Greetings!
After a hiatus from blogging, I'm back with an exciting announcement: It's time for Happy Mango Beads' "Trash to Treasure" beading contest!
This is a fun one, with categories such as "Trash to Cash" (paper, plastic, bottle caps, etc.) and "Scrap Metal" (metal, old keys, chain, etc.). Prizes are gift certificates for Happy Mango Bead products.
The deadline is May 13th, so put on your thinking cap, create a new piece and enter it!
Lessons learned in a beading class. . .
Okay, I won't say that everything I ever needed to know, I learned from beading. But I did learn some valuable lessons the other evening when I taught a beading class. It was a class on making a simple strung bracelet. Simple? Not necessarily. Here's what I took away:
- 25 people is probably too big a group for one instructor unless you have a giant projection screen up front.
- Don't teach crimping to 25 people at once (without said giant projection screen) and expect them to be able to crimp their own bracelets just like that.
- Do call on friends to serve as assistants who can travel around the tables and help beginning beaders.
- Put your handouts (with instructions to follow at home, coupon code for your Etsy shop, contact info, etc.) by the exit door, not in the opposite corner.
- Don't set up your own station in the darkest corner of the room.
- Don't open a tube of crimp beads while standing up and then bend over to pick up something from the floor. . .
- Repeat people's names when you are introduced; this can help you remember them later.
