New Beader.

Q: I would add some thread heaven to the order and be sure you get a couple of different weights and colors of 'Nymo' or 'Soft-Flex'. Some bead tips will hide your crimp beads, and some boullion wire (gold or silver) will cover the exposed thread/soft-flex wire.

A: Your list looks good to me. I just wanted to further encourage your decision to purchase a crimping tool. I love mine. I got an excellent price on it at that "dabeadbabe" site. I don't use barrel clasps because they come undone so easily. I make a lot of my own hook & eye clasps, and I use lobster clasps on expensive/heavy pieces. Don't forget when you make that matching bracelet (and you will, you know), barrel clasps take TWO hands to open or close. Definitely go for springrings/lobsters/etc. if you make a bracelet. My mother had a hard time with the barrels, but doesn't like the lobsters or toggle clasps. I found these HUGE barrel clasps which she found very easy to use. I can't remember where I got them! How wide is the bracelet, and did you leave a long enough leader of small beads attached to the "T part" of the clasp? There needs to be about as many as the length of the "T cross bar" for this to work. Soft/half-hard/hard/etc? I'm quite a beginner at wire-wrapping, but I've been using half-hard, since the soft seems to just kind of melt when I wire-wrap it. Those are the beatle clasps, which I'm still working on (I used to be an engineer, y'know!). I'm trying to find the gauge/hardness/shape of wire that will work the best. I'm just making regular wire-wrapped hooks & eyes right now for pieces.

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