a macrame journey

 Look, I know that Macrame is an easy DIY project and that it was probably at it's peak in the 70's. (Do I factually know that or just assume it because it was referenced in the recent TV show WandaVision when they're set in the 70's. That plus just the straight up look of it. I'll let you be the judge of that. But am I right or am I right?)
However. I found a beautiful macrame wall hanging that's less about knots and more about colour and I am all about colour. Look at this:

Sorry it's just a screen grab from the etsy shop, but idk how to crop it... so that's what you get to look at to see the beauty of the thing.

So I decided I could make my own. But it's hard to find enough of the right rope. Why? I don't know if that's because everyone is doing all sorts of macrame projects because the government is still concerned that we maintain shutdown or because it's truly gone out of diy-ing favor. I looked at loads of images of macrame online and there are some very incredible macrame wall hangings to be found.

On that note, let me bring you along on my journey to recreate this visual masterpiece.

First, the inspiration piece got me going.

It got me going so fast and so hard that at 5pm on a weeknight, right as Jacob would normally be signing off of work and joining us in the kitchen for a typical round of, "I'll cook the dinner if you play with the kids." However, he was on a particularly long call and unable to talk me out of my irrationally timed decision to take the kids to the store. 

However, I could not find what I wanted at the wallyworld, even though I went to the bigger one that is 20ish minutes away instead of the close one that is 10. The problem wasn't so much that, since I was now close to Hobby Lobby. The problem was that I couldn't get myself out of the store. I wandered around aimlessly until I bought initial supplies for a party I decided to throw when I saw the supplies. 

However. I got myself to Hobby Lobby just as Jacob noticed I was missing from the house and called to ask what was going on for dinner. 

He didn't call, he texted. But I was in a hurry to find a bathroom for my potty training 2 year old. SO. I responded inconclusively and rushed us into the store with our baby in the carseat/stroller combo because the hobby lobby carts are so so tiny... I sort of understand but I also don't understand. 
However.

We didn't need a big card because we were not there for furniture, multiple throw pillows, or wall hangings. 

Well

Technically we were there for a wall hanging but more for the DIY pieces of a future potential wall hanging.

But look. They didn't have enough of the stuff that I was looking for.

okay clearly that's not a great picture of what I purchased, seeing as it's only the label. However. Just trust me when I say it wasn't enough. 

Oh, let me fill you in on the background of that trust. I had asked Jacob to cut a piece of wood for me, about a foot long, and he did, and, in addition, he sanded it. So I had already gotten a piece of wood and I couldn't make enough sense of the wall hanging with the measly 75 ft I had happened to discover.

So. The project was on hold for the time being, and Jacob made dinner while the kids and I came home.

A few days later my creativity bug woke up enough to prod me into calling the next closest Hobby Lobby to see if they had any more of that Craft Cord. They didn't. So I started doing some research online and found a better deal from Amazon. So I put a big ol' spool in my checkout cart.

And I let it sit there for probably two weeks.

My dudes, On the Jordan Peterson Getting to Know Yourself personality test I scored exceptionally low on the Industriousness category. This is because I am not very industrious. And so I was already quite impressed with myself for going to such great lengths to obtain the cord for my macrame that I sort of felt like I had already accomplished the thing I had set out to accomplish. 

I hadn't.

So, eventually I decided to push the purchase button on that macrame rope in my amazon account and the next day I had it. !!! What a world we live in. It was not hard at all to get this stuff. I just needed to know better where to look. And online is where we look.

So then after another amount of eventually I decided to work on it while my children slept.

Which is funny because I have a 2 year old. XD 

So she came down and painted in a box while I worked on this:

You can see that she's having the time of her life.

So Here are the videos of what I did to get to that point, except for trimming the rope bc I didn't think about that until too late.

Psych. I don't know how to upload videos so that's dumb.

I basically mixed paint with water and dipped the middles of the ropes in up to where the tape was.

I realized a few things: the paint had been sitting long enough to start separating the purple from the blue, The colour wasn't as dark as I had intended, and I wanted to add a second colour because the blue didn't seem like it was going to be enough.

I let it dry that night in the garage and the next day in the sunshine.

And then when the kids were actually asleep at bedtime I stained the piece of wood, which I will display via picture not video later when I take a picture (not video) later.

One interesting thing is that while it was drying the water seeped up and extended a lighter blue beyond the originally intended dark blue. Which means it might have solved that problem on it's own. And if it did that I might be okay with a lighter and also purple'd blue too. 

I'm determined to make a pretty one so I'll post again when this one is done and then I'll see what I can do in learning how to get a good dark colour on these silly macrame strings.