Beading with seed beads takes time and patience. Sometimes it’s good to have some aces in your sleeve. If you can bead faster, you won’t grow to hate your unfinished project. We all know how frustrating it feels when you bead and bead day after day and finishing the project seems as distant as it was the day you started. We wish to maintain the feeling to be full of inspiration and eager to create something wonderful.
This idea is not my invention, but it has helped me so much that I want to share it. It’s quite simple: this is just like ordinary peyote stitch but instead of picking one and skipping one, you pick three and skip three. This requires that the amount of beads in one row is divisible by three. Even count peyote would be 6, 12, 18 beads and so on. Odd count would be 9, 15, 21 and so on. Technique is from B & B, the design is my own. (Note: is says there’s a video but there isn’t. At least I didn’t find one. The sketch here is the important thing.)
This is what you’ll need for a bead roll:
144 seed beads
1 needle
Some tape
1 yard of beadstring
Here we go. One row is made of 24 beads. After first row you turn and start the three-drop peyote: pick three, skip three.
After second turn you can add a piece of wire. That may help to keep your work stable. Using the wire may feel a bit tricky at first. Taping it down helps a lot.
When all six rows are at place, you can to remove the wire. It has now served its purpose. The bead with green dot is the same one as in the next picture on left.
Pick up the sides in sets of three and tighten the thread until you have a tube.
Tie double knot (or so called surgeon’s knot) to prevent your work loosening.
To end your tube nicely, pass the thread through first set of beads, tie a the thread in the needle with existing thread that holds your work together. Do this two or three times with both loose threads. Then you can direct the threads out from the other end and cut away the extra.
For a necklace, you’ll need at least 8 of these tubes. In my necklace, there are 8 tubes with grey 8 mm glass beads. They are put together with ordinary beading wire, just like when making a necklace with big beads.
