A ribbon ending inspiration

What would it be if we didn’t give you a good mystery for the Sweet Margaretha Theme box, inspired by the one and only Mata Hari? Like the one called “What is hanging at the bottom of this ribbon?” The choice is yours!🙂

You can hang your pendants in many different ways, and this time Veronka will show you ideas on how to do it by sewing them right onto a ribbon from the Theme box –  10 mm Entwined galloon braid. You can use this for most of the ribbons as a simple solution, while adjusting the beadcount to match the width of the ribbon and components you use.

MATERIAL LIST:

• 22x 3 mm Fire-Polished beads (FP3)
• 6x Crescent bead (CRE)
• 15/0 Miyuki seed beads (R15A + R15B)
• 11/0 Miyuki Delica (C11)
• 11/0 Miyuki seed beads (R11)
• 0.5 m x 10 mm Entwined galloon braid
• Clasp

Pendant

This is the easiest way how to sew your pendant directly to the ribbon.

1. Exiting the bead on the top of the pendant pick up R15 + R11 + FP3 + (2) R15 and bead to CRE + Ribbon.
2. After a short stitch in the ribbon, pass to the open hole of CRE. Pick up (2) R15 + FP3 + R11 + R15 and bead to your starting bead.
3. Without adding new beads, pass through R15 + R11 + FP3 + (2) R15. Pick up (3) R15A + (2) R15B and bead to ribbon.
4. After a short stitch in the ribbon, pick up (2) R15B + (3) R15A and bead to (2) R15 + FP3 + R11 + R15 and bead to your starting bead.
5. Repeat the threadpath one more time (skip the pass through CRE).
6. You can repeat Steps 1-5 on the other side of the ribbon for more balance if needed.

Front and Back of the ribbon end

1. Fold the ribbon end. Pick up CRE + R15B + R11 + R15B and bead to the open hole of CRE.
2. Repeat Step 1 on the other side of the ribbon. Repeat the threadpath once more.
3.  Pick up a sufficient number of FP3 beads and join them in the circle in the folded ribbon. Repeat the thread path twice and tie a knot.
4. Add (3) R15A above the central FP3. Pass all around through FP3s + (2) R15A. Pick up R15A and clasp and follow the instructions of How to join beaded motif and components (or check the drawing below).
5. Tie knot and trim.
6. Repeat Steps 1-5 on the other end of the ribbon.

The side view of the added clasp and the connection.

Adding a component with the hole from right to left – always good to repeat!

This is definitely the easiest case of joining components.

After beading through the seed bead where you’d like to attach the loop (let’s call this the joint bead), pick up a sufficient number of size 15/0 seed beads, bead through the loop, and pick up the same amount of seed beads as before the loop. You might need to adjust the number of seed beads depending on the component, and always make sure that the component is turning the right way.

Bead through the joint bead one more time, from the same direction as before. If you’d like to create a more elegant shape from the 15/0 seed beads, retrace the thread path one more time, but skip the joint bead this time. The result is a teardrop instead of an oval.

Even if this is a super simple thing to do, you can play with the shape of the loop created from seed beads. If you retrace the thread path but skip the 15/0 in the middle, the result will be a rhombus instead of a teardrop, which might fit some designs more, especially geometric ones.

It might happen that the seed beads are hanging further from the component than you night wish. You can fix this by retracing them but skipping the last and the first seed bead next to the component.

What if the loop is turned to the ‘wrong way?’

I used to hate it when this happened, but since I figured out a simple solution, I like the look of this even more than the case that I showed you before.

This is what you need to do:

Bead through the joint bead. Pick up a group of 15/0 seed beads. Bead through the loop of the component from the front to the back, and pick up the same number of 15/0 seed beads. Instead of beading through the joint bead in the same direction as before, bead through it in the opposite direction. If your thread was hanging from left to right before picking up the first group of 15/0 beads, bead through the joint bead from the right to left this time.

Bead back through the second group of 15/0 beads, the loop of the component from back to front, and the first group of 15/0 seed beads that you picked up. Finish by beading through the joint bead again – in the original direction, before picking up the new beads and the component.

Since the beads are attached from both sides, they are evened out and they settle exactly in the middle, covering the top part of the loop, hanging exactly in the middle below the joint bead. If you want, you can retrace the thread path and skip the joint bead to create a teardrop-shape, like in the first case with the hole running from right to left.

Happy beading lovelies!