I’ve always enjoyed making beaded bracelets and necklaces. It’s a wonderful thing to do with children too, although I often find myself carrying on long after they’ve wandered off and started doing something else. We have a box full of random beads in all different shapes, colours and sizes. Some came from kits, others from brocken jewelry. Some were mine when I was little. It’s a real sammelsurium (in English hodgepodge, I just like the German).

Recently I needed some little prizes to put in the layers of a pass-the-parcel and some bigger prizes for other games. So in an attempt to be thrifty and reuse stuff I already have, out came the bead box and some hat elastic. Further inspiration came from my three years old’s current interest in sorting things by colour. The result was eight little rainbow bracelets (which I forgot to photograph) and two necklaces.