Hama Beads Archives - Simple Crafts

Hama Bead Shamrock Patterns

March 1, 2014 by Merry Leave a Comment

If you are gearing up for some St Patrick’s Day crafting, you might like these free hama bead patterns. Made with Green, Mint Green, Translucent Green and Pastel Green, they cheered up my day enormously. You can also strengthen them around the stalk with clear and make a mobile from them.

I sorted the outline first to make it easier and followed inwards from there. On the bigger one, some of the inner rows have an extra bead in the corner to stop it being too square.

A lovely easy but satisfying pattern to make.

Finished.

And some gold coins too… well, it would be rude not to!

Hama Bead Cat Pattern

October 20, 2013 by Merry Leave a Comment

Continuing on a cheerful theme of cat related crafts (I’ve not quite got to grips with Halloween yet this year, so I thought cats might be better!) Maddy has produced her signature cat in Hama Beads. Many years ago, though she doesn’t remember, they used to have a Willo the Wisp video and I think she is secretly channeling Carwash with this design.

Here he is, in all his glory. A nice easy cat on a rectangle (or two interconnected square boards) in Midi Hama Beads. Maddy chose to do him in blue with black, white and pink details and I think you should be able to follow him from the photo. We will get round to doing a printable version of him too!

It was an accident but we quite like the little angle to his head. If you want to copy it, just gently stretch the beads and mould it while it is still warm from ironing the pattern.

There are more ideas on BeadMerrily.

Hama Beads Valentine Box

February 12, 2013 by Leave a Comment

This is the perfect gift for your valentine this year, it can be made in any size or colour and can hold anything from chocolates to jewellery.

You will need hama beads of your choice, a heart shaped hama board (big or small depending on the size you want the box), a hexagon shaped board and some glue.

First make two heart designs as the bottom and the lid of your box. To make the ribbon effect make a line across the heart, you can make it plain or patterned. Don't worry if its not straight, you can cover any wobbly bits with the bow later. Once they are finished iron them both.

Now make more hearts but only the outside layer as shown, make sure you get the patterns right so that it goes down the side. The more you make the bigger your box will be, I suggest about 4, 5 or 6 layers, once they're done and ironed glue them together as shown (but don't glue on the lid!), if you like you can make a layer one smaller than the others and glue it to the bottom of the lid so it doesn't slide off.

Finally make the bow on the hexagon board and glue it on the lid. You can make it bigger or smaller or patterned or you can make more than one, but make sure you make it like the ribbon. Leave it to dry and then you have the perfect valentines gift box!

Blogged by Maddy.

Chinese New Year Hama Beads

January 13, 2013 by Merry Leave a Comment

This week my kids and I are going to spend some time revisiting Chinese New Year and seeing what we can remember from previous times we’ve explored it. The Hama Bead patterns are old ones and have previously featured on our family blog but I thought I would pop them over here too. The dragon, which is done on the ordinary Hama dragon board, gets plenty of admiring comments as he perambulates around the internet 🙂

Maddy has a great craft lined up for tomorrow but I’m hoping I might persuade her to do another dramatic and brand new hama pattern too.

The same year we also had a go at making Hama Bead tangrams…

These sort of worked – we had another go and made each individual piece too but the bumpy edges meant they weren’t good enough to play with. Did inspire the kids to actually print off some paper ones though.

One of the younger children made Chinese people. Clearly the whole red and gold thing had hit home, even if nothing else did!

I’m a little out of the blogging habit just now, what with one thing and another (and a lovely blanket to crochet!) but hopefully putting up a recycled craft here will inspire us all to be more creative tomorrow!

Hama Bead Christmas Bauble Designs

November 25, 2012 by Merry Leave a Comment

While looking for some inspiration to do some cross stitch last week, I found various Christmas bauble designs... And got inspired. I'm always on the look out for hama bead ideas I can adapt to my own purposes and some of these were really tempting. With a nip and a tuck and a wander into our imaginations, we created 22 bauble patterns, with 2 of my children spending a whole day and a half making them up in beads. Maddy then transferred them patiently on to our design software.

Here are the first 4 for you to try. You can of course make them up in any colours of hama beads. We really like them in gold, pearly, silver and all the standard festive Christmas colours. All you need are beads, a large square pegboard and some ironing paper.

The next batch will go up, free as usual on our other resource site BeadMerrily which is dedicated entirely to Hama Beads. If you don't want to miss them, why not pop over there and join the email subscription for hama bead ideas direct to your inbox. There are already lots of other Christmas Hama Bead ideas there to look at. All 22 patterns will be available to print or download as a free PDF.

The slot at the top is to thread ribbon through and make a decoration garland, though you could hang them on the tree with it too. We have a no decorations up before mid-December rule here though, so you'll have to come back for that photo next year!

Melted Hama Bead Candle Holders

November 15, 2012 by Merry Leave a Comment

Last week Maddy had a go making candle holders in Hama Beads, using jars and colours to reflect the changing seasons. You can see her efforts here; they’ve already been getting a good showing on Pinterest and I think they were very innovative.

Naturally I wanted in on the act as she inspired me to try using some of the special effect Hama Beads that have come out in the last couple of years.

