Pieces by Polly: Stamped Washers

Wednesday, April 20, 2011

Mother's Day Stamped Washer Necklaces Tips & Giveaway

A year or so ago, I was doing a lot with stamped washers projects and stamped washers were all over blogland. It all started (for me...) with this post on Not So Idle Hands. The ironic thing is that even though I started with making washer necklaces, I never got around to posting about those...so I'm doing it now. I'm sure you've all seen these before, but I thought with Mother's Day coming up, it might be a good time to post about them. These make a great gift to make with your kids and are also simple enough to do as a youth group activity.

To stamp the washers, I ordered my stamp set from Harbor Freight online for $5 (plus $7 shipping). It's been well worth the investment already with the number of things I've been able to make with them. You can find my directions for stamping the washers here. Or if you want to make it really easy on yourself, you can order them custom stamped from me in my shop. For a limited time, I've got a Mother's Day special. You can order 4 washers for $1.25 plus shipping. (The regular price is $1.75.) If you want to order a large number of washers for a youth group activity that have mostly the same phrases on them, contact me at polly.helping.little.hands (at) gmail (dot) com for a bulk rate quote.

There are all sorts of ways to make them. I've used leather cord, ribbon, hemp, woven cord, and elastic cord. They all work great but each have their own look, depending on what you want. You can add beads or leave them plain. Many of the pictures show hemp because that's what I first had available. I've come to prefer the colored woven cord or the leather, though.

Last year I helped the Firecracker and Little Brother make necklaces with their names for their birthmoms. They chose the beads and I helped build up the necklaces.

We also made some last year for the Grandmas...

You can also stamp them with the kids' or grandkids' names.

And they're great for just about any reason for kiddos...because one thing I've learned is kids LOVE anything with their name on it. These were for some cousins.

I've made several different versions for Firecracker over the last year.

Okay, so here's how I make my necklaces. Take you string of choice, cut it longer than you think you'll need it...because you can always trim more off if you need to. Fold it in half, and stick the loop through the hole in your washer. Then take the two ends and put them back through the loop.

Then you can add beads however you like. I kind of liked them seperated a bit along the necklace and used knots to hold the beads where I wanted them.

I also like the really simple look of just adding one bead after the washer.

There are tons of ways to finish the necklace as well. The easiest, of course, is just to make it long enough to tie a knot and slip it over your head. If you're looking for something easy, but a bit more sophisticated, you can use a bead and a loop as I did here.

I've also used jewelry claps held on with crimp beads for a more traditional necklace, although the cord has to be thin enough to fit through the crimp beads.

And as long as I'm on the subject of stamped washers...

Check out all my posts with stamped washer projects.

Zipper Pull Tab	Grandpa Keychain	Dad Keychain
Grad Keychain	Washer Earrings	T-shirt Bag Tags
How to Stamp a Heart	Washer Necklaces	Backpack Tags
Order Custom Stamped Washers from my Shop

And finally the GIVEAWAY to reward you for making it to the end of the post. I'm giving away a set of custom stamped washers to one lucky reader. If you win, you can choose to have them sent loose to make necklaces with, or I'll make them into a keychain for you...your choice. (If we get a lot of entries, then I might choose two or three winners.) Entries open utnil April 27th at 12:00pm PST. Make sure your emails is attached to your blogger account or leave it with your comment.

~~One super simple way to enter:~~