Trip to Cousin Corporation Day 3

It seems like ages ago since I got back from visiting the headquarters of Cousin Corporation in Florida. {If you missed my first two recaps of the trip read them here and here!) I would totally be ok with going back to the beach and all of the beads pronto!!!! But since that won't be happening anytime soon I will just reminisce on my last day there I suppose :)

The last day that we were in Florida was pretty quick.  We were picked up at the hotel at 7:30AM and had to be all packed for the airport. It was lovely getting ready that last morning - as it got closer to 7 and the sun came up I left my balcony door open to hear the ocean better and feel the fresh air.  Such a glorious feeling!!

That morning at Cousin we had a variety of meetings learning more about their sister retail site Prima Bead (Cousin only sells beads wholesale to major suppliers like Walmart and Michaels and also to local bead shops, so Prima allows them to sell right to the public), how Cousin follows current trends, and more about the production process of getting the beads into the stores. I learned so much about the jewelry supplies biz during this trip! 

After all of our learning the last activity was the one I had been looking forward to for MONTHS before this trip - filling up a big box full of beads to take home!! We were given a priority mailing box:

 And then were led out to this big warehouse....

 And then we got closer...to...the...PROMISED LAND OF BEADS.

Two long hallways stocked full of discontinued beads that we were free to "shop" from and Cousin would package up and send home to us.

 We had about 20 minutes to stuff our box and it got pretty intense.  It was CRAZY humid this last day and the warehouse was not air conditioned, I started to work up a sweat from grabbing so many beads!!! (Hence the crazy hair in this photo)

My strategy was to hit up all of the chain first. I love using chain in my jewelry and wanted a bigger stash up it so I scooped up most of them in the beginning. Sorry other ambassadors!! Haha, we actually all have very different styles so we gravitated to different types of beads. Below you can see Dawn trying to stuff her box full and Allison and Shelly still picking a few items to top theirs off with!

I just got my box back in the mail this week and of course HAD to spread it all out to take a good look: 

Hello my pretties...

Cousin, you know how to make a bead hoarding/crafting/jewelry making girls dreams come true :)

Overall the trip was a BLAST and I'm so sad I have to just go back to virtually talking to all my beading friends! We all got along great and loved spending time learning and creating together. Cousin also welcomed all of us to stay on as ambassadors for another year so I am excited for more projects and beading news to share with you all! But for now...I have to find a home for all of my new beads!!!

DIY Wire Wrapped Teardrop Earrings

Wire wrapping is still one jewelry making technique that I am delving into more and more. I know the basics (see this wire wrap tutorial or this one for an easy intro project) but there is really so much you can do with the wire wrap technique after you catch the hang of it. There certainly are complex jewelry pieces you can make with more advanced wire wrapping skills, but just wire wrapping a basis earring form into a set of earrings can have such a delicate and dainty yet professional approach that your friends won't believe you when you tell them you made it yourself!

So even though these earrings involve some basic wire work, don't be intimidated, its very simple and easy to get the hang of! 

 Supplies:

To make your own earrings you will need two different gauges of wire (about 24/26 gauge for the skinny wire and 16/18 gauge for the thicker wire), 4mm czech glass beads, earring wires, needle nose pliers, round nose pliers, and wire cutters. 

Steps:

To start these earrings cut two lengths of your thicker wire about 7 inches long each using wire cutters

 Use round nose pliers to round one end into a loop and then gradually use your fingers to form the rest of the wire into a tear drop shape

Make sure to leave a decent tail above the tear drop like so. Don't worry about making your tear drop shape perfect, it won't be super noticeable after its wire wrapped!

Cut a long piece of the thin wire and wire wrap a couple wraps directly beneath the loop you formed with the thick wire.

Pull these wraps tight and then add on a czech glass bead

Position this bead on the outer side of the earring form and then wrap the thin wire two times around the earring form to secure it in place

Continue this pattern like so:

When you have reached the other side of the earring form wrap a few more times without any beads to finish the wire strand off.

Cut off any excess wire with wire cutters and position the tail flush against the earring form using needle nose pliers.

Directly above the wire wrap bend the earring form back 90 degrees using needle nose pliers

Use wire cutters to trim off all but a short tail

Then use round nose pliers to form a circle perpendicular to the one you formed at the beginning

Hook this circle around the original circle and squeeze shut using needle nose pliers

Now that you've got the hang of it you can make another one no sweat right??!!?

Lastly, all you need to do is attach an earring wire! Use needle nose pliers to open back up the original circle 

And then add on an earring wire and squeeze back shut using needle nose pliers

Voila! A beautiful set of wire wrapped earrings.

You can do a lot with this basic technique.  Instead of a tear drop shape you could make a circle or a star, you could do two tear drop shapes within one another or even add a dangle of chain down the center with bead charms for added interest.

But for right now I like these earrings just as they are. The perfect set of pink dainty earrings that have just the right about of handmade flair!

Your Whims Wednesday #152 {And Features}

Time for another Your Whims Wednesday Party!

<center> <a href="http://www.mygirlishwhims.blogspot.com/"><img border="0" src="http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y77/Becca187/YWWsnip.jpg"/></a></center>

In case you haven't been around the blog this week yet, I've been sharing about my recent visit down to the Florida to the headquarters of Cousin Corporation, the bead manufacturer! You can read my first two recaps here and here. Spoiler alert: posts involve lots of BEADS :)


And just as a quick personal side note, today is my two year wedding anniversary! It's crazy to think that I'm 23 and have been married for two years already. We are so happy together though so I'm glad we got started young :) I was blogging when we got married so I did post a recap if you're interested!


But anyway, enough about me: here are some of my favorites from last week!

