Advice for nice but inexpensive beads

My local charity shops save their unsellable broken jewellery for me .
I've made many items from them .
Otherwise , I've made beads from clay and that really is fun .
It's possible with some supervision .
Otherwise cheap embroidery thread makes wonderful bracelets .

I would try online with Etsy.

My granddaughters like the beads with letters on them. They make them for their friends. Lots of kits on Amazon.

I just looked it up and my clay is air drying and bought from Hobbycraft .
The make is Das .
I made the holes with a knitting needle -that's why I think that eight year olds need supervising .
I've baked clay beads with my four year old granddaughter.
Some clays needs baking .
We decorated the beads with old nail polish .
They came out well and made nice presents .

you can get lots of gemstone beads on ebay really cheaply as they come straight from the place they're mined, India etc. type gemstone beads for jewellery making in the search part.

Try Etsy online

My GDD is nine and loves the plastic beading kits with the letters on the beads as she loves making friendship bracelets for her friends. They’re big Taylor Swift fans so like to copy her, your GDD may be the same.

Don’t over think it…. My granddaughters love the plastic colourful bead making kits they swap with there friends once they’ve made the bracelets.

Thank you.

I appreciate your suggestions.
I have now put together a nice mix of co-ordinated colours and sizes as well as a few of the "bold and brassy" sort. What I'm going to look for now are some "dangly" things. - the sort that are like little charms.

I have been through all my own beads and fished out the ones I know I won't use again (including some beads from charity shop jewellery that I took apart years ago.

I have bought "stringy stuff" for threading - elastic that's a bit thicker than the shirring sort, some stretchy see-through stuff that looks like fishing wire but is more stretchy.

I've had a few things from the Range (two bead assortments), a couple of "not great but OK" things from pound shops and The Works and am now looking at things online including something like a bead-sorter or screw sorter type thing to keep them in.

I have to say it was less work to buy a tracksuit for her brother!

Thanks for the Fimo/Das ideas.
I confess I'm not a fan of Das but have made Fimo beads lots of times before. I have bought her a Fimo set for Christmas so maybe will do some beads with her later. I had found a few beads in my stash - made by my daughter about 40 years ago!

The other thing I'm looking for is some type of sorting box (such as for screws).
I really thought they'd be everywhere. The Range had the best selection- I bought one but it's strangely pretty hard to use.

Thank you everyone.

I found this:

“LightInTheBox is a legit company that generates over $400 million dollars in annual revenue by supplying goods from China to individual consumers and sellers worldwide. LightInTheBox's parent company, LightInTheBox Holding Co Ltd., is listed on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE).”

So legit but probably not ideal. Hobbycraft sell lots of jewellery-making kit. Good luck!

If you have a Flying Tiger nearby, they are brilliant for craft stuff

When I did a beaded jewellery course we used this stuff
www.cjbeaders.com/bead-thread-cord/nymo-beading-thread
It comes in lots of different colours

Loved AskAlice's Light in the Box products

The link a poster gave fir Lught in the box, if you don't want to use them it's on Amazon and the same price and also a cheaper one. I've bought kits similar from Amazon and also from Shein but they tend to be smaller than they look online.
Children dint care if its plastic and you'll waste your money buying something that suits your style at a higher price. I have 5 grand children and we make jewellery a lot as I used to make my own. The tend to make it, wear it for a few days and you never see it again, as they've moved on to the next thing.

I have just bought this set for my nine year old grandaughter.
She has spent most of today making bracelets for her friends and I am wearing a lovely pair of homemade earrings.
33% off at the moment.

Go on Etsy and type in charms all sorts there . I have brought some Christmas ones excellent quality .

I bought DGD a lovely set of beads from a local craft market, wooden and ceramic. In a recent clear out of her bedroom she asked me if I wanted them as they weren’t really her taste!! 🤣🤣🤣 She was about six or seven and is now nearly thirteen! Little girls love “tat” even if we don’t …

I bought something from Light in the Box a while ago.
Ships from China so took ages to arrive and no returns policy so impossible to send back without paying the full shipping cost to China. It would have cost more to post than the value of the item. I would advise not to touch them unless others have had a better experience

Start with the cheap and cheerful, and if she shows enthusiasm, and a desire to do more, you can graduate to better quality.