Hello World,

I usually don’t post about my personal life on here, but today’s tutorial is different. It holds a deeper meaning to me. My grandma (I called her Granny) passed away almost two years ago, and my family was given some of her things. Granny was very bright, loved to read, collected quirky cat figurines, and had doilies all around her home. I have had one of her doilies, and finally found a symbolic way to use it.

Granny liked to focus on the positive, and didn’t let negativity get to her. I find this attitude towards life similar to a dreamcatcher. In some Native American cultures, dreamcatchers are believed to filter out bad dreams, letting only the good dreams through. So I used one of her doilies to make an oversized dreamcatcher, as a happy reminder of her, and to remind me focus on the positive, no matter what life throws at me.

Check out the tutorial below:

1. Gather your supplies: a small hula-hoop (mine was from the dollar store), a doily, twine, scissors, various lace trimmings (I found mine at thrift shops), beads, buttons, and fabric glue (not pictured).

2. Pop in your favorite movie, and start wrapping your twine around your hula hoop. Continue until you have completely covered it.

3. Take note of how many points your doily has. Mine had 12.

4. Start by tying a tail end of twine to your hoop. 1/12 along the way of my hoop, I pulled tightly, and looped my twine around my hoop. I repeated this until I had a 12 sided polygon inside my hoop.

5. I continued around a second time, this time looping my twine through the center point of each previously-created polygon side. My doily was large, so I didn’t continue working around the twine spiral. If yours is smaller, continue working your way around. Tie a knot when you reach your stopping point.

6. To attach my doily, instead of working it into the twine spiral, I just looped twine through one of the corners, and tied it to the hoop. I hid my tail ends my wrapping them around the hoop a bit.

7. Attach your various lace trims to your hoop. Either knot them onto it, or fold them over and glue in place.

8. Add any other trimmings to your dreamcatcher. I tied on pearl strands, twine braids, and other beaded strands.

9. To hang it, I looped a piece of trim around the top of my hoop and glued the tail ends together to create a loop. I also added a vintage brooch to the doily of my dreamcatcher.

I haven’t added feathers to mine just yet, as I haven’t stumbled across the perfect feathers yet.

Happy crafting! Be happy!