Welcome back!

Did anyone else spend way too much time following the NFL draft last week? To be honest, I didn’t watch any of it on TV, but did check in on my Twitter feed a lot more often than normal. And though I tried to ignore all of the drama with Aaron Rodgers and the Green Bay Packers that was going on at the same time, I just couldn’t look away! Our MVP quarterback apparently wants out of Green Bay, and as you can imagine, I am NOT happy about it. It brings back painful memories of all the drama at the end of Brett Favre’s career at Green Bay, that resulted in Rodgers getting the starting QB job.

Anyway, enough of that. I might have to dedicate next week’s post to sharing all my thoughts on the subject.

Today, however, I wanted to address the people who see my social media posts, and ask why I always seem to have so many tools laying around! Do I really use them all, or are they just for show?

There are so many types of tools, but the most commonly used are pliers, and I do use every pair I have! There are many different types and sizes of jewelry making pliers, for many different purposes and sizes of materials. And here’s a quick overview of what they are, for those that have been curious!

Flat nose or needle nose pliers are the ones I use most often, for opening and closing loops to connect different jewelry components:

And I’ll use 2 pliers at the same time to open and close jump rings, which I do for almost every piece of jewelry I make:

For softer jump rings, like the ones used to make chain maille jewelry, I have specially coated pliers that won’t mark up the surface of the metal:

Round nose pliers are used to make a loop in a piece of wire:

And I even have several pairs of specialty ones that will trim the wire and form the loop all at one time:

A flat nose pliers is great for making a perfect 90-degree bend in wire:

And there are special pliers for making loops in memory wire, because it’s made of hardened carbon steel:

And then there are something called crimping pliers, used to secure pieces of wire with a tiny little metal tube:

And nylon jaw pliers, use to bend hard metal with leaving any marks:

And of course, I have a few sets of pliers that I keep on hand as back-up, in case I can’t find the pair I need, or one of them breaks!

That’s a lot of pliers, isn’t it? And that doesn’t even include all of the other tools I use to make jewelry, so maybe I need to write another post on everything else! Drop me a comment it you would be interested in that!

Now, back to pondering the world of professional sports, and whether or not Aaron Rodgers will be back with the Packers this fall! Argh!

See you need week:

Carrie