Nifty Thrifty Thursday: Jewelry, in bulk

I love my local thrift stores. I also love garage sales, case lot sales, and clearance bins. Thursdays I'm going to share some of my great finds at these places in hopes of inspiring your own craftiness. 

Bring on the bling! I found two vases at Savers filled with jewelry and taped shut. The larger one was priced $4.99 and the smaller $1.99 (plus my 20% coupon for my donation).  I got home, with the "help" of my baby girl emptied out my haul, and I got a bit excited.

You see, the ladies at my church are collecting jewelry to donate to our local elderly care center.  The ladies love to look pretty, but they need necklaces that can slip over their head without clasps. Looking at all the beads in the jar, I just knew I could remake some of them into perfect pieces for them.  A few I'll just donate as is, like the shell leis, and some of the little girly bling my boy wants to sell at our garage sale at a whopping quarter a piece. (He wants to sell everything recently!) Is it wrong of me to want to keep two of them for myself? I've been looking for silver and pearls (actually made two necklaces out of the chain on the far left) and I just loved the green one next to it, too.

The rest are destined for greatness then gifting to the care center!

Here's what I've done so far.

I removed the clasps and added chains to 3 short ones .

There were some really long ones that I was able to make into 2 necklaces each. And twice I was able to take two smaller necklaces and combine and/or re-thread the beads to make them into one longer one.

I also cleaned out my jewelry supplies and created a couple from scratch-- hey I was on a roll.  I hope they enjoy them.

So whether you are gifting or crafting, check and see if your local thrift store has jewelry in bulk!