Simple Round Clothesline Bowl Tutorial aka Rope Bowls

 You will need some cotton clothesline. Some clothesline comes with a polyester core and some without. Your bowl will be sturdier with the poly core. There is also polyester cord aka paracord but it doesn't give the organic look regular old cotton clothesline does.
I used 3/8", 7/32" & 1/4" inch clothesline.

Your basic sewing machine with a zigzag stitch.

Size 14 sewing machine needle.

Neutral threads -whatever colors you want to use up.
This tutorial is just for a basic bowl. Any color comes from the thread.

2-5 bobbins filled with thread. This is actually a great time to use up those bobbins that are partially used up. Whenever your bobbin runs out, get up and stretch.

 I start coiling the rope on itself, utilizing four straight pins to hold my disc steady. The pins won't penetrate the poly core so just skim the pin thru on top.

I  clip a wee bit of the core out and smush the cotton fibers close. You can also utilize some glue/fraycheck to help.

 Wind until you get a 2 inch disc.

 To start a circular bowl, you'll need to wind your cord in a circle and stick some straight pins through from the side to secure. Then carefully start zigzagging so the stitch catches both coils.
At the beginning,  take two stitches, lift your presser foot, pivot, and sew another two stitches and repeat. At about 2 1/2" wide (see photo) you don't have to lift your presser foot so much and can start feeding it through on the curve.

I tried to sew over my pins at the beginning and ended up hitting one and breaking my needle. This is really the trickiest part of making the bowl. Keeping the bottom coils flat enough as you zig zag in stops and starts. Maybe pull your pin out enough as you pass and then stick it back in. The pins are only there for a few rounds.

My machine has a needle down button. The needle stays down while you pivot the disc.

My zigzag varies according to the diameter of the rope. You'll need a wider zig on wider cord. Mostly, I'm somewhere around 4.8 - 5.0 in width.
The zag is set around 4.0 - 5.0 length.

Some tutorials have you do a cross on the bottom disc with your zigzag stitches. They mostly don't show unless you are using up strong colors.

I tend to criss-cross the bottom with my zigzag until I feel it is secure. Moving pins in/out as they get in the way. Then as soon as I can see clearly, I start zigzagging around the circle joining two coils together with the zigzag stitch.

I also have my disc with the coil feeding off to the right towards me. If it goes to the left then you can stop and cut threads and flip it over to match the photos above.

Remove the pins at about 2.5". Or when you don't need them to help hold things steady.

The neutral threads don't show. If you can't sew a straight line, this simple project allows do-overs. Just sew again - right on top of your wayward stitches. They won't show, I promise.

When I first started making these bowls, I would occasionally wander in my stitching as I did the endless circles. Easy fix - just make sure thread in bobbin and spool is neutral colored like the clothesline. No one will notice.

For most bowls, I sew a flat disc until 6 inches. Then, I raise the whole bowl against the machine for several rotations. If you want steeper sides, smash that bowl against your machine. Easier sloping sides, use your left hand to gently lift as you sew.

 Sloping sides here. My hand is not lifting as I sew.

 Here is my hand gently lifting. straighter sides result. Straighter? Smush it against your sewing machine - up high.

 A close-up of my bottom - ha! not mine, the bowl's bottom. That first darker teal is where I broke the needle. The second is where I ran out of bobbin thread and started again. The thread tail got caught up in the stitching.

 Here's my wobbly stitching. Which no one has ever mentioned.
Run with it.

How to finish.

Well - you have to eventually. I liked a knot here so I sewed up to the knot as close as I could get and then back-stitched the end in place.

I've seen handles. Holes left purposely to make handles, etc.
You just sew to the place where you want a handle in place and run your zigzag so it doesn't catch the upper coil for 3 or 4 inches (5?). The handle will be a bit fuller than the previous coil so when you want to end the handle hole, you bring the outer coil down with enough give to create a visible hole. Move your zigzag stitch back so it catches both coils.  Continue sewing to the other side and repeat. It probably would be helpful to mark those places with a pin or wonder clip to keep handles at even intervals.

