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Saturday, July 23, 2011

I've Always Depended on the Kindness of Internet Friends

In the mail this week I received a box full of gold and silver. GOLD AND SILVER! And other stuff. It was sent to me by someone who is neither cranky nor an old man, yet that's what she calls herself. Don't ask me, I'm just the recipient of her largesse. This was a good thing to get in the mail this week as it has been brutally hot and we don't have central air.

Yesterday was spent huddled around the bedroom air conditioner as if it was a campfire and I was Roald Amundsen (look it up). Inspired by my treasure box (that's what she said), I decided to try my hand at bead weaving.

From left to right are my first, second and third attempts at the peyote even count stitch. There were other attempts but they didn't count because they never made it past the s#$so%$^j fucking BLEEP! stage of development. Mostly because I was using the needle and thread in my sewing basket and lemme tell ya, that piece of crap cotton thread will snap on you for no good gandagit reason. Just POP! and beads all over the place! Without warning. Just. . . POP! Just freakin' POP! Motherhumping string snapping WHY OH GOD, WHY DO YOU KEEP DOING THIS TO ME, I fucking HATE YOU there are beads in my cereal POP! Yes, I'm still emotional about it.

Attempt number one, my very, very first attempt, was encouraging. Only I had a problem figuring out which beads were in which row. I also had a problem with starting a new row from the top. I figured I could help the not-knowing-which-row-the-bead-is-in problem by using different color beads for the different rows.

Which brings us to attempt number two. Alls I gotta say is: WTF? I seriously have no idea what in the hell went wrong there and how I ended up with that ball of mess. It's like I took peyote and not stitched it. At least the string didn't pop.

The third weave. Now that's what I'm talkin' 'bout! Except for I still cannot turn the corner and start a new row from the top, hence the mess at the top of this try. But I'm getting closer.

I will get 2 six row down, 4 row across peyote even count stitch weaves. I will! I've got earring plans for them! And then, when I make these earrings I've designed in my head using this weave, I'll sell it for $400 because that will be monetary equivalent of the pain, time and suffering I put into them.



Get 'em while they're hot! I've already got one complaint that the earrings they wanted to buy are gone. Oh, I'll make another pair for her but it won't be the same.

5 comments:

  1. Wow, if a creative genius like you finds herself challenged by peyote stitch, I don't feel so stupid and uncoordinated anymore! Every peyote stitch I've attempted looks like I had first *taken* liberal doses of peyote and then tried to sew with the cactus spines themselves. And then, somehow, I would up in a web as the crack spider's bitch. Not sure how that happened...

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  2. *wound* up... gaaahhh.. why can't I type?

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  3. A creative genius? If you say so! I'm putting that on my business card. I'll be like Wyle E. Coyote.

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  4. If it's any comfort, I find that some largish proportion of the Peyote stuff I've seen looks like Look at My Craft Project! or bad 1970's jewelry.

    I get that the technique can be challenging and I admire the work that went into it, but I think sometimes that challenge blinds people to the fact that the thing they've just designed looks crappy.

    SOME peyote stuff is gorgeous, sure. But a lot of it makes me think, "It's a terrible shame that it took that much work to make something I wouldn't buy at a Stuckey's truck stop for $4.99"

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  5. Believe you me, I've made plenty ugly in my time. They're still my own darling creations but, I like the pretty ones better.

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