"The art of teaching is the art of assisting discovery" — Mark Van Dorena

Using supplies you probably have at home, we'll learn how to braid a two color round cord on a handheld disk! It's fun, easy, and portable! Kumihimo cord can be used for award cord, drawstrings, necklaces, trim, ribbon, bracelets, shoe laces, and more.

This is a beginner class and no experience at anything is necessary.

The class is 2 hours to allow students to get hands on practice during class time.

What You Need Click on the item for ideas on how to make or find each of them at home: Class handouts Kumihimo disk 8 Bobbins 1 Counterweight 4 strands of size 3 or 5 crochet cotton (embroidery floss, ribbon, rat tail cord, or other non-stretchy yarn or cord) Get Ready For Class To set up the disk for our class, use the info in the following sections of the Pattern Handout: Prepare the bobbins Attach the threads to the disk Disk set up: Use the color setup for Stripes

• Kumihimo — History, brief how-to, Bibliography, and Webography
• Pattern — 2 color round kumihimo braid

Print the disk template On a piece of cardboard (cereal box, notepad cardboard, box cardboard, etc.) trace: The outside edge of the disk The center hole On your cardboard, outside the outer edge of your tracing: Mark the "+" and "|" marks Mark the 2 slits on each side of the "+" and "|" marks
On your cardboard: Trim the cardboard near the outside edge without cutting off the marks Transfer the marks to your disk Cut the slits in the disk Cut around the outside edge of the disk Cut out the center hole of the disk For thinner cardboard, you might want to hold an unused CD or DVD under the cardboard disk to strengthen it.

They can be the Floss Holder Bobbins or the Paperclip Bobbins you can find on this page
Or you can cut some out of the same cardboard you used to make the disk. Here I've cut out a bobbin pattern from lined note paper and used that as my template to cut 8 cardboard bobbins. They are about 1.5 inches wide by 2 inches tall.

You can use anything as a counterweight; if it doesn't have a hole in to tie a cord to, you can tie it into a small bag or a piece of cloth so that it can be attached to the braided cord.

See what you can find at home to use for a weight, and if you can't find anything, you can still take the class and make a cord without a counterweight. We'll discuss the use of counterweights in class.

I prefer to use size 3 crochet cotton. But you can also use any size of crochet or pearl cotton, or embroidery floss (but NOT the cheap brands, use DMC or other named brands), narrow ribbon, rat tail cord, or other non-stretchy yarn or cord.

If you can't find any of those, stretchy wool or acrylic yarn will also work.