can say I love "bling" and anything that has a little sparkle or glitter so most of my beaded jewelry will reflect that. If one were to raid my bead collection they would be amazed at how many glass beads I own, foil lined glass beads dominate my glass collection followed by faceted and bicone crystal beads.
A lot of cheap costume jewelry that I have bought over the years are made with cheap plastic feeling fake glass beads that look nice but feel horrible so when I started recreating vintage style costume jewelry I wanted to keep the same look but use real glass and crystal beads and the results turned out to be very popular. Above is a picture of a bracelet I made with blue foil lined glass beads, light sapphire Swarovski crystal beads clear glass beads and foil lined seed beads.

Beaded Jewelry: Quartz

Quartz is one of the most abundant minerals on earth it comes in many different varities, agate, rose quartz, amethyst, jasper, aventurine and onyx are a few popular varieties of Quartz. A lot of the beaded jewelry that I make and wear contain some type of quartz mineral. I love all types of gemstone jewelry but rose quartz is usually my go to stone, I like to wear pink all year long so I find alot of my beaded jewelry consist of rose quartz with some type of crystal bead or glass bead accent. One of my favorite pairs of dangle earrings that I made were rose quartz with pink glass pearl beads and pink rose Swarovski crystal bicones (pictured above) I wore these a lot last summer.