How to Decrease a Brick Stitch and Make a Bracelet

	FireLine Braided Beading Thread, 4lb Test and 0.005 Thick, Smoke Gray (50 Yards) SKU: XCR-1265 $13.99
	English Beading Needles Assorted Variety Pack SKU: XTL-3004 $4.20
	The Beadsmith Cordless Thread Zap II Thread Burner Tool SKU: XTL-0106 $16.49

Note: This audio transcript is auto-generated and may not be completely accurate.
Hi. I'm Andrea with Beadaholique.com and in today's video I'm going to teach you how to decrease in brick stitch. And while I'm at it, I'm going to show you how to make this neat bracelet. So what this bracelet actually consists of is twelve separate segments of decreased brick stitch in the shape of pyramids or triangles. Now if you watched the video on How to do Brick Stitch you'll know exactly how to do it and you'll know that that beads lay staggered just like bricks. Instead of just doing long rows of brick stitch for this bracelet, I did separate segments, is that it has a really cool kind of scallop effect if you do it this way. And it looks sort of art deco. It's really pretty. Once it's on it has a very cool structure to it because the separate triangles kind of keep their shape. First things first you're going to need some four millimeter Miyuki beads I choose two similar colors but you can do a real contrasty thing if you want to pick two different colors. You're going to need two tubes of each color. So four tubes total. You're going to need some 11/0 seed beads as the little turnaround beads at the tip of each pyramid and also I use them as a little decorative edge on the finished bracelet. So I've already gone ahead and zipped them together. All eleven of these segments. I;m going to make the twelfth segment. to show you how and then I will show you how to add it to the bracelet. If you are not familiarity with ladder stitch go ahead and review our video on how to do that because and it kind of go quickly through that step. I have about one yard of Fireline thread and I've got a little stopper bead. An adjustable one. I don't have it tied on. It's just on there about eight inches away from the end. I'm going to do my first row which is the bottom row of the pyramid and it's going to be seven beads long of ladder stitch. So I'm going to go ahead and do that. I have my base row done. Seven beads in a ladder stitch. Also I just wanna point out really quickly that each one of these segments is staggered or alternating so the ones with the base, the wide point on this side of the bracelet, have the gold iridescent beads at the bottom and the ones facing the other way have the green as a base row. I need one more segment and it's going to be facing this way. So the beads I'm using and in the base row, the green iridescent. So just like you would do in regular brick stitch I'm going to pick up the next color of the next row. I'm going to pick up two at one time. I'm going to thread my needle underneath the thread that's connecting the second and third bead, not the thread that's connecting the first two beads. I'm going to skip those and go to the next one. And those beads should kind of start to sit in place. You can help them along. I'm going to take my needle and I'm going to go up through that first bead of the second row. Pull tight. Now they're really sitting close together. Now I want to go back down the second one of the second row and underneath that same thread that you passed under the first time around. Then back up through that second bead. As you can see the next row already staggered a little bit and set in from the first row. There's a different way to do this but it would require you to start with only one bead instead of two and also you would see the thread on the outside of the pyramid which we don't want. We were our thread to be hidden. So now I have my first two beads of the second row on. I'm going to pick up one more of the same color, the gold color. Now I'm just going to go through underneath the thread that connects the next two sets of beads in the first row. The back up to that third bead. Again I'm going to do the same thing just adding one bead at a time now. Go underneath that connecting thread in the first row back up through your bead I've got two more in this row. Now I have my first two rows of my pyramid done and I always love to do my beadwork in the same direction so I'm going to flip it over. I'm going to work on my third row which is going to be a green row. So just like I did in the previous row I'm going to pick up two of my green beads. Remember I'm going to skip this first connecting thread and pick up the connecting thread between the second and third beads. I'm going to go back up through the first bead of the third row. So my beads sit nice and tight together. Back down to second bead and underneath that same connecting thread that you passed through the first time and back up. Then the rest of the row is as easy as the previous row was. You're just going to pick up one at a time now and pass your needle underneath that connecting thread directly underneath where you want your bead to go and then go back up through that bead. We only have two more for this row. Once you've added the last bead on the row flip your beadwork over so you're working in the same direction right to left. At the start of the fourth row we're going to do exactly what we did with the previous rows. I'm going to pick up two. Skip the first connector, go through the second, the thread bead between the second and third bead. Go back up to your first bead down through the second and under that same thread and back up through the second bead. Now we're just doing one at a time. This is going faster and faster as you can see because your pyramid is getting smaller and smaller. And flip your beadwork over. This row only requires three beads but still you're gonna pick up two for the first go round. Always skip the first connector thread, go through the thread between the second and third beads and one more for this row. Remember we're alternating colors Flip your beadwork over and in this row you only need two. I'm going to pick two of my gold beads up. Once again skip that first connector so I'm just going to go right under that last two bead connector back up through the first one back down through the second underneath that same connector thread and then back up once more. Flip your beadwork over and now we only need one bead. I'm going to pick up my last bead for very tip of the pyramid but then I need somewhere to go from here. I can't just go down back down into the bead or else obviously my thread will come undone. So I'm going to need a turnaround bead. That's why I have these little 11/0's here. I'm going to pick up one of those. All I'm going to do right now is go back down through the tip of the pyramid. I'm going to go all the way down one side of the pyramid and pull tight. This is where I'm going to make my half hitch knot. I'm going to thread my needle underneath my connecting thread right here. Go around my needle once with my thread or twice. Now I can go back up if I want to just for a little added security. I can go through the turnaround bead again and now go down the other side of the pyramid. So I have my thread coming out of the last hole right next my bead stopper. I'm not going to cut the bead stopper thread. I'm just very carefully use my Thread Zap II to trim off my working thread. I'm going to remove the excess thread from this needle. You can use a different needle if you want. I'm just going to take off my stopper bead and I'm going to add my needle to the tail. Okay now that I have my needle added to the tail my thread. I'm going to do what I did with the other working thread. I'm going to run my needle underneath the connecting thread between the first two. make a little overhand knot. Pull tight. This time you don't have to go back up through the pyramid and catch the turnaround bead and come back down. You can just weave the rest in if you'd like. So I'm just going to go up through levels. Once I feel like it's thread work is sufficiently hidden and sufficiently secured. I can go ahead and trim off the access. So now I have my nearly finished bracelet and I've got some thread coming out of where i was zipping the pyramids all together. I'm going to sew on this last pyramid just to show you how to complete this. As you can see the thread is coming out from right underneath the tip of the pyramid. I want to catch this bead right here. What I'm doing essentially is I'm going to be doing and kind of a modified ladder stitch to join these together. I'm going to bring my thread up through this bead back down and down through the second bead down the side of the pyramid. Then I'm going to come and catch this bead and go around and back down catch that bead and around and catch the next bead until they're all nice and snug, up against one another. I want to kind of explain it first because once I get started it's a little difficult to see. So remember I'm going down the pyramid and I'm going to go through the next bead. I'm going to cut across to the bead in the newly formed pyramid here and go up. Pull those two tight go back down through the second row and also through the third row. I'm going to catch the last bead in the tip of the last pyramid here and go back through the base of the adjacent pyramid just for good measure and that's the bulk of the bracelet. So at this point I can either tie off my thread and weave the best in or I can add my loops and my decorative edging and done with the bracelet at that point. Also another really easy and fun thing to do with this weave is to leave the pyramid separate, make only two of them and they're little christmas trees that you can make into earrings. I think we're gonna have a upcoming project on that ready for christmas time. I hope you've enjoyed this and you've learned a lot. Thank you so much for watching. Go to Beadaholique.com for all of your beading supply needs!