Instructor: Karen Zukas
Ages: 15 up
Format: 3 hour workshop
Date: Friday, July 24th
Time: 2:00 - 5:00 pm.
Course Fee: $55 All materials included: hoops, reeds, staves, weaving rush, colored rush, sea grass, tools, instruction, dye. Bring snack/water.
Basket Weaving ~ Cracker or Catchall Basket
Great for your first or 21st basket weaving experience. This is one of my favorite little projects, and I use it every day. This is a beautiful 5" X 10" X 5" medium sized basket woven with a combination of various sized reeds along with an accent color. It is finished off with half round reed and sea grass. It is a sweet addition to a buffet table for crackers or dinner rolls, I use mine as a catch all for my t.v. clickers, pens and reading glasses. You will love the fact that you made it yourself, you'll go from not ever having weaved a thing, to making a basket in 3 hours ! After completion, the basket will be dipped in a black walnut stain for preservation, beauty and durability. This basket is sturdy with a myriad of uses.
Students usually find that basket weaving has shown a positive effect on their ability to maintain manual dexterity, and also as a means of warding off the stiffness of arthritis. Persons with even major sight impairment can weave baskets. Mentally, basket weaving can also help to keep senses sharp in the same way that puzzle-making, crossword puzzles and balancing the checkbook without a calculator all require more active brain manipulation than the passive use of calculators. With basket weaving, measurements are taken as supplies are cut; decisions are made as the weaving progresses, and most of all, a deep sense of satisfaction comes with the finished basketry! It is affordable, creative, draws on common sense, resourcefulness and imagination. I also think that the relatively short amount of time that's required to weave a basket is a good incentive for pursuing this craft. Good, clean, fun!
Karen Zukas and Annette Kelley each have several years of experience making reed and stave rimmed baskets with either reed or wooden bottoms, handles or no handles in several shapes, sizes and functions. As students of Patty Batson, they've apprenticed and produced a variety of baskets, understanding the skills and techniques of making these attractive little wonders out of thin air. You'll be amazed that a little instruction and an ability to follow the mantra "over, under, over, under" will guide you on your way to producing a variety of sweet, functional treasures to keep or to share as heirlooms. You'll want to make the next one, and the next and the next.
Have your GPS take you to 101 West Rodney French Blvd. in New Bedford. Once there, please park on the end of the building AWAY from the main entrance. You'll see an ORANGE door that says Mattress Handup...enter there and go up the stairs. At the top of the stairs...follow small yellow signs for NBACE. We're right around the corner behind the mural !!