Basic supplies needed to make earrings

As I was reading over my last blog I realized that I mentioned that there are suppliers from China that can be trusted, but forgot to mention which one I used hehehe. So the site of the supplier that I ordered from is www.ayliss.com . The best part is that they offer free shipping all over the world and their prices are extremely reasonable. I received my order within 10 business days, it was packed nicely AND the quality of the items was good as well. I ordered Silver plated pins and ear wire to experiment with, and later plan on ordering sterling silver findings. I still have to find a good wholesale site that offer superb pricing on sterling silver products.

Now that I am done completing my previous blog, on to this one. There are numerous tools and supplies to make jewelry but there are a few basic ones that a person needs to definitely have. These are:

• Round nose plier
• Chain nose plier
• Cutter
• Pins (flat head or ball)
• Ear wires ( hook or ball head pin etc)
• and of course beads/ crystals/ gemstone

There are many different kinds of materials that the findings (ear wire, pins, clasp, bead caps etc....google ear findings to know all different kinds =)   ) are available in. Some for example are silver plated, gold plated, sterling silver, gold filled, surgical steel, vermeil, steel, copper, 18K gold, 14 K gold. Most of these words are defined here:

• Silver plated: A thin layer of pure/Sterling (usually Sterling) Silver plated over base metal
• Gold plated: A thin layer of Gold plated over base metal (usually Steel or Brass)
• Fine Silver: Contains 99.9% Silver, sometimes stamped .999
• Sterling Silver: Alloy containing 92.5% Silver with 7.5% base metal (usually Copper) usually stamped .925
• Gold filled:  5% or 1/20 of the weight contains Gold. These are not actually filled with Gold but have multiple sheets of Gold covering the base metal (usually Brass or Copper)
• Surgical Steel: contains 8% nickel
• Vermeil: ...Pronounced Vermay....Sterling Silver that has been Gold plated
• Karat: Measure of purity of Gold, how much gold is mixed with an alloy. 24K is pure Gold, 14K contains 58% Gold and 18K contains 75% Gold.

most definitions taken from: http://craft.ontheinternet.com.au/beads/gold-filled.htm

If there is something that I may have forgotten to add, feel free to add it through your Comments. I'll add it to this Blog and also put your name for reference =)