This post is Mirrix President Claudia Chase's Summer Weaving Challenge for Week Six "De-Stash"
Over the years I have gathered a bunch of beads that were part of various projects or kits I have made. I had a whole bunch of size 11/0 Delica beads. They were in tubes in a basket and hadn’t been touched in ages or sometimes at all. I am kind of an anti-hoarder. When I feel like my stash is getting out of control and there are things I have never used I panic a little. I blame this on my mother. If you hadn’t used something for six months it was time to give it away. Now that was extreme and I do regret all those amazing toys my granddaughter will never see. But some vestige of that instinct has stayed with me.
As for my project: I picked out every tube of beads I was not particular fond of. I have my likes and dislikes as do we all. We get stuck in ruts. So this challenge was a way to force me to make a bead tapestry from beads I had been passing over for years.
I did not create a bead pattern. This was free form. I also used a technique I may have invented where like with tapestry I wove discontinuous sets of beads. This way you can better control the design in free form. So I would weave fifteen beads and then weave back fifteen beads. Then I would weave some in the middle. To avoid slits I would wrap my weft thread around the warp next to it. It was very liberating. The final product was a surprise to me. It in my mind looks like a Japanese tea garden and I ended up loving the colors. Colors I had ignored for years.
You need to try this. It might send you into a whole different sphere of creation. I know it did for me.
