dreamcatcher.

After showing you how I made magnets and stationary for my friend Emily, I bring you what was the hardest but the most fun to make - a dreamcatcher! I have to tell you that I had big dreams for this dreamcatcher - I envisioned feathers and all kinds of weird baubles and such but I was short on time and supplies and it ended up being very basic. However, it was the most creative idea I've ever come up with (don't forget, my friends are the craftiest people ever) so I was really proud of pulling it off at all.

I went to Michael's Crafts and bought the following things:

• a spool of suede leather lacing
• a metal hoop
• thin, white stitching string
• two types of beads that would fit onto the leather lace
• krazy glue

and at home at I had hundreds of tiny little colored beads that would fit onto the stitching string.

The first thing you do is wrap the leather lacing tightly around the hoop. I used Krazy clue on every third or fourth loop just to make sure the thing wouldn't come loose. I suggest picking what the backside of your dreamcatcher is going to be so you can keep consistency in ugly knots and glue marks being kept out of sight.

I grabbed the stitching string and tied it in a firm knot on the hoop. I even added krazy glue to the knot to really make sure it would stay. I then wrapped the string around the hoop about 1 or 1.5 inches away from the knot, then looped the string around itself. Then I did the same thing about another 1-1.5 inches way. I continued this around the whole hoop.

When I came full circle, I continued looping my string around the middle of each section I had just made. I threw some beads onto my string and arranged them so one bead was on each section. I learned later I should/could have done more beads since each section would be further divided when I did another round of loops. Also, the big blue bead you see in the picture below was fairly heavy and slightly awkward. Something to keep in mind. I kept the string loose as I was working but as you complete major sections, you can pull the string tighter to see the more appropriate aesthetic of the dreamcatcher. That's the beauty of simply doing loops rather than knots.

Over time, I started to loose the symmetry and rigidity I had at first but it ended up looking kind of cool and funky that way...or at least, I hope Emily thinks so!

I measured out my leather lacing for the dangly parts and krazy glued them onto the back of the dreamcatcher. This was a little stiff, so in the future I would use something else - a looser type of yarn or string, hidden by loads of beads and feathers and baubles.

The dangly parts ended up being very basic since I could only fit two kinds of beads on there. Like I said, next time I would not use the leather lacing as the dangly part of the dreamcatcher and would use something more versatile that isn't as stiff and can be heavily decorated. It's a start, though!

Remember to leave some sort of hole in the middle when doing your looping. I found a place to end my looping and tied a triple knot and krazy glued it shut. I cut it as much as I could to give it a blended look. This hole is where the "good" dreams are supposed to go through while the webbing is what keeps the "bad" dreams out.    :)