Tuesday, August 21, 2007

Kumihimo

Last saturday I was in Charlottesville for a kumihimo workshop. Kumihimo is a method of braiding particular to Japan. Bundles of silk threads are braided together to create a cord.
A pretty good explanation is at Wikipedia with some links:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kumihimo

My teacher is Norma Shapiro from Roanoke. She has come up with the idea of braiding strands of beads together. This is the second class I've taken from her. In the first class we did a hollow braid with 8 strands. This time we did a spiral braid with 8 strands. When finished it kind of looks like a double spiral chain (http://beadweaverdreams.homestead.com/doublespirals.html).

Will post pics soon.

Thursday, August 2, 2007

Beaded woodpecker - "My Grub!"



Hmmmm....

My first attempt at posting a photo.

This is also one of my first attempts at combining two of my hobbies. Charolttes (glass seed beads cut on one side) cover a plastic craft form in peyote stitch, right angle weave stitch and - my personnal favorite - "damn-it-all" stitch, aka "whatever works stitch."

This piece was part of Beadwork IV:The Beaded Figure http://www.interweave.com/bead/events/BeadedFigure.asp