These are made from red, silver or gold hama beads in the bottom of the jar. Then I added pearl hama beads mixed with clear ones and topped them with the same colour as the bottom. I had preheated the oven to 180c and popped them in for about 10 minutes. I kept an eye on them and pulled them out once they had melted just enough. The pearly beads really glisten and the clear ones add a sparkle too; they look a little like snow and are very effective.

One important thing to do is take them out of the oven carefully while still hot and press a tealight holder into the top to flatten it. However I’ve since found that pouring water and a little bit of white glitter into these adds even more sparkle and of course the water keeps the candle base cool and allows it to float on the surfaces lightly.

Full making details are over on BeadMerrily, where the original version was featured.

Hama Bead Firework Patterns

October 31, 2012 by Merry 1 Comment

Well, in an effort to get some Firework Night crafts up on the site, we’ve made up a few patterns that we haven’t had time to make for real yet. (I lie slightly, Maddy made up the rocket using real beads, which is why it is quite a lot better than my other ones!) Still, hopefully these will give you a few ideas to get started; hexagons, circles and starts with different colours and patterns would look great. We had plans for a mobile but half term is rushing by a bit.

This one is pretty lovely, done on a large square board. Maddy used gold beads for it which look great – I think the catherine wheel below would suit some gold hama beads too.

Hmmm… I’m not sure about that one really… you could send me your own ideas?

Once you’ve made a heap of stars in different combinations, you might want some tails to swoop about after the explosions.

Try these 😉

You might not know but we have a craft shop which sells the entire Hama Bead range. If you can, do support us while buying your supplies so we can.. ahem… have more time to make better hama bead firework patterns 😉

Hama Bead Ghost Pot

October 24, 2012 by Merry Leave a Comment

Finding new things to do with a hama bead creation is always a challenge worth taking on; I particularly like 3D items, especially if they are useful. This particular ghost pattern, converted into a pot for holding glowsticks, possibly pushes the boundaries of actually being useful, but it is fun!

Maddy made up these patterns; while I tend to go for interlocking designs, she decided she would stitch them together. I love the way this looks; it gives it a really different finish and perfect for a spooky pot!

It’s a very simple set of patterns, all made in green glow in the dark hama beads. Once made and ironed on one side, Maddy stitched them together in a square. There are two designs of ghost and they alternate around the square base.

Once stitched, a painted toilet roll tube went down the middle to support the ghosts. We actually covered ours with black card for speed, but felt or paint would work better. It’s now a perfect storage pot for all those glowsticks you have hanging around!

One thing that occurred to me afterwards was that if the tips of the hands and the bottom row of the ghost were done in white, rather than glow, they will look like they are floating when in the dark. I think that would be an extra good spooky effect that wouldn’t alter the look of them when the light was on.

Here are the printable patterns for the pot. We really hope yoooooooooooou have plenty of fun with it!

For a spooky graveyard scene in hama beads, visit BeadMerrily for a brand new pattern set.

Hama Bead Owl Family

October 21, 2012 by Merry 2 Comments

Owls are fairly traditional Halloween fare but I must admit I’ve got a bit of an obsession with them in general (hooooooo… hasn’t?) and I’ve been collecting them on my owl board on Pinterest for quite a while. All the cute little chaps on there inspired me to have a go at some Hama Bead patterns in bright colours and these are the results.

I’ve got a bit of a soft spot for the one with his wings up and I think I might tweak the mummy owl a bit at some point but over all I was quite happy with them. They definitely show a few different owlish attitudes 😉

I’ve drawn up the patterns for them which is free to download for this site by right clicking and saving. The patterns are all worked on a large Hama Bead Hexagon board and can be done in any colours you like. I’ve chosen bright dark colours accented with their pastel conterpart and then white and cream tummies (I altered mummy a bit when I created her pattern) but you could do browns, whites and blacks for more realistic owls.

Here’s a small version of all the patterns I’ve created if you can work from that and just want one quick set to print off. Otherwise, full sized versions are below.

I’d love to see what you make with these; do leave me a comment and a link if you try them out and feel free to share them on the internet via Pinterest etc 🙂

Autumn Hama Bead Coasters

September 26, 2012 by Merry Leave a Comment

Drink coasters are one of the most made things with Hama Beads and there have been loads of searches on this site recently for autumnal version of them. So Maddy made some to share with you and I think you’ll agree she did an excellent job. All three of these are made with Midi Beads on a large circle board; she made a plain backing in the background colour with the outer ring for each one to make them stronger and thicker too.

Below are the patterns for making these coasters. You can right click and print all of them and they’ll shortly be available as an autumn download on our other website. The double thickness makes a real difference with these (bottom one is photographed double) and gives them an extra strength after ironing. It also means that both sides of the coaster can have the un-ironed look; use tacky glue to stick the ironed sides together. It works really well with hama beads.

Maddy had a good time creating alternative colour ways for these too. I’ve not produced them all as patterns but here is her three versions of acron coaster. What a very autumnal feel they have.

I think that is it for our autumn hama bead crafts on this site for now. We’ve got some 3D patterns to go up on BeadMerrily so do keep an eye out over there.