Melting pony beads...

I decided to try melting some pony beads after seeing several posts by people who had tried it.

These are the larger size (9 mm) beads on the parchment paper before I put them in the oven. I tried melting them at 350°, but found that it worked better at 400°. I honestly don't know how long I baked them - I just kept checking until they looked right.

Here's what resulted after a short while (15-20 minutes, maybe). After they cool, they easily lift right off the parchment paper.

So what did I do with these?  Here's an example using them as a flower center:

You can see that these make a fairly large embellishment. The beads do come in smaller sizes (5 mm and 7 mm), and my sister purchased some of the smaller ones. Since they come in bags of hundreds--sometimes thousands--of beads, we're going to share so that we each have some of the different sizes to melt and use.

In this photo you can see the dimension they add to a card.  I adhered them with an adhesive called "Gem-Tac" which worked well and held them securely. They really do look like the enamel dots that are so popular right now.

Be aware that baking these beads does elicit some unpleasant fumes--not a lot, but some. You'll want to have your windows open and kitchen fan on when starting this process. If you have a portable toaster oven, you might want to use it to do this outside.

Thanks so much for stopping by, and remember to laugh--a little or a lot--every day.
Cheryl