First, you can use a small clip or foreceps on the insulated part of your wire to protect it from melting when you are soldering it to a board or to a component. The foreceps (locking clamp) are pretty cheap from amazon or ebay, and they make it easy to keep the wire where you want it to be without heating up your fingers. I also use the foreceps a lot if I need to hold onto a part I am desoldering. Second, I like the bonded stranded hookup wire from guitarpcb.com It is not cheap, but a few feet of wire will go a long way for these projects.