I decided to make some paper beads, and I took photos during the process so that I could share some tips and tricks that made it more difficult than it had to be!
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Use paper that’s decently thick to make paper beads.
I used this printable paper that I printed on regular printer paper. (You can get the files here) I realized pretty quickly that printer paper is thin, and you need a lot of it to roll into a bead that’s any size worth making.
Unless you want teeny, tiny beads, use thicker paper! Or just plan on using a lot of thinner paper if you want beads that are thick enough to be substantial.
These are some that I made with watercolor paper, which is thicker than printer paper, so it made thicker beads. Painting the paper first lets you create your own colors, which is good if you want to match a specific color scheme.
Cut the strips with a template!
I used a paper cutter to get straight lines, but I didn’t use a template for the beads since I was just messing around. That’s fine if you don’t need your beads to be exactly the same size, but if you’re doing anything that requires beads that are the same sizes, you should start with a template so that your paper strips are cut consistently.
You can get some paper templates from Squeakerchimp on Etsy. 
She also has printed bead templates that you can cut and roll to make patterned beads.
Use the right tools.
I did have bead rollers that I got from Etsy so I was ready to go, but I’ve seen a lot of tutorials that show people making paper beads with toothpicks or skewers or whatever.
You can do that, but without the ridge on the roller that holds the center of the paper bead in place, it gets really tricky to roll it tightly.
My paper strips slipped out a lot and when they did, it was really hard to roll the beads. I wouldn’t want to try it without having the roller, so if you do, be aware that using the right tool makes it a lot easier.
Glue sticks work really well for this.
I was using regular glue, and it was fine except that it was really messy. I know that people put the glue on the very last part of the bead and not all the way down the strip, but that’s what I did because I wanted to make sure the whole thing was secured.
Because of that, there was extra glue that squeezed out of the bead a lot of the time, and it got messy. It wasn’t a big deal because you can just rub the extra glue onto the outside of the bead to help seal it, but it made it hard to handle the beads.
So either don’t use as much glue as I did, or use a glue stick that isn’t going to ooze out.
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Make sure that the hole in the center is as big as you want it.
I was using the largest roller that I had, but I’ve seen bigger ones. Make sure that the size of the roller is as big as you want the hole in the center to be.
Also make sure that when you pull the bead off of the roller, you don’t pull it too hard or the shape can shift a little. If you roll it too tight it can be hard to take off of the roller, so you have to find the balance between rolling it tightly but not so tight that it’s hard to remove.
Dry them on a non-stick surface!
I put the beads in a plastic container to dry and that worked well to prevent them from sticking to the surface they were on. If you have a silicone mat or a plastic container like this, that will let them dry safely,
Don’t use paper, waxed paper, or anything that will stick to glue, obviously!
Round beads need longer strips.
I wanted to make rounder beads than the ones that were coming out, and I figured that I would need a longer strip that narrowed a lot more gradually to accomplish that.
I cut a strip that was slightly narrower on one end, then did a second one that was as wide as the small end on the first one, then repeated that with a third strip.
When I glued them together end-to-end, they formed one long strip that got narrower very slowly, so when I rolled it up it formed a gradual narrowing and was thicker in the middle, which gave it a rounder shape.
Here’s the final round bead, which I like more than the oval ones. Notice the dried glue all over my fingers…At this point I had made a bunch and the glue had leaked out from the rolled beads and was all over my fingers. A glue stick would have been good!