Crafty people, I need your HELP!!!!!

A good friend of mine is in a relationship with her boyfriends birthday coming up, the first time they hung out they stood under a tree in the rain and she wanted to try making beads from the leaves of that tree to make matching bracelets for it. She got the idea after seeing something about making beads from flowers on Oprah.

She's asked me to help her find a way to do this, but I can't find much apart from a wiki-how and another method using clay, which she isn't keen on.

I was wondering what other ways we could try to make long lasting beads from leaves, please let me know if you have any ideas, we have about 3 weeks until she needs to make it.

Thanks so much!!!

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5 replies since 28th February 2011 • Last reply 28th February 2011

Reply #1:

Hey that is such a great idea! I have flowers from my grandmothers funeral made into a resin pendant, but I dont think that would look good on a brace let. Have you seen this how-to though? It looks pretty good

http://www.ehow.com/how_5829196_make-real-flowers-jewelry.html

If that doesnt bring it up go to www.ehow.com and search for

How to Make Real Flowers Into Jewelry
By Melissa Reece,

The only thing I would change is just to seal it with some type of paint sealer or resin. Just to make sure the beads done fall apart if they get wet again.

good luck<3

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Reply #2:

Have you seen newspaper beads? They're made from strips of newspaper and rolled up. Maybe you could do something similar with the beads? And then paint them over with Mod Podge, so bugs or whatever can't get at them (there are so many uses for that stuff).

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Reply #3:

Wow thanks guys, wasn't expecting such a fast reply! That's awesome.
Pammerz, every website I looked at so far has been a method pretty much the same to that, so I think that's really on the right path, hoping that leaves have similar oils to flowers, I think it needs something over it too. Maybe that Mod Podge that Sarah D mentioned, thanks Sarah D! I'm not sure if we have that in Australia but I'll start looking. I heard of it but only by name. I'm guessing it might be like our Clag, haha. I hadn't thought of the bugs :s

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Reply #4:

PS If you cant find Mod Podge, theres a really helpful board post about how to make your own! I always see it pop up on the rightside of the page in the little box, that has the "most viewed" and "in this forum" sections. Its the number one mos viewed. Good luck, if you and your friend end up making some beads, post it as a project. I'd love to see how it turnes out!
<3

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Reply #5:

Oh! I see it, fantastic, thanks! And I will, I'll make sure she takes some pictures all the way through.

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