Paper beads - by Shell

I discovered the world of paper beads at a little local church-hall-flea-market a few months back. A woman was selling paper beads hand made by women in Uganda (Hope Beads), with all the money raised going back to them in their community. Curious, I did a little googling and stumbled on this fantastic site... http://www.paperbeads.org/ ...complete with tutorials. The beads made by Janice are just beautiful and well worth a look. Having a go at making my own has given me an appreciation for just how skillful and patient she is; she makes it look so easy in the video-tutorial. So here is a picture of my first attempt, a work in progress at the moment. So far I've cut my paper strips from newspaper and rolled about half of them up. I liked the idea of using newspaper, with the thought that each bead carries it's own story in more ways than one. What would make this stage a lot easier is having a ruler the length of your paper...some of mine ended up a little wongly! Next is the process of lacquering and re-lacquering, then stringing them into some sort of wearable creation. Check back for an update soonest...