How to Make Lizard Bead Art

Bead and lanyard crafts are popular at summer camps as an art project for younger children. Making a bead and lanyard lizard keychain is a craft with an enjoyable resulting product, as the lizard can be used as a keychain or hooked onto the eye hole of a backpack zipper.

Things You'll Need

• Six feet of lanyard string
• Key ring
• 37 body-colored beads
• 2 eye-colored beads
• 12 foot-colored beads
• 8 back-colored beads

Instructions

Creating the Head

1. Fold the lanyard string in half.

2. Tie the lanyard around the ring by passing the bent portion of the lanyard through the ring, passing the two loose ends through the loop created and pulling tight.

3. Thread a body bead by passing the right end of string through the right end of the bead and out the left, and the left piece of string through the left end and out the right, then pulling tight.

4. Repeat Step 3, passing the ends of string through two body beads this time.

5. Continue threading three more rows, with the following patterns:
   Eye-Body-Eye
   Body-Body
   Body-Body

Creating the Front Legs

1. Thread two body beads, then three foot beads onto the right loop of the string.

2. Create a loop in the string, then pass the same piece of string back through the two body-colored beads.

3. Snug the body beads up to the final layer of the head, then pull on the excess lanyard to cause the three foot beads to fan out, creating three toes.

4. Repeat Step 1 through 3 with the left string to create the left leg.

Finishing the Lizard

1. Create the body by threading six layers in the following sequence of beads:
   Body-Accent-Body
   Body-Accent-Accent-Body
   Body-Accent-Body-Accent-Body
   Body-Accent-Accent-Body
   Body-Accent-Body
   Body-Body

2. Create the back legs by following the same steps in Section 2.

3. Thread a layer of two body pieces.

4. Thread six layers of a single body bead each.

5. Tie a double knot in the string, and cut off any excess string.