How to Make a Fully Beaded Dream Catcher

Dream catchers have been used by Native Americans for hundreds of years, and while there are those who have commercialized them, they are still an integral part of Native American culture. The purpose of a dream catcher is to catch those dreams which are bad and would be upsetting in the web, thus allowing only those dreams which are pleasant to filter through the web and down to the sleeping individual. As someone who makes and actively uses dream catchers I can attest to the fact that they do indeed work.

Instructions

Difficulty: Challenging

Things You’ll Need:

• A medium sized metal macramé ring, approximately six inches across
• Size 11 seed beads
• Thin strips of leather
• Beading needle
• Size D beading thread
• Glue
• Pencil

1. Take a strip of leather and glue one end to your metal macramé ring. Wrap the leather around the ring, adding a bit of glue every inch or so. Do this with as many strips of leather as necessary until you have the entire ring covered.
2. Allow the glue to dry.
3. Take a pencil and mark off twelve points that are equidistant from each other on your hoop. These will be the points on the star pattern you will be creating for your dream catcher.
4. Cut a long piece of beading thread and then run it over the beeswax. Tie a knot in the end.
5. Thread your beading needle and then put your needle through one of the marks you made on your hoop. Pull it until the knot is lodged tightly.
6. Thread twenty-one beads on your needle and then pull them down your thread until they are resting against the leather. Then take your needle and put it through the spot where your next mark is on your hoop. Pull the thread tight, and come back up through the last bead that you threaded on. Pull it fairly tight.
7. Repeat step 6 until you reach the last mark. Then take your beading needle and put it up through the first eleven beads on your first row. Now you are ready to begin the second row.
8. For each successive row you will want an even number of beads. Generally the next less even numbered. In this case for the second row I would choose eighteen. Since you will have less and less room as you add rows you will want to reduce the number of beads for each row to help your web stay tight. As you start each new row you will want to put your needle up through the first half of the beads in the first section of that row.
9. Repeat step 7 until you get to a point where you have a circle in the center. Since you are reducing the beads each time you will find at one point that the last row is only four or five beads between the points of the previous row.
10. In the center, add a larger bead. This is called the Grandmother Spider bead, and while not all dream catchers have them, I like to add them to mine.
11. Weave your thread back through the web until you get back to the rim of your hoop. Pull your needle through the leather on the part that will be facing the wall and cut and tie off a knot.
12. Get a new piece of thread, wax it, thread it, and knot the end. Then pull your needle through the leather at the top of your hoop on one side. Now you will need to make the part to hand on the wall. I suggest you thread several seed beads until you have a nice long row, then thread twenty more beads. With your needle go back up through the first ten beads of this twenty. This will create a loop you can hang on a nail at the top. Take your needle down through the second set of ten beads and then string a second line of beads that is approximately the same length as the other side you just strung before making the loop. Attach this to the leather opposite where you began on the top of your hoop.
13. Take your needle back through all these beads that you used to make the hanger at least once until you get back to where you first started. Pull your needle through the leather again and then tie it off. Your dream catcher is complete and ready to hang.

Tips & Warnings

• To dress up your dream catcher a bit more add some rows of dangling beads, ribbons, or feathers to the bottom.
• If you also want the dream catcher to be used for healing, you can do a little research and add gemstones for healing purposes to it as well.
• Instead of trying to tie off knots when you reach that point try burning the thread down into a little knot next to the leather. The flame melts the wax on the thread and glues it to the leather so that your dream catcher cannot come undone.
• Allow the glue on the hoop to dry overnight; this will ensure it doesn’t come unglued when you start sticking a needle through it.
• If you decide to burn down your threads when you’re done with a section, be careful not to get the flame close to the beadwork and to blow the end of the thread out as soon as it touches the leather. You don’t want to catch your dream catcher on fire or weaken any of the thread used to create it.