Happy Birthday Liam

This is late because it's the third kid and during shelter-in-place which requires home schooling too. It's a rough time.  But better late than never.  His birthday was April 14.

My mom made the number collage for me again. I made the chalkboard. I have to say the chalkboard was harder to fill out this time. I couldn't remember if his first word was dada or yeah. I tried to go back and find it but wasn't sure. I couldn't even think of foods he likes or what he likes to do.

    

If we would have had a birthday party, we would have displayed these. If we have a delayed one then we will print  them. 

I kept track up to 2.5 for Ella and 2 for Miles. I definitely won't keep track of all this for another year.

If you want to see I also have similar posts for Ella and Miles.

More Necklace Links

I've spent many hours here and there looking for various charms. They are hard to find. There are so many out there and also so many that are the same exact charm but cost a lot more money.

Since my last post I bought some running charms on Etsy. They were hard to find. Most were not in bulk and you could find one charm for $20 but that is just too expensive for me.

I bought a variety pack, cameras, ice cream cones, unicorns, sports, traveling (bikes, cars, airplanes) and letters since the last post. The variety packs always are cheaper per charm but I feel like about half of those won't be used even with a group choosing charms. I also bought a bigger chain for charm bracelets and more solid bracelets. The pictures below are all links.

The unicorn charms are pretty large but the kids loved them and used them with best friends forever charms.

This necklace shows 2 of the 3 running type ones I got on Etsy. I got the shoe on amazon.

I have had this tab open on Etsy with infinity charms just to give myself ideas when I plan to use mine!

This one is the link to the camera one I used but it has many other choices too.

Apparently the last 4 pictures don't work. I've tried multiple ways. But if you click on them it takes you to the charms. Maybe I'll fix it another time.  ETA the last 4 don't even show up at all now. I will try to add pictures later!
Have you done any jewelry making? What type of charms would you like? I like the lifting and running ones but then had to get the cameras. Those seem to be my hobbies. I want to start running again!

Jewelry Making

I decided to take up another type of craft with Ella. I bought a bunch of stuff to make jewelry with Ella. I did a lot of searching on Amazon for good sizes and good prices. I figured I'd share them. Links and descriptions below but at the bottom are pictures that are links.

I had a necklace (bottom left) that was a little long for most shirts so I added a jump ring. It can still be worn at it's original length too.  I timed how long it took me to make one on the right and I was shocked it took a half hour to assemble and deal with the jump rings. 

Best Friends Forever Charms I'm not sure how I need 90 of these but that is what I have.

Children's blank Bracelets These just barely go on my wrist too. But they are 2.0 inches. The next size up seems to be 2.4 inches. Sometimes 2.6 inches is used for women. 2.2 would be better for me. I bought a bracelet once with charms on it and it was 3.0 inches and incredibly large. That's what made me decide to try to make my own jewelry.

Unicorn Necklaces (part of a kit)   Now if you don't want to be making a ton of necklaces you can just buy some unicorn best friend necklaces. These have made great gifts in the past. We are on our second batch of these. Unicorns are apparently a big thing with the kids.

Thin necklace chain  It comes out to less than 40 cents a necklace!  It is too thin for some of the jump rings and some jump rings are too little to go around charms. So I also ordered the 2.0 mm chain instead of just the 1.5 mm chain. It comes with 20 clasps and 30 jump rings. I'd say at a minimum you need 40 jump rings with 20 clasps. At 18" a necklace you'd get 24 necklaces. Most kid necklaces are shorter than 16" so you'd end up needing more clasps too. But you definitely need more jump rings that fit. Some necklaces I was splitting with the infinity symbols so 1 necklace uses 4 jump rings.

Jump Rings (since I ordered, I saw this one with tools) None of these jump rings will fit through the chain of the 1.5 mm chain but they fit around it. They are just a little too thick to go into it.

Infinity Charms
100 Charms
Workout Charms

You will also need needle nose pliers and wire cutters but I already owned both.

Keep in mind how inexpensive the chain is and the clasps and the jump rings but then you have 100 charms or 36 feet of chain so then you have a lot of supplies. It's not worth it for a couple necklaces/bracelets. We will be making these for gifts and for ourselves. But we will probably have a ton of charms leftover but then want different charms too.  I'm still trying to look into some form of nylon for bracelets with string but I haven't done ample research yet.

I still need to figure out nylon for bracelets to use some of the infinity symbols and then make them adjustable. Have you ever made any jewelry yourself?  I used to make jewelry all the time with beads growing up. But I never had charms.


Links are affiliate. Trying something new since people buy stuff after I spend all the research figuring it out.