Macrame: Low Tech Crafting

Just over a week ago we had a tornado hit our neighborhood, including our yard. We were blessed to have no damage to our house but we had several days without power and lots of free time. I have been wanting to try macrame for a while and this seemed like the perfect time. It's a very old craft. The basics are pretty easy but it can be used in so many ways. I will show you the simplest one for now.

Here is what you will need:

-any sturdy yarn or cording. (I suggest you use yarn for your first attempt. Cording can tend to be slippery but it is more strong. I used cotton yarn for all of my projects.)

-any ring (I used a key chain)

-scissors

Measure 4 pieces of yarn, 1 yard each. I used the old trick I learned from my mom to measure. Hold one end straight out in your hand and the other end to your nose while looking the opposite direction. On a grown person this should roughly be a yard. Here is my dear daughter showing how it's done.

Fold your 4 pieces in half, with a loop at the top. Put the loop through the ring and pull the other end of through the loop.

Pull tight.

Separate your strings into 4 groups of 2. Tie each group into a knot. I just eye-balled it but it was about 6 inches down. You want to have enough room to get your pot through here.

Next, you are going to take your strings and separate them into new groups of two and tie knots about 3 inches down.

This part can be a little tricky, but you are going to take the two outside strings and tie them together, creating a tube.

Now we are going to do it again, separating and tying knots. 

Take the two outside string again and tie them together in a knot.

Lastly, tie a knot in all of the strings at the very end.

It can be a little confusing and look like a mess as you are doing it so I hope the pictures help. The best thing about this kind of crafting is that you can do it anywhere and it can be as simple or as complicated as you want. I did all this sitting outside on my patio, eating some yogurt and watching my middle child roller skate while the twins napped. My garden somehow managed to make it through the storm. A few trees around it fell so now it will get even more sun. The rest of our yard is still kind of a mess but it is peaceful here.

If you want to step it up there are tons of fancy knots that you can do.