I went away for a few days because I had some important business to attend to, and stayed a few nights at a friend’s house. During my downtime sessions, I was allowed to rummage through their stuff as they were undergoing a house renovation and had stuff to get rid of, and came across tubs of Hama beads and equipment. I was told that this was leftover stock from when the children were younger and they made fridge magnets all the time, but now no-one uses them anymore.

I’m always reminded of 8-bit  when I see these sorts of things, and the first thing I thought of designing was sprites from Final Fantasy. I did exactly the same thing when I was given the opportunity to make patterns in Animal Crossing, haha!

My favourite things from Final Fantasy are moogles and chocobos, so I simply recreated the sprites. Here is the original moogle, back when it had red wings instead of purple!

I opted to show the non-ironed side but I hear that preference varies amongst other bead makers.

And here is the chocobo! I gave it brown legs and blue eyes.

To turn these into necklaces, simply put jump rings through a hole in one of the beads and then attach a very long chain to them. I opted to not give it a fastener, as it seemed better to make it long enough so you can throw it directly over your head and have it hang low.

And this was my first foray into Hama beads! They actually let me take the beads back if I wanted to but I declined since I don’t have enough space as it is. I suppose I won’t be making another one of these for a while then, hmm…

Materials: Hama beads, jump rings, 70cm silver chain per necklace