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Alcohol Ink Paper Beads

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pillow beads

In my newest video, I’m finally making alcohol ink paper beads after shying away from them.

In the same video, I’m also tackling the issue of how to easily thread pillow beads to make a necklace.

alcohol ink paper beads
I finally figured how to make pillow beads easy to thread on 1mm elastic.

Why did I initially shy away from making alcohol ink paper beads?

Well as viewers of my YouTube channel will know, in April, I published this tutorial.

alcohol ink paper beads
A previous video using alcohol inks

That tutorial was going to be about making paper beads using my alcohol ink paintings but it ended up being about pendants instead.

Most paper beads waste so much of the design and colour on whatever paper you are using.

That is because as you roll the beads, the central part of the strip gets hidden.

So if you’ve spent a fortune on alcohol inks and created beautiful paintings with them, why hide most of your work inside a paper bead?

And so in the middle of shooting that tutorial, I changed direction and made pendants instead of paper beads.

I did talk about my change of direction in the video and one kind viewer came up with a suggestion.

So thank you Deanna for the idea I have used in my latest tutorial on alcohol ink paper beads.

Deanna told me it’s not her idea, it’s one she saw on YouTube but couldn’t remember the creator’s name.

Whoever it was had used their alcohol ink paintings to make puff beads (also called pillow beads).

Pillow beads are where you wrap the traditional triangualar paper bead strips around each other, as I demonstrate in my video.

Pillow Beads

I do think it’s a brilliant idea even though it does still hide quite a bit of your painting efforts.

Also, I haven’t been much of a pillow bead fan because they can be tricky to thread onto stringing materials.

So in this video, I set out to find a way to make pillow beads easier to string as well.

Making your alcohol ink paper beads in this pillow style does show a bit more of your lovely artwork.

My finished stretchy alcohol ink pillow beads necklace.

But I still wasn’t completely happy with hiding any of my expensive alcohol ink patterns inside paper beads.

But then I got to thinking about the alcohol ink creations that don’t thrill me as much as others and I had a look through my stash of work.

Sure enough, there were some in there that I was happy to use to make alcohol ink paper beads.

Ok, so technically, these aren’t paper beads because it’s on Yupo but they are Yupo paper beads.

And if you follow my technique for using plain paper with alcohol inks, you can easily use actual paper for this.

Just use good quality thickish paper and follow what I do in the tutorial.

My regular readers and viewers know that I usually giveaway a free printable with each project.

This time, I’m giving away another one of my alcohol ink abstracts. It isn’t the one I used in the project – it’s better! (In my humble opinion of course 😂).

I didn’t want to use the original for alcohol ink paper beads because too much would get lost in the rolling.

But I may well print this off myself and make a necklace.

This is the design and you can use it in any craft project.

alcohol ink paper beads
This week’s free printable to print and cut up for craft use.

Click here to go to Google Drive and get the full resolution image.

You can find my Terms & Conditions of using my free printables by clicking here.

If you aren’t sure where to get craft supplies such as alcohol inks – see my links below.

I have two Amazon storefronts where I list most of the supplies and tools I use in my videos for those who are not near a craft store.

Amazon.co.uk

Amazon.com

Amazon affiliate statement.

Thank you for stopping by here and don’t forget to subscribe so you get to know about all the free printables I publish.

You can find my previous free printables by clicking here.

Take care everyone and come back soon to see what’s next after my alcohol ink paper beads.