Tool Time Tuesday...Hardware Store Jewelry

You read that correctly...Hard "Wear". You will be wearing something from a hardware store after this Tool Time. I know what you're thinking right now..."this girl has a screw loose". Hey, screw loose, that's a TTT joke!!
space
Monday morning I ran to Home Depot before I went to work to pick up a piece of sheet metal that was going to be this week's TTT. However, Home Depot didn't have the same piece that I saw at Lowe's, so I had nothing to take a picture of for this week's Tool Time idea. Hmmm, what do I have at home in my box of goodies. I'll do my conduit pipe idea. So off I went to find the bracket I needed.
space
Well, look what I found instead of the brackets...conduit locknuts (what ever the heck that is), but it looks cute to me. We have conduit pipe in our basement. It's that pipe they run electrical wires through and it attaches to an outlet box. These must be a locknut for that, but it looks like jewelry to me...WOO HOO!!! A whole new world in the hardware store for you and me. I didn't have time to explore other possibilities, because I had to go to work, but my mind was ticking all day.


space
You will need a bag of these. They are only 73 cents for 20 of them!!! I'm telling you, we need to keep this on the hush hush. If the hardware store big wigs find out what we do with their cheap stuff, they're going to raise the prices for sure.
space


space
Then I ran over to the aisle where they have all the little bags of screws, washers and nuts and I found these. They are lock washers that are split. See the little picture of it...the 2 ends meet, but aren't attached so they separate easily. All the little bags of things are only 98 cents.

space

They separate easily with these two...one for each hand when you open up the little ring and when you close it.

Figure out your design. I was doing mine at 10:00 am Monday morning when I had to leave at 11:00 for work. If I had more time, I would have experimented with colorful beads.

First, you need to open up a little ring, slip on a big one and another little one. Close that one up with the pliers. Open up the third little ring and slip it into the last little ring and add a big ring. Close it up and continue on.

The first step will look like this. Two little rings are attached to the big ones with a little one in the middle.

Keep going until it is your desired size. I used 6 big rings and 18 little rings. I didn't use any jewelry closures, I just squeezed my hand through and it fit fine. You can add a clasp if needed, I just didn't have any on hand. There is a black shadow on the rings in this picture, but it isn't there in person. They are really shiny.

And here it is...isn't it pretty?!!! What's it made out of...who knows. The bag of little rings says stainless, but I'm not sure what the big rings are made of. Will it tarnish, will it turn your wrist green, how long will it last. Not sure of anything, I just made this up this morning. It's definitely a Tool Time experiment, but so cute. Not to mention cheap. I figured the big rings are 4 cents a piece and the little ones are 8 cents a piece. So for $1.68 it not bad.

If you were a fly on my wall this morning, you would have cracked up. I was all dressed in my work uniform ready to go to work. I wanted a better picture of the bracelet...not just sitting there on the table. So I undressed and put on an outfit just to show it off. I changed my top twice so the color would look good in the picture. I know...screw loose! Not to mention, I hate taking a picture of myself in the mirror, so I took a bunch...was my butt sticking out, why does my hand look like a man's hand in certain pictures, how did I get the cat's tail in this picture. I had to suck in my stomach, hold my breath, try to snap the picture with one hand, while making sure the camera strap wasn't in the picture!! Oh well, all in the name of blogging, right?!

space

Have a wonderful Tuesday,

~Karen~
space

ps...I just thought of another idea for this...wouldn't it make a really cute belt? Just need to think of a closure for it. Back to the hardware store.