Gourds and weaving materials can be purchased from The Basket Farm.

basketfarm@msn.com

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Preparing Your Gourd For a Woven Rim

1)  First~Find a nice gourd that sits well and decide how tall you want your bowl to be.

2)  Mark and cut your gourd at that level. 

3)  Clean your gourd out well and be sure to save all those seeds. 

4)  Paint or dye your gourd if desired. 

5)  Measure down aproximately 1" from top rim and mark the spots where you will run your spokes through your gourd.  You will need an even number of holes, there really is no set distance that they need to be apart, I usually go about an inch and then adjust to add or remove one to get an even number of holes. 

6)  Next, drill you holes big enough to insert the material that you will be using for your spokes. 

***Now you're ready to weave!  The hard part is in deciding which technique to use.*** 

HAVE FUN!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Twining Twining A Gourd Rim

 

Before you can begin twining you must cut your spokes to be inserted into the holes that you drilled in the "Preparing Your Gourd" file. Decide how high you would like the weaving to be above the drilled holes and multiply that by 4. Take that number and add 10 inches to it for the top border. This will give you the length for your spokes. You should have an even number of hoes drilled into the gourd. Count and divide them by 2.  This gives you the number of spokes that you will need. Cut your spokes from #3 Round Reed or any other material that you'd like to play with. Just be sure that your holes are big enough to insert it.

SOAK your spokes very well... From the inside of the gourd, insert each end of your spoke into a hole and pull it through to the outside, making it even in length on each side. It will be bent like a hair pin with the crook on the inside of the gourd... While spokes are still very wet, gently bend them up onto the gourd so that they will take on the shape of the gourd. Sometimes it is helpful to tie them up for awhile.

***Always keep your wood wet while weaving. Either dunk your wood now and then or keep a spray bottle of water handy.

1)  Pick two long strands of #2 Round Reed or other weaving material. Insert each of them behind a spoke, angling them to the right, using two spokes side by side. Use a clothes pin to hold them on the left if needed.

2) At this point you have two weavers sticking to the outside of your gourd. Each of them will be crossing in front of a spoke as it comes out of the gourd. Pick up the weaver on the left and weave it behind the spoke on the right that the other weaver crosses in front of. After moving it behind this spoke move the rest of this weaver back to the outside of the gourd. You will always have both tails hanging to the outside...

3) Continue picking up the weaver to the left and moving it behind the spoke directly to its right. If you should run out of weaver, just leave the tail of the old one on the inside of the gourd and insert a new one underneath of the old one on the inside and continue weaving. Weave until the weaving reaches the height that you want. Try to stop weaving at about the same place that you originally started so that the top will be even. End the twining to the inside of the gourd by just weaving it behind a spoke and not bringing it back out. Trim and leave about a 3 inch tail inside. Have fun, relax and take your time!

Border

To make a simple border to finish off your weaving: Twining should be finished and your spokes should be the only wood sticking up... 1) Soak your spokes well in a bucket of water before continuing. 2) Pick any spoke and weave it to the right behind two spokes, to the outside of the gourd and back into the gourd by going in front of one spoke. Continue this one spoke at a time going to the right around the gourd. The last three or four will have to be worked in as the spokes that they would normally go around have already been woven. Just look at the others and try to follow that path with your last few spokes. 3) Trim your spoke tails inside the gourd but be sure to leave them long enough so that they won't pull out later.

***Defuzz and stain if you like. Then sit back and admire your work... You did a beautiful job!

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Copywrite 5-10-01 Pam Crowder basketfarm@msn.com