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February 24, 2016

Wanted: Micro Macrame Students

Micro macrame wrap bracelet by Sherri Stokey.

Do you want to learn micro macrame?  If you live anywhere near Omaha, here's your chance!  I'll be teaching a class at the Omaha Bead Affair on April 17th.

Another micro macrame wrap bracelet by Sherri Stokey.

This class is geared for beginners as well as people with some knowledge of macrame.  In the process of making this fun wrap bracelet, students will be learning five of the most common macrame knots.  If you have never done any macrame, this class is meant to get you acquainted with knotting and working with cord.  If you've had some experience, it's a good refresher for different knots (and a lot of fun!). 

Micro macrame wrap bracelets by Sherri Stokey.

A materials kit is included in the cost of the class, so you'll only have to bring a pinning surface  In case you're not familiar with macrame supplies, I did a whole post that includes some suggested sources here.  And if you really want to be a showoff, dip your toe in the micro macrame pool by completing this free project.

I'm ridiculously excited about teaching another class (seriously - I have a blast teaching classes).  Hope to see you there! 


February 19, 2016

Happy Accidents

Wizard necklace in micro macrame by Sherri Stokey of Knot Just Macrame.

Don't you love it when a plan comes together?  Or when some lucky accident leads to what you can claim as a plan coming together?  In my case it started with this bracelet:

Micro macrame bracelet from Knot Just Macrame.

Waiting for some custom order raku pieces to arrive, I made this bracelet playing around with some of the lighter colors in typical raku pieces.  (I'll give you a taste of what I ordered, but if you want to see all of the lovely pieces, you'll need to pop over to Love My Art Jewelry and take a peek at the post I did there - hint:  it's worth the click.)

Raku bracelet bar from Star Spirit Studio.

Look at me getting distracted by the pretty things.  Where was I? 

Raised to be thrifty, I always keep the excess cord I trim from projects if I think they are long enough to use for something else.  Which is how I end up with a mess like this:

Cord mess.

But that, too, is a whole other topic.  Back to this story...  I trimmed excess cord from the ends of that bracelet and started knotting what I intended to be a pair of earrings, but the one I started got kind of large, so I decided to turn it into a pendant instead.   

I went digging through my stash to find larger ring to anchor a necklace onto and a drop bead or something to add to the bottom of the pendant.  But when I found a ring, I decided to incorporate it into the pendant instead of hanging the pendant from it and the pendant ended up upside down with a big(ish) ring knotted into the top.  Still with me?

Micro macrame knotting from Knot Just Macrame.

Still looking for a drop or something to hang from the bottom (which used to be the top), I came across this:

Wizard pendant.

No way this could match any better if I had designed my color palette around this it!  I have no idea what this pendant is made of - I don't even remember who I bought it from.  I do remember that it was from someone destashing, so if you recognize it, let me know!  I am guessing it's made of bone, but that's only a guess.  I did take a photo of the back side, if this helps someone identify the material (and if you do know, please tell me!):

Backside of pendant.

Anyway, there I go again, veering off topic.  Well, I guess I'm still mostly on topic, just slightly left of center, but back to the main story:  I love this fun wizard pendant and it looks awesome with the pendant piece and I probably couldn't do that again in a million years because the colors are pretty much spot on.  

Micro macrame necklace by Sherri Stokey of Knot Just Macrame.

At this point I pretty much  just had to knot some straps on this puppy and put it to bed, but you know me - I can't leave well enough alone.  I wanted to use the soft green colored cord for the necklace straps, but I thought I needed to bring some of the colors from the pendant and the... what would you call that?  A knotted pendant holder?  From that thing, anyway... I wanted to bring some of the color up into the body of the necklace, so I added a bit more knotting to the topside of the ring and then transitioned into the solid green knotting on the straps.

Micro macrame necklace straps by Sherri Stokey.

And that's how this necklace came to be.

Micro macrame necklace with wizard pendant knotted by Sherri Stokey.

I wish I could tell you that this fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants design plan is an anomaly for me, but sadly this is more the rule than the exception.  I'm not a sketcher and even when I do try to be a planner, it often veers off track.  Sometimes, though, things come together just perfectly!  I guess maybe we'll have to call "going with the flow" my plan.

February 11, 2016

Macrame Owls for All

Let's face it:  it's just not a macrame party until somebody busts out an owl.  There's nothing more iconic than the knotted owl; in fact, mention macrame to many folks and this is what comes to mind:


I couldn't resist a while back and made my own version of the cliche, but in a smaller (palm sized) version meant to be hung on a person rather than a wall.  I made the original version using .5mm cord.


The other day I got some coin beads I'd ordered for eyes and discovered they were smaller than what I'd been using (I think these are 8mm), which made me wonder what would happen if I tried making the owl with smaller cord.


For comparison:


It's surprising just how much smaller the owl turned out using the C-lon fine instead of the "regular" .5mm cord.  (Need help on cord sizes?  See this post.)  Of course I had to try pushing it just a little bit further:


The tiny misshapen khaki owl is done with C-lon micro.  I have trouble knotting with cord that small.   Theoretically it should work, with adjustments to the size of the beads and something smaller than the split rings at the top.  But, it took me nearly three times as long to make the small one as it did to make the large one!  Lots more fiddling - and that's from a professional fiddler!  Maybe I'll just wait for one of you to try it and let me know how it turns out.

If you'd like to try making your own owl, you'll find the tutorial here in my Etsy shop.  And don't forget, I have a whole page of videos knot tutorials here.  

If you're looking for ideas on how to make your owl pendant into a necklace, there's an easy idea in this post, or you can add a simple macrame spiral or a little chain.  They're all cute!


Have fun!!

February 5, 2016

Weathering the Storm

Micro macrame bracelets by Sherri Stokey.

We had a blizzard this week!  We got over 11" of snow that blew into drifts over 4' tall at my house.  It made getting to work (or anywhere else, for that matter) impossible and resulted in a... wait for it... SNOW DAY!  I was perfectly content to stay in and watch movies while working on micro macrame bracelets.  I caught up on the 2016 remake of War and Peace and watched Dr. Zhivago and got three bracelets mostly finished and another one started!

Micro macrame bracelets by Sherri Stokey of Knot Just Macrame.

The bracelets I made all have the same beads (matte metallic khaki iris) and khaki cord.  The first one was solid khaki cord, then I tried adding in a couple shades of green.

Micro macrame bracelet in khaki and greens from Knot Just Macrame.

 Which led to trading out the deeper green for a coppery pink cord.

Micro macrame bracelet in khaki, green and pink from Knot Just Macrame.

And then that led to switching out the green for a deeper pink.

Micro macrame bracelet in khaki and pink from Knot Just Macrame.

That led to switching out the lighter pink for the deep green.

Micro macrame bracelet in khaki, green and pink by Sherri Stokey.

And before I knew it, I had all of these (had to finish up over the next couple of evenings):

Beaded macrame bracelets.

All in all, I consider it a most excellent snow day.  So tell me, what would you consider the perfect snow day?

Handmade macrame jewelry.