Kumi-whaaaa?

Kumihimo. That's what. It's a form of rope-making that comes from Japan. We've been intrigued for some time. Here's our first try at it. A spiral cord. (And before anyone asks......Yes, it's simple. Even we can do it.)

We used the info from this site and 16 lengths of ordinary embroidery floss (cut to 36 inches) . . . 4 each of 4 different colours. There seem to be a lot of variations.

We chose these colours specifically to go with a pendant that our sister-in-law (the potter) made for us. Yes, it's made of clay and fired in a kiln. She gave us 2. We suppose they could have been earrings, but the kumihimo won out.

Once we had the pendant and the cord, we only needed the hardware. We've been playing with wire, but it's been slow going. We were influenced (as always) by Sherri over on Knotjustmacrame, who made a lovely clasp for one of her bracelets. She pointed us to this tutorial. We think we'll just follow Sherri around and pick up her crumbs. :)

We Talk Back!

Now for some unfinished business... Mischelle recently left us a comment on a long-ago post about those macramé bracelets, asking for a tutorial. She didn't leave us any way to get back to her, so, Mischelle, if you're reading this, this info is for you. Everything you need to get started in beaded micro macramé can be found in one book. It's the very book we used to get started. It's Micro-Macramé: 30 Beaded Designs for Jewelry Using Crystals and Cords by Annika de Groot. Good luck, Mischelle!

Weird Science

We're sorting out the details for a new beaded micro macrame bracelet. We haven't been at this long but we seem to have amassed a pretty good stash of beads and cords and findings. However, we've learned that no matter how many beads one has in her stash, she's always lacking one. That seems to be the way it goes.

20 ga. bronze craft wire

We need a special bead for the closure on our new design and we can't really start until we've selected one because the loop is done first and it has to be the right size.

It needs to be a sort of dull bronze. Coincidentally (ever notice how often that word comes up in the Kingdom of Coco?) we saw a tutorial on the Beading Daily blog for making beads out of wire.


That was pretty easy! And we ended up with a nice bead....albeit a shiny bead.

We read that you can give copper and bronze an antique-y patina with a chemical called "liver of sulphur" but we also read that it's more toxic and difficult than we're comfortable with. A quick internet search (where would we be without Google?) suggested there's an all-natural alternative. That's for us!!

We hard-boiled an egg, chopped it up and put it in the bottom of a ziplok bag. We put our bronze Precious-es in there as well and sealed it up. The article said to leave it 4 to 6 hours. We left it overnight.


See the difference?

In the morning, we opened the Ziplok bag and laughed our maniacal mad scientist laugh.

It worked!

Can world domination

be far behind?

Cassie's interested in science, too!

Socky progress

Every sock progress photo looks better with Cassie in it, don't you think?

No, not "sucky" progress .... a little progress on the socks. Such a pretty gradation of greens and so soft! We highly recommend the wool ...............

.............. and a totally unoriginal idea.  We saw these great needle organizers for sale somewhere and thought they were such a good idea that we grabbed our wire and our jewelry making tools and tried one out. It works! These are 3.5 mm double points. We had to experiment to find the right sized mandrel because it turns out you can't just wind the wire around the double points. It doesn't end up round. :(  We've been stymied in our jewelry making by our inability to actually be able to see the holes in the beads so this wire wrapping project is a minor victory. When we get our vision back we've got great plans for beaded micro macramé jewelry. Feel free to google that but be prepared to be amazed.

Just what the doctor ordered



Stitch Markers and other assorted wire work


We had the most wonderful weekend. We had guests! Adult guests and adult conversation. (No! Not THAT kind of adult conversation .... just the kind where you're not constantly being interrupted by a high-pitched voice demanding something.)  It was lovely.

Yes, it was unmercifully hot but we re-discovered the pleasures of ice cubes and G&T....and mint! An excellent addition. There is fresh mint aplenty in the flower beds of the Kingdom of Coco, free for the plucking. We had good food and good company and good conversation and a whole lot of laughter.

As well, Grandma Coco and her guest played with THE BEADS!!! Such fun. We started out to make simple stitch markers for LM's knitting because she's knitting with a very ornery ribbon yarn and really needed to keep track of her stitches. That led us into wire work. As we all know, that's the Slippery Slope! As if any of us needs another hobby. (!)  LM is a potter. A real one, with a wheel and a studio. She's going home to make some more clay beads so the next time she visits we can really go wild!!

We were having so much fun, we forgot entirely to take photos. What a shame. LM took 6 lovely stitch markers home with her.... all unique....all beautiful. They're made specifically for size 8 mm needles. These are the largest stitch markers we've ever attempted. So, although we don't usually knit lace on such large needles, we made a couple, too. (We're so easily led, as you all know.)

The red one should look familiar since that's an extra bead from our white summer cardigan and the green one is made with rolled paper beads we rolled ourselves and one of the MANY rabies/license tags we accumulated over all the years with our dogs and cats. We've saved them with the thought that one day they'd come in handy. We think that day has arrived.

For a good tutorial on making stitch markers, we like this one on the Bad Cat's blog.