Hourglass
Alright. This is a basic full square knot design, with the occasional thread switch in order to make that little weave in between beads. What’s that? Well, let’s break it down.
I made this one with 4 strings (each about 4.5 feet in length). The strings are set parallel to each other. You make a knot and hang them somewhere to hold the strings while you weave. The outer strings are the ones used for knotting while the two inner strings are simply used for spacing (the more strings in the middle, the thicker the jewelry gets).
Let’s look at it with some sort of image. The outer strings are red and spacers are regular color.
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After doing some weaving
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I switch the cords
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It would be more obvious in the necklace if I had been using color hemp, but… I don’t have color hemp. *laughs* I wish I could buy more. My local store only sells small little bunches (enough for one necklace), and with all the mistakes I make in the measurements, that simply is not enough. I currently have a 600ft ball of hemp, which is perfect for my trial and errors. When I find a place that sells color hemp by the quantity (and at an affordable price), I’ll probably start making neater jewelry.
Hourglass
Skulls
Made this one for the Hubby but he won’t wear it. Say’s it is too girly. So I asked two of my buddies, Empy and Ord how girly it was. They said “it's kinda one of those that it wouldn't matter what gender wears it; it should look good either way… did you make that? and your husband said it was girly? He needs to get bit. yeah. he needs to get bit really hard!” and “that's pretty damn cool lookin'! real human bone? COOL! and your husband won't wear it… what's wrong with him?!”
Hehehe. Ahh those two. Anyway, I did go bite the Hubby and also told him what my buds said. He just shook his head.
Hubby’s not a jewelry person.
Skulls – Leather cord and bone beads
Greenbeans
A necklace today. I am not sure if it is unisex or just a girl piece. It is made with full square knots and adding a green pony bead every 10 counts. It would have been much nicer if I had done it with rocks or some other semi-precious stone but… I ain’t got money right now, so plastic beads it is!
This one is 20 inches point-to-point, so it fits a guy. For a girl it will fit comfortably as a choker (17 inches) if the extension just hangs (the extension is the part that has no actual knotting – the very end).
Greenbeans
Spiral and Rope
My sister is throwing a party for Halloween. We’ve been coming up with several activities for it and I am in charge of the scary music… and some dance music too, and games. ^_^
Since I am learning my Macrame, I decided to make several pieces to give out as prizes for winners of the games. I’m getting faster the more I knot.
This one is a regular half-knot bracelet which results in a spiral. I added black and orange pony beads to make it look all Halloweeny. It is 10 inches which fits the wrist of most girls, if not then there are an extra 2.5 inches (up to the last black bead). At the full 10.5 inches, it can be used as an anklet.
Spiral
This second one took close to 5 hours to finish! It is a more manly style… in other words, plain. It is using a technique called cross or monk knot… When I first saw it I was like “Wow! Now that’s a style I hadn’t seen before!” Geesh, now I know why. It’s a pain to do it! If I had 4 arms, I could have done it in about 2 hours, but since I am a normal human…
Anyway. I think it came out pretty nice. The full bracelet is 11 inches – perfect for your average guy.
Rope
Butterfly
Filler post for this Saturday.
Another hemp piece that I made several weeks ago.
Butterfly - My second hemp jewelry
This one is made out of half knots, all moving from left to right. Took a couple of hours to make, since the cords begin to twist after about 6 knots. But with practice, this one becomes pretty easy to make.
The Sacrifices A Person Does
My husband loves me.
Before he and I began to date back in grad school we had talked about everything that was expected from ‘us’ (the person and citizen) by people of our cultures. Mexican ladies are supposed to be obedient daughters, obedient wives, good housewives, excellent mothers, etc, etc, etc… we are also supposed to be Catholic, believe in the Virgin Mary, and marry a handsome Mexican man who will know how exactly how to control our lives… for the benefit of the family. Bangladeshi men are supposed to be God-fearing, impeccable sons. They must obey their parents, obey the laws of Islam and the Holy Quran… or else in death they will go to hell. That last part was concealed from our chats.
It wasn’t until today, during dinner that I discovered this bit. We have a couple of friends who are dating. He is Muslim and she is not. If they wish to marry she must convert, for that is the only way that he may marry her. I wondered if that was simply because he was most religious. But my husband says it is because no Muslim may marry anyone that is not a Muslim, for it is a great sin.
