Earring Solutions for Sensitive Ears

Hello friends... I planned to have this post ready for this morning, but things have gone awry. It is snowing here in my little corner of the world and of course my kids were determined to get out in it, even though one of them was just getting over a bout with the flu and has a lingering cough. Their little outing lead to a big boo boo. My darling daughter and baby boy were on a two man inflatable sled and instead of going their normal route decided to take a trip into the retention pond in our neighborhood that is designed to hold excess rainwater, if necessary, to prevent flooding. At the bottom of the pond is a big metal culvert that probably connects to the sewer or something, I don't know or care. Anyhoo... apparently big metal culverts aren't as soft and squishy as they look because baby boy took a beating.

They hadn't been outside fifteen minutes when my daughter burst through the door screaming hysterically. It took a minute to figure out if it was her or brother who was hurt and then to get an idea of how bad it was. I'm imagining bones sticking out, and I am NOT okay with seeing bone. Plus I hadn't washed my hair in three days and was thinking "I don't want to go to the ER like this." My eighty three year old Papaw wasted no time and headed for the hills to rescue his number one buddy. However, that presented its own issues, since what goes down the hill must also come back up the hill.

I'm throwing on shoes, grabbing paper towels, and trying to catch up with Pap, all the while worried that I might see bone or that someone might see ME. I was somewhat relieved when I saw him sitting up and from a distance seemed to have all of the major limbs attached. To make a long story short, he had cuts on his face, a busted lip, lost a tooth, had a pump knot on his head with some abrasions in his hair, and bruised up legs. Seeing blood in the snow made me a little weak in the knees, but at least there was no bone showing.

I half walked, half carried him up the hill to the house and dispatched my daughter to wait for and monitor Papaw. Did I mention he has a history of heart attacks?

When we got home I pulled out the essential oils and went to work on him. I used helichrysum to stop the bleeding and it worked! He didn't take another step on his own the rest of the day and I was chief nurse. It wasn't until much later in the day that I found some of the injuries like the bruising and the knot on his head.

So, if you've been on the edge of your seat all day waiting for a post from me, that is my lame excuse.

The REAL reason for this post is to share a little crafty project with you. My daughter and I both have sensitive ears, and they get infected easily with some earrings, but not with others. Usually by the time we find out which ones hurt and which ones don't, the packaging is already in a landfill somewhere. We decided to do some experiments to find out which ones we can wear and it turns out that we can both wear sterling silver with no problems.

My genius idea is to convert a lot of the earrings we have that hurt to silver posts. This tutorial is showing some earrings we made to give away for Valentine's Day. We used some painted wood buttons to make earrings simply by gluing the earring blank to it. It couldn't POSSIBLY be any easier.

Step 1. Find two matching buttons or any small wood, glass, or plastic objects.
Step 2. Acquire earring blanks
Step 3. Glue earring blank to buttons
Step 4. Let dry
Step 5. Look amazing

The posts I have aren't sterling silver, but now that I know we can wear silver, I am ordering THESE and will be converting some earrings that I like to them by simply prying them off their original posts and re-gluing them to these. Also, you can very easily do the same thing with dangly earrings by using THESE sterling silver earwires. We will now be able to convert most earrings we might find to one of these two styles for less than a dollar a pair. Stud earrings won't be easy to convert, but they often come in sterling silver already, so that shouldn't be a problem. I'm looking forward to being able to wear earrings more now that I know which ones won't hurt my ears.

The best glue to use is E6000. It sets up really well and works great for a lot of jewelry projects.

The button cards were made using THESE stamps from Papertrey Ink. THIS is the link for the die that cuts the card. and THIS is what I cut the backs out of. Just choose ink colors to match the buttons you are using or use a neutral color.

I hope you don't have sensitive ears like I do,but IF you do, I hope you will take the time to convert them to a metal that doesn't hurt your ears. Let me know if you try it!

Kristy