DIY Wood Love Sign Burlap and Bananas


Paint Dipped Upcycle Craft Organizers by The Concrete Cottage

Chevron Bag by Gina's Craft Corner

Icicle Wrapped Bracelet by Undeniable Glitter

Thanks to all who linked up! Grab a button if you were featured :)  
<center> <a href="http://www.mygirlishwhims.blogspot.com/"><img border="0" src="http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y77/Becca187/featurededited.jpg"/></a></center>   Now... onto this weeks party!

I show off my girlish whims weekly on my blog, and now I want to see yours with 
Your Whims Wednesday!

Guidlines:

1. Link up as many projects as you would like: as long as it is one of your girly ways, you can link it! I'd love to see crafts, recipes, style posts, etc. Anything and everything feminine :)

2.Please add my button (code at the top of this post) to either your blog post or somewhere on your blog. 

3. Take a quick moment to comment on at least one other entry. We we all love comments!! 

4.I'd love if you would follow me as well :)

An InLinkz Link-up

Trip to Cousin Corporation Day 2

I’m back to talk about the second day of my trip to Cousin Corporation. If you missed the first part, you can find it here!

The second day of our trip was LONG. We were picked up at our hotel at 7AM which definitely came earlllly after staying up late enjoying myself the day before. This morning ocean view did help to make up for it though for sure :)

We all loaded back up onto the “Cuz Bus” and headed out to visit the company headquarters.

One of the things I really took away from this trip is how…approachable and relatable the Cousin company and brand is. Cousin is a MULTI-million dollar enterprise but it is run with a family background and realistic principles.


The president, Jeff Cousin is a business man and very successful but he doesn’t have a crazy huge office or ego. Liz Heggy the sales manager really carries a lot responsibility and has a lot of power within the company but talked and related to all of us ambassadors as just another girlfriend.


We took a tour of the facilities and got to see where all the beading magic happens. I loved how the office décor was all about beads and jewelry!!! There were pictures displayed everywhere and lots of handmade jewelry displayed throughout the building. I mean, they even had handmade jewelry displayed in the bathroom. Talk about inspiration EVERYWHERE!!! 

The best part about the tour was seeing all of the masses of BEADS!!! I was basically salivating. I mean, I think I could have just moved in and lived amongst the bead displays and forever be happy.

We got to see the different collections they have set up for different stores and how they arrange to have all of these beads displayed on different planograms. There is so much science and process behind getting those pretty little beads onto the shelf and into the consumer’s basket.



Another part of the tour was to visit the warehouse where all the orders are packaged and shipped out. Walmart is a HUGE customer for Cousin. Cousin basically stocks about 75% of the jewelry section for Walmart in America and Canada. That’s a lot of beads! They have an entire assembly system and entire team of workers dedicated just to Walmart orders.



The warehouse might not be as pretty as the office section, but still just the thought of the amount of beads in that place makes me drool. This looooong aisle is just filled with boxes upon boxes of beads. And there were a lot of aisles!!!



After our tour we headed out with Liz Heggy to do store visits at Walmart, Michaels and Joanns. We learned a lot about how Cousin has to stay on top of trends and styles and present new lines to the store buyers months before the trend actually hits to get the real estate space in the store. Also, each store has a different type of target customer and as such not all of the same beads are stocked at each store. It was fun watching Liz check out all the competitor products, she even had a store employee come over and scan one empty section to see who's stuff was going to be moved in there next.



After our store visits we had a product development and trend lunch to share what we thought Cousin could be doing better with, and then after that it was time to craft!!! I was so excited to get to bead since we had just toured the facilities AND went to three different craft stores, my fingers were itching to get at some beads and make something.



All of us ambassadors were paired with a Cousin designer and we each had to create a necklace, bracelet, and earring set that will be used in inspiration marketing at AC Moore stores! We were each assigned a color story (I had pink/red, go figure why haha) and given a bunch of strands to work with. We could supplement our strands with extra findings and accent beads from the AC Moore section of beads at Cousin. Man it was fun to be able to go pick a bunch of beads off the shelf to craft with and not have to buy them first haha! We were given two hours to craft and the in-house designers were there to help us, but man it was intense! I managed to get my necklace and earrings done and my lovely designer Theresa executed my bracelet idea. I pretty much felt like I was on project runway for beading haha. We were all set up around a big conference table that was just COVERED with beads and random supplies when we were done.



I can't share what I made until summer time when all the new Cousin strands will hit AC Moore stores. I will be sure to share after that though :) After the mad dash to design, we headed back to our hotel to get fancied up for dinner. We were supposed to wear another handmade jewelry design so I sported my DIY Silver Sparkle Necklace



We were treated to dinner at the schwanky Middle Grounds Grill. Since we were right by the ocean I made sure to try some seafood like this fish spread and my entree was a shrimp pasta. I even tried a mussel for my first time! I was a littllleee scared but I ate it anyway. It wasn't bad either!



We all had a great time and then when it was time to head out I saved the last of the wine from the table haha (no one was taking it!) In Florida they give you little goodie bags to take home your wine bottles if you don't finish them! They also sell wine and liquor in Walmart which this PA girl can't understand since our state has such weird alcohol laws and you have to go to three different store to by wine, a six pack and a case of beer (and none of those places are a grocery store).



After dinner some of the ambassadors went to bed and few of us others enjoyed a little more time enjoying the Florida weather outside the hotel and walking along the beach. This was a picture from earlier in the evening- it was just SUCH a pretty area to be in! Can I move to the beach now??



This was our only full day in Florida so it was packed full but it was a good type of busy! Friday was our last day in Florida (*cries*) and I will be back to talk about that soon!