Cathead Basket with Handle

   

















I spent a relaxing weekend at the 8th Annual "Weaving Your Cares Behind" retreat in beautiful Bedford, Pennsylvania.  I took two classes from Pati English, a juried artisan, basket maker and instructor from South Carolina. If you ever have a chance to take a class from her, don't pass up the opportunity.  You will learn a lot from Pati.  (www.BasketsMySpecialty.com)

The basket started with a cats head open weave base.  The sides have a band of triple twining in blue reed plus a blue and cream over two under one trail.  The rim of the basket used a cable stitch over a seagrass filler.

Free-form Pine Needle Basket

This pine needle basket is coiled around a shell.

I drilled a row of holes around the shell using a drill press.  Using waxed linen thread I attached coils of pine needles to the shell to form the bottom of the basket. 




 


 Since the shell was an irregular shape I coiled a free, unattached row of pine needles to create a more round shape for the basket.  Once the base was more rounded I brought up the sides.  On the final row I left a portion of the coil unattached again to offset the open space on the bottom of the base.

Lastly I wrapped a band of the waxed linen in a pattern on both of the free coils.






6 inch  diameter x 2 inches high

Market Basket with Reed Flower Embellishments

I ended my Odyssey 2014 weekend of basket making by taking a class lead by Sharon  Klusmann, a basketmaker from Ohio.   I made a 8 1/2" W x 16" L x 12" H market basket using black, maroon and cream read.











The handle was woven into the base.




The sides were pulled up and a simple pattern of wide black reed, thin maroon and cream reed was woven. 

Then a band of twining was inserted with colored round reed.  A decorative handle was woven incorporating the colored flat reed. The black rim was attached and lashed in place.  Two flowers formed with round reed were attached to one side as the final embellishment to the basket.

Ribbed Hearth Basket

Anne Bowers is a skilled basketmaker from West Virginia.  Ribbed basketry is her specialty and she shared her expertise at the Central PA Basket Weavers Guild Odyssey 2014 by teaching a Saturday class on a  Ribbed Hearth Basket. 










I began my hearth basket by weaving a decorative chevron cane pattern on the wooden hearth frame handle.









Then I wove a tear-dropped shaped God's eye on each side of the basket using 1/4 inch flat reed.

The primary ribs were whittled and inserted behind the God's eye. Weaving an over-under-over pattern with cane held the ribs in place as I spread them evenly between the rim and handle base..

 The secondary ribs were then added to complete the rib frame.  After about 9 rows of weaving with cane, I switched back to 1/4 inch flat reed to finish weaving the basket.