Blast from the Past: Beaded medallion

I made these beaded medallions as my Christmas decorations a few years back. The large glass beads I used for the centers were either in this green or a golden brown, in several different shapes.

To make these, I started by making a thread base around the bead. I threaded the bead and tied the thread around quite tightly, then moved the knot into the middle of the bead (the loose end was woven into the beads later on). Next, I added more loops in a sort of figure 8 around and through the bead so that there were three wraps of thread on each side. Still using the same thread, I added the first row of beads in brick stitch onto the base threads, continued with brick stitch for two more rows, then ended with a picot edge. Using the same thread I was beading with, I anchored the beads by going back into them a few times, then made the loop, and finally anchored the end of the thread back into the bead work.

I was really happy with how they turned out. They look really nice in the tree. They're fairly small - about 2 inches across - and would do well on a mini-tree, too.