Pillow Beads To Make and Thread

Pillow beads are notoriously hard to thread when made the commonly known way.

Pretty as they are, if you don’t know how to make a proper threading hole, they are useless.

Last May, I shared an idea I had on how you can make these beads with a proper hole.

That video is mainly about making alcohol ink paper beads but also, how to make the pillow bead holes.

My favourite, go-to threading material is 1mm round elastic, and it’s very hard to thread this type of bead on that.

In my latest video, available by clicking here, I show how to make these beads with my new free printable.

If you make these beads the normal way, you don’t end up with very clear threading holes.

You can force a thick needle through the corners of the beads to create more of a hole.

But the beads don’t look very neat afterwards and it’s still hard to get 1mm elastic through.

So I found a way to overcome that so I could thread beads like this.

I usually only use one strip per bead when I make my paper beads.

We use two strips per bead when making pillow beads, which leaves room for creative color mixing.

You can mix and match the strips however you want if you use my free printable to make these beads,

I used tiny silver metal spacer beads in the video but, I ended up swapping them for wooden ones instead.

The wooden beads were lighter and seemed to complement the pillow bead colours better than silver.

But of course you can use whatever spacer beads your choose; you could make your own paper spacer beads.

You can download it by clicking here, then all you need to do is print it off on photo paper and cut up.

Follow my YouTube video as well if you aren’t sure how to make the beads.

And there are more free printables here on my download page.

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