Macramé Australian Animals & Flowers by Nan Bosler

Macramé Australian Animals & Flowers has cute animal projects and the beautiful flower patterns. However, in my opinion, this book is short on instruction. Also, I would have preferred more diagrams/pictures within the patterns. Disclaimer: I’ve made a number of macramé projects, so I’m not a beginner. However, I haven’t had a lot of recent experience [I could be out of practice] and I’ve mainly done plant hangers (albeit complicated ones) and wall hangings in the past. No multi-dimensional animals.

I tried to make the “Elly Echidna” pattern and failed miserably. The material information was sparse so I ended up using the wrong material. I probably would have anyway, because whenever possible and if I can, I try to use materials I already have on hand rather than purchasing something specific for just one project. I know it’s a bit of a gamble, but I’m cheap and sometimes I like the challenge. This time though it was frustrating and patience-testing. [The cord size wasn’t mentioned, so it would have been hard to use the correct stuff anyway]. The instructions were complicated and I just couldn’t follow them. I finally gave up about halfway through.

The diagrams for the knots were good, but I think they authors assumed the reader/crafter mostly knew how to macramé. My other macramé books have more diagrams for the general knots as well as for the patterns themselves. They are easier to follow. [I’m a very visual person and I find that diagrams/pictures help me a lot.]

I have a few pictures of my failure, which I plan to upload onto Flickr. They won’t be there immediately, but should be there fairly soon. I still plan to put quills(?) on the “thing” hoping to salvage it somehow. Once I put the quills on it, I’ll post more pictures. I’ll update this journal entry with a link to the pictures when they are there. Feel free to laugh.

I had planned on photocopying a few of the patterns to try at a later date, but I think I’ll pass on that option considering my first experience. I’m going to release this book for someone else to use. Hopefully, it’ll be someone with more experience, patience and common sense to use the correct materials. Enjoy. I truly hope you have more skill/luck than I did.

[If someone finds my patience wandering around out there, please send it back to me.]

Update May 11, 2007: Here are the photos on Flickr:
Photo 1
Photo 2

Update October 17, 2007: Finally I've added the quills and posted the photos on Flickr:
Photo 3
Photo 4