Best I back up a bit & explain. When I started this I was a little ambitious for someone who had only done one 8 strand braid in her life before - I decided I wanted 16 strands & that the braid needed to have some sort of design to it. Then there were the beads.....
I don't have any seed beads that are a regular size & within an inch of braiding knew that this wasn't going to work for me - so I undid the lot & started again without beads. It seemed such a pity as the beads that I did have worked well with the colours of silk I'd used.
As I braided an idea formed in my mind... & then a plan. Of course I blithely overlooked the fact that the plan would involve yet another skill to learn - that of stitched beading. Braid finished I set about the task of learning some basic seed bead stitching.
I eventually settled on ladder stitch all in the same style beads as it seemed to compliment the Kumihimo braid without competing with it too much. It also allowed me to add different size beads every now & then for a bit of texture - without the need for me to try & figure how to make bridges around those beads. This step took me almost as long as the braid to complete... & I had bigger plans yet!!!
This is where I was up to on the 27th January - the intended reveal date. All was going well until I discovered that I'd used all of my 16 gauge copper wire to make the "Love Me Knots" for mine & Mallory's first Artistic Challenge. So off I went out in search of some 16 gauge copper wire to pull it all together into a completed piece.
Perhaps you can imagine my disgust at finding that a 10' length of 16 gauge copper wire was going to cost me $18.00 locally. I decided that I wasn't that desperate & left the shop without it..... & then spent the rest of the day quietly fuming at how much we pay here for what few craft supplies we can actually get. In fact I was so wrapped up in my fuming that I forgot I was meant to be posting the results that night.
The next day things went marginally better & I did manage to get one other component I needed I also managed to source a short length of copper wire from a friend, which should be arriving any day now.
So there you have it - a semi-reveal, the completed braid & beading but not a finished piece. That you are going to have to wait for - but hopefully not for very much longer.