I have a pinterest board with several finishes I liked (K8hobbies under Rope Bowls). Some people hide the end join with a piece of leather riveted on. I tend to just make knots.

At times I hand-stitch my coils or knots down. Have fun and let your creativity loose.

The cotton clothesline does create some lint fluff. Clean out your bobbin case after you make a few.

Fabric-wrapped bowls. Pain in the patuttie. My tip? Skip the long strips. Go with 1.25" wide strips by 3 inches long. Easier to control until you've made at least one. Put a strip here and there. Use some scraps.



Notes on time and other questions:

My first bowl took a solid hour - maybe 1 1/4 hours to make the first one. The smaller one took 15 minutes.

 I had been thinking about it for months. I knew I did NOT want to try the fabric wrapped version. Other than securing the bottom and angling the bowl 'plate' UP at 6". it was very organic. Look again at my Pinterest board. I added some ideas. Odd # stripes is from landscaping and window dressing advice: group in 3's and/or 5's.

You can only sew until your bobbin runs out. I used five on the the large bowl, most of two on the small bowl.

The body hurt is all at the beginning where you are hunched over trying to get the zigzag to catch both coils. When you angle the bowl up and start the shaping, then you can consciously sit tall in your sewing chair, relax, and find your sewing rhythm. My clear foot has two red dots on it on either side of the center 'opening' (toes). I try to eyeball the dots to guide me. Staring at the neutral rope will hypnotize you.

Because of the bobbin changes, it's easy to take breaks. The designing is very organic.

Rope tips;

1. I liked the 7/32" wide cotton clothesline to begin with. The 3/8 (6/32) was a tad more fiddly. It was a different brand as well.

2. In my little town, I have four stores that sell cotton clothesline. Varying in price, thickness, and strength. Buying for me and a few 'skeins' for friend in Japan has emptied the town. Yes, I could buy online. For cheaper. But I feel clothesline is one of those staples that if we buy online, we help close another brick & mortar store. {opinionated}  I made four bowls out of what I bought. I'll wait until someone re-stocks to have another go at it.

3. A wide zigzag of 4.0 to 5.0 is good for catching both cords as you sew the bowl together. Again, the larger 7/32 cording was a great starter.

4. Your white or off-white thread disappears into the clothesline weave. If you wobble off your join line, go back and have another go at it.

5. I have a Pinterest board to help focus my 'organic' rope sewing.

6. While out researching my town, I was tempted by some turquoise para-cord but -- I don't like the feel of the polyester stuff and I can't imagine having a para-cord bowl sitting on my counter unless a grandchild made it and I had to. Neutral, organic, cotton clothesline gave me the feel I was after.

7. Have fun. Use up some thread spools.


For more inspirational photos, you can search my sidebar on the full sized web page for "Clothesline", "Rope" and "Bowls".
(Apparently I am not good at tagging projects consistently.)

Easter Basket

I needed a fast gift for Easter.
To hold all the candy.

I turned to my clothesline and 45 minutes later  --Ta Da!
Very satisfying craft.

 I went with pink and purple threads. I wanted the basket to be big enough to hold the candy and tried a racetrack oval for the bottom with success.

I switched out thread and bobbins several times to get the striping and then I wanted the beefy handles at the end - utilizing three rows of clothesline. 

I use my wonder clips to mark the start and end of the handles and eyeball it to make sure they are evenly sized. For this, I find using the white/natural color thread to be useful. If you make one handle super gigantic, it's easy to sew it down more to match without anyone knowing.

I finished it with a swirl and hand-tacked the swirl down. Very nice work.

  We are taking easter dinner over to the sister who is deeply depressed. We're trying for a group - en masse - all six of us - effect.  No pressure - just doing what you do - on Easter.

This will be supportive without being threatening.

