Between the various family outings, visiting high school friends, the solid cloudy skies since Christmas, the utter lack of bright, direct lighting in my house, and the fact that my mother actually wanted to wear her gift, it has occurred to me that I should have taken photos of it before I wrapped it. But I finally have some good ones.

Anyway, last year I got my mother these earrings for Christmas, and she loves them. So I thought this year I would get her a matching necklace. But the seller doesn’t have anything like them anymore, and neither does anyone else on Etsy. Clearly it would be up to me to create such a thing. So I searched the internet and found a place that sells matching beads, bought a gold chain and assorted findings, and set to work.

I had a basic idea of the look I wanted, relatively simple with one teardrop bead in the middle and round bead on either side, so then I played around with spacing and how to incorporate the crystal accents. I had a little trouble manipulating the eye pins and of course I wanted everything I did to be perfectly even and round, but several sets of impartial eyes assured me that it looks good anyway. Overall I’m quite happy with it, and so is my mom.