Thanks so much for your suggestions. I call these my "pedestal beads" The ones I love so much by themselves I have a hard time committing them to a project for fear that I won't do them justice. So earrings won't work because this is a project for me and I would never use that many earrings. The suggestion to harden the jump rings worked like a charm, and gave me exactly what I originally designed. However, now I think my original design was flawed, the beads are far too heavy for the light chain I used. I think I may have to figure out some way to attach them to a bangle instead.