I felt in advance that feathers would give the whole thing the “hairdo” look.


In this same photo as the end of the last step - if you look closely at the walnut attachment for the bead in the top row on the left, you can see the knot I tied in the hemp twine to anchor the feathers. This knot “stoppers” the feathers to hold them in place.



In the background you can see the pack of embroidery thread from which I selected a black skein to tie the feathers onto the walnut stringer. I plucked about a half dozen hackle feathers from the neck or tail (I eventually ran out of nice hackles) and arranged them so that they could be held together with the hemostats, leaving about 3/4 of an inch of the bottom of the feathers all bunched and aligned, ready to tie on. I lined them up with the knot and tied them on with the black embroidery thread. I knotted about a half dozen half hitches in a row, quite tightly, then snipped the excess embroidery thread and the excess hemp line.




Next the remaining walnut stringers had their respective clumps of feathers attached. It makes a very different noise than any of th others.

Make a Shakere is sponsored by Fertility Futures, a firm focused on helping make families possible. Many would be parents are unable to realize their dreams of a family with children due to fertility issues. Fertility Futures brings medical specialists and counselors to bear on these difficult problems, helping couples with a range of solutions from fertility therapy through the use of surrogates to carry a child through pregancy for a family. In order to support this service, Fertility Futures also solicits egg donors for its ova donation program. People who face challenges in becoming parents, or healthy women who are willing to become egg donors should consider visiting Fertility Futures.

Rhythm Workers Union my inspiration for all things rhythmic

Guerilla Poetry Insurgency some wonderful people who understand the power and importance of the spoken word