Beautiful Barrels Earrings

Take one of those blue rings, and scoop both the silver rings on it. Close the blue ring.

Take your second blue ring and hook it on both silver rings, just like the previous step, but don't hook it through your other blue ring. When it looks like the picture below, close that blue ring.

Congrats! You've got the start to a barrel! Make three more just like that. (If you're making a shorter earring, you only need one barrel, so hang tight.)

Now we're going to connect our barrels. Open a gold connector ring and loop it through one (just one!) of your blue rings.

This is a bit tricky, so bear with me. You're going to take that second blue ring that's dangling at the bottom there and slide it up and on to the gold ring. You're not flipping it up like a book; you're sliding it like a piece of paper across a table. Do not put the silver rings on the gold ring.

Another way to think about this step is considering rings like beads with very large holes. In the picture above, the gold ring is strung on the blue ring from the back to the front. The other blue ring needs to be strung on that gold ring back to front as well (not front to back!). Once it looks like the picture below, close that gold ring.

Okay, this is the (slightly) trickier part. Not only are you going to add a connector to the other side of your barrel, you're going to add a SECOND barrel. We'll go ring by ring and even explain it twice. (If you're making that shorter earring, you're just going to add this second connector and stop.)

Open a gold connector ring and hook it on to the two blue rings just like you did in the last step, but on the opposite side of the silver ring barrel. This should be a lot easier than last time because the blue rings are already in the right orientation. Just make sure you go through both blue rings and DO NOT go through the silver rings. (If you're making shorter earrings, close the connector ring, and skip to the bottom for some finishing tips.)

Before you close your gold ring, add the first blue ring of a second barrel on the gold ring.

Slide the second blue ring up and on to the gold ring. Not like a flipped book page, but like a playing card sliding across a table. If you totally understand this step, great! Close the gold ring.
If you're still a little confused (this is a confusing step!), here is another view to help wrap your mind around it.

We're in the home stretch now. Connect your third barrel in the exact same way you just connected the second one. It's going to be easy to get the gold ring through the opposite side of the second barrel because the blue rings are already in the right position, then add the third barrel one blue ring at a time.

Add your last connector ring to the bottom of the weave exactly like you did the very first connector ring. Put it through the two blue rings that are already in the right position, and you're done! See finishing tips below for tips on reversing your second earring, and making a matching bracet.