Brown Wooden Rosary

 

I finished a new rosary on Saturday. Its wooden beads are stained a warm brown color, and its metal parts are brass and gilt. The circlet is about 30.75 inches in circumference. The drop is 6.125 inches long from the top of the centerpiece to the bottom of the crucifix. The rosary is 21.25 inches long from the middle of the third decade to the bottom of the crucifix.

This is a simple and unpretentious rosary. Because the beads are wooden, it feels relatively light and has a pleasant texture as the beads move through the hand.

The Ave beads are wooden ovals about 7mm x 4mm, stained a dark brown. I got them from Ave Maria's Circle [AMC 521].

The crucifix is a style sometimes called "papal" or "JP2," and is about 38mm long (1.5 inches) 35mm without the eyelet at the top, and about 23mm wide. It also comes from Ave Maria's Circle [AMC 344] the rough bark-like texture goes all around the crucifix. This crucifix could not be engraved. On the back of the crucifix, and the bottom of the upright is the word, "ITALY."

The centerpiece is about 16mm in diameter, just a little smaller than a dime. Including the eyelets, it is about 19 mm wide at the widest, and 21 mm long. The front of the centerpiece is an image of Mary based on the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe, but also includes a representation of her immaculate heart. The reverse shows the mystical rose. It comes from TierraCast, and I bought it at the JSM Bead Coop.

The Pater beads are rectangles 7mm x 4mm. I got them from Ave Maria's Circle, but they are no longer up on the site. The rosary is wired with 22-gauge brass wire. I bought the wire at JSM Bead Coop. All loops are wrapped, but for the beads, the wrap is tucked inside the bead. While this adds strength to the wraps, I also did it to simplify the look, to keep the rosary from getting too long, and to let the beads, rather then the wire, dominate the appearance of the finished rosary. the paters are connected to the decades of aves and the centerpiece and crucifix by wrapped-wire bows. I make my bows with two layers of wire because when I started wire-wrapping rosaries, I didn't think I had the precision needed to make them in the way I saw them made by others. I have since found that the way I developed to do it was already in use, and these kind of bows are called "Sailors' Knots." There are 14 of them in the rosary.

business card 3

Here is the third design. The background color looks aged and distressed. It has a drawing of a rosary. Here I used the slogan, "Hold on to things that last." I described my wares as "durable rosaries: custom designs, handcrafted."  I used my initials rather than my full first and middle names. (Most folks know me by my initials).  Which card has the best slogan? Which product description best describes my rosaries? Which fonts work best for the text? What do you think about the backgrounds and graphics? 

Give me some feedback, people.

amethyst dyed Mexican onyx

The owner brought this to me to restore if I could. She had had it for many years, and it had great sentimental value for her. Originally it had been a standard 5 decade ["Dominican"] rosary. The same beads were use for the Our-Father and the Hail-Mary beads. Only a long separation between the Our-Father beads and the Hail-Mary beads distinguished them. Silver-lined bugle beads and #7 silver-lined seed beads separated the OFs from the HMs. Within the decades, the Hail-Mary beads were separated from each other by a single #7 silver-lined seed bead. Of the original 59 beads, only 49 remained. of the original seed beads and bugles less than half remained and they had lost most of the original silver lining. The beads were strung on a single strand of clear mono-filament fishing line, which was brittle with age. The beads varied somewhat in length and diameter. They seemed to be carved from Mexican onyx, and were dyed an amethyst shade of purple. There was a simple cross carved of the same substance. There was no centerpiece.

The owner asked me to keep as much of the remaining parts as I could, and fill in as needed.

Lutheran prayer beads

This week I made these two sets of Lutheran prayer beads. The larger set is the "Lutheran rosary" or "Lutheran Lenten Chaplet" of the same kind I made back in February. The smaller one is called the Wreath of Christ - Frälsarkransen or Savior Ring.

For the Lenten Chaplet, I got the black cross from my local bead store (JSM Bead Coop). It is carved from horn. The cable is covered with #15 matte black seed-beads from JSM. The small black beads (the weekday beads) are 7 millimeter wooden ovals [AMC #522] from Ave Maria's Circle. They slide on the cable as your fingers move over them in prayer. The larger black and gray globes (the Sunday beads) are fixed in position on the cable. They are snowflake obsidian and come from JSM too. The large white globe (the Easter bead) is howlite, and also comes from JSM.

The largest bead on the Savior Ring is the gold God bead. I used a gold colored globe of dichroic glass from JSM. Next largest in size are the seven 8mm rounds. Five of them are glass druks from JSM, and two are glass pearls [OLRM #655] from Our Lady's Rosary Makers. The 6mm rounds are Swarovski glass pearls. There are also six 5x9mm clear glass ovals from JSM. For an explanation of how these beads are prayed, go here.