And do not marry Al-Mushrikat (idolatresses, etc.) till they believe (worship Allah Alone). And indeed a slave woman who believes is better than a (free) Mushrikah (idolatress, etc.), even though she pleases you. And give not (your daughters) in marriage to Al-Mushrikoon till they believe (in Allah Alone) and verily, a believing slave is better than a (free) Mushrik (idolater, etc.), even though he pleases you. Those (Al-Mushrikoon) invite you to the Fire, but Allah invites (you) to Paradise and Forgiveness by His Leave, and makes His Ayat (proofs, evidences, verses, lessons, signs, revelations, etc.) clear to mankind that they may remember. (Chapter #2, Verse #221)
“But we are married” I said, “and I did not have to convert. I thought that as long as the parents were okay with it, then it would be fine…” Since that was what we did. He told his parents that I was not Muslim and they were okay with that. He tells me that his mother is still quite concerned about it. That she hoped I would soon convert. “I do not think that is happening any time soon, if at all.” If I ever pick up on the religion it would be just to hush the bad talking from people in his family, but not because I ‘feel’ it. And of course, that is a very bad reason to adopt any religion, so I truly do not think I would do it at all.
He agreed with me. The only way to become Muslim is ‘to believe’ and once the boy or girl believes in Islam then and only then can the marriage take place, otherwise it is not a true marriage. Otherwise it is a union based on sin.
“And if that happens what? You go to hell or what?” I was joking as I said it. But he looked at me very seriously as he nodded his head. “So you actually believe in hell and heaven?” He had said yes before, just as many of my friends, but of course, the subject is usually done during light conversations. He believes, he truly believes. I know this because I saw the spark of fear in his eye.
“I believe in what the Holy Quran says. Everything in there is true. If I did not believe in heaven or hell, then I would not believe in my religion and I would not be a true Muslim.” He told me.
“So… if it was so delicate, why did you marry me? Why did you risk it?”
“Because I love you…”
It was the first time he said it in such a way that almost made me cry.
What An Inch Can Do
I have a couple of works that I had not posted because I had been lazy. The last time that I fixed my desk I moved it a bit to the right, lining it right next to a smaller desk where I had placed my scanner (a slick Epson Perfection 3200). Well I had not used such hardware in a while now until about 2 weeks ago or so. The smaller desk on the right has a raised table where a monitor should go, it is about 8 inches from the main table (where the keyboard should go) and when I tried to open my scanner… alas! The cover would hit the raised table. So I tried dragging the scanner more to the left, but double alas! My main desk wouldn’t let it move far enough to be free from the raised table. ~_~
So today I finally asked Hubby for help to move my main desk an inch to the left. Ta-da! Now I was able to scan this:
Jade - My first hemp jewelry
Now, why didn’t I just take a pic? ‘cause I am not a good photographer still, and so the detail would not be as evident as in a scan. Too bad I can’t put up the original scan in here. It would take forever to load… I scan at very high resolutions and then minimize for the web. Hehehe. ^_^
Beading Stitches X_x
Since I ‘quit’ my job as a web developer I have ben looking for ways to keep me busy at home. While posting like mad at my favorite groups is great I should definitely be doing more. I don’t have to worry about programming now, since I pretty much finished all projects with clients - although, I know that every once in a while one will ask me for a specific change, etc. So I decided to expand on my knowledge of jewelry making.
So I’ve been working on going outside of the single strand jewelry to the more complex styles, mainly those involving sizes 6, 8, 10 and 11 beads. So I pretty much know how to use a loom. Now I need to learn basic stitch patterns as well.
Here’s a basic Square Stitch. It’s nice and makes the same pattern as loom beading, except that in here you add the beads one-by-one. It seems to be less secure than loom patterns, so I probably have to change the width of my thread.
Square Stitch
One can pretty much do long chains for purse necks, or bracelets, or perhaps straps for whatever I’m doing. This one is a 3-bead one, with little tension… It works better using bugle beads, which are long, thing tubes, but I had no bugle beads so I had to improvise. The technique that I needed to learn was what mattered.
Three bead neck
Finally I worked on two very similar patterns: the Brick and the Peyote stitch styles. Pretty much both resemble a brick wall the difference is that in the brick style one works horizontally from right to left and back, while with Peyote one must work up and down, vertically. Both can be paired up when finished, as in the image. The peyote stitch is the more complicated of the two, but both create a very firm and solid patch since the thread keeps going around the beads for at least twice on each.
Brick Stitch; Peyote Stitch
Halloween CD
Woo hooo! I am making a spooky song CD. Hopefully I get enough to make it a good CD. It will be for a party.
So far I have
- Thriller
- Purple People Eater
- Love Potion Number 9
- Spooky
- The Exorcist Theme Song
- Pipe, Organ, and Bassoon Music
And trying to get:
- Psycho Theme Song
- Halloween Theme Song
- Hellraiser Theme Song
- Bach Organ Concertos, although those may be a bit toooo long
I wonder what else I should add…
