As you may have noticed I haven't been posting much more than just the Sky Watch photo's for some time, because I have been devoting nearly every day for over a month to the making of this gourd rattle.
My title of "Friendship Gourd Rattle" is because I custom created this one for a longtime Apache friend who's daughter is soon to have her "Sunrise Ceremony" (traditional celebration of young Apache girl becoming a woman)...I did this as a gift to present to this young Apache Lady.
The style of the rattle is in the" Peyote Stitch" ( sometimes called the "Gourd Stitch") and I used size 15/0 seed beads which are only about 1 mm wide and I used the Apache colors for the Four Directions, White,Yellow,Blue, Black.
I used my own designs in the beading to create a feathers design and it consists of over 6800 beads....one bead at a time in the beading process.
There are 12 twisted pieces of buckskin for the fringe at the end of the Rattle handle, and there is a bundle of Horsehair at the very front.
The Rattle sound is made of some of the seed beads and some very special Ant Hill Garnets in the gourd to make a nice Rattle sound.
See below various photo's of the different parts of beading, click on any photo to enlarge.
Overall view of the rattle
View of beading just behind the gourd part.
View of beading and horsehair bundle at front 
Showing beading and 4 directions design
Beading at rear of the handle on the rattle
Beading around the gourd 
1 comment:
Bob, this is a beautiful rattle and what a tremendous gift it will be for this young woman. You have created something so perfect and unique, anyone would be honored to own one of your pieces!
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