I've got a spiral ham and scalloped potatoes in the oven warming up. A pretty tablecloth and napkins, some flowers, and some easter candy for the nephew. 

My pretty tulips despite the daily drizzle. We're all whining about no sun here. Although, I am glad we are not moving house in the daily drizzle (Like someone I know) and this type of winter weather only comes around every ten years or so.

Happy Easter everyone. 

 

 

 
 

Holiday Candy Dish

 I had a small ball of clothesline left over from my last rope bowl. As I was sewing a medium sized gift last Saturday, I kept bumping into it. And then I saw a rope bowl online that used small strips of fabric wrapping to provide color and Voila!  --- another 20 minute gift completed.

I used one- inch strips of fabric from my scrap basket. I originally pulled whatever colors that got my eye and then as I was sitting down, ruminating on the purpose of this gift, I decided to just do red strips.

These strips are between 4 and 5 inches long - little pops of color on the neutral base.

Finishing off, I did  a little loop with the intention of doing four more. My process is very organic. As I was marking those four spots for the loops, I decided it was such a small candy dish size bowl , that it just needed two loops, which organically, ended in the spiral thingy.

While photographing the bowl for this post, the candy dish looked slightly "off". In a massive "Aha!" moment, I stitched that weird spiral down against the side and now I am very happy with my newest rope bowl.

Styled with my beautiful persimmons. I am waiting for the persimmons to become ripe which actually occurred slightly after Thanksgiving last year. The yellow will  become more orange and there will be a slight give to the fruit when you handle them.

Fabric Wrapped Rope Bowl

Complete with threads hanging off.

Benta and Janine challenged me to tackle fabric wrapped clothesline bowls.
I dreamed about it.

A red, white & blue bowl....

Actually, they didn't challenge me. They just thought about it. lol

This is how I start my bowls. I wrap it tight into a spiral and push straight pins in to secure.
This particular rope is a cheap one -- $5 for 100 feet, which will make a good sized bowl. It's cotton braided around a styrofoam core. I didn't have any problems sewing on it but I did use a size 14 needle. Anyhoo, my pins won't pierce the styrofoam so I insert them just enough to grab the cotton bits. The pins help to keep the spiral flat while starting the sewing.

I also put a spot of Fraycheck on the end so it doesn't 'fluff' up. You could use any glue.

I make my spiral about 2 inches in diameter and then zigzag around in tight circles and even going back over the initial circles twice and then start going round and round. It's important to have the tail come off on the right hand side so you can zigzag in a continuous spiral.

 I really didn't want to mess with strips of fabric, getting tangled trying to wrap the cording.
And I was right. It is a bother.

So, in my dreams the other night, my bowl was designed with three rounds each of red, white & blue. With the rest of the bowl being the natural cotton clothesline.

I robbed my scrap basket - no real fabric was harmed in the making of this bowl. However, blue became turquoise, because there is no other color of blue in my scrap basket.

And just plain white up to my fabric strip colors felt wrong, so I switched threads and bobbin and put some red into the bottom of this bowl when the base was still flat.

 I really like my knot finish on this bowl too.   Three stripes, three knots?

 Overall, I like this bowl.    I'm not in love with it though.

It feels unwieldy big. And the contrast between the natural white and the fabric colors is more intense. Just using thread feels more modern and trendy.

I do like how the handles were even set off the top.


I can't say that I'm done with these bowls. They are amazingly fast and give such awesome results. They feed my need to make a craft in my small amount of free time. This fabric wrapped bowl took just over two hours. Just using thread is half the time. Big bang for my creativity.


I still need to trim thread tails and this bowl will go on the completed pile.

 My friend in Japan sent me an awesome t-shirt: SEW Elaborately Days - complete with vintage sewing machine.

Last, but not least, Fabric sale tomorrow in the church parking lot (??!!).
I'm gonna take my bike (3 miles into town) so I can behave myself.
With my tiny biking backpack.

hahaahahahahahahahahaha.