Temari Dreams

I am finding that I am much more interested and excited about stitching temari when I use my Japanese temari books for bed-time reading. I think reading about temari just before I go to sleep helps me dream about temari and solve problems in my sleep. The past week or so I have been studying this picture in Cosmo 7 (page 32). It is nice, because there are diagrams for each of these temari, which isn't always the case for Cosmo books.

I like the coordinating colors, similar, but not exact. And since I have been dreaming about these, I decided to try my hand at one.


When I study them, it is very interesting. The lines run parallel between the centers, and on this page there is an example with 2 lines, 4 lines, 6, and 8 lines, building up in complexity. I decided to be brave and start out with the 4 lines example, and because of the weather outside, I went for snowflake colors.



I haven't decided yet if I need to take out the guidelines or not. I think I will probably end up taking them out. This one isn't done yet, it still needs the flowers. While I was stitching I was trying to analyze the pattern. Working it reminded me of the weaving temari I made this year (the 3-way weave). This one is made with triangle shapes, which isn't terribly evident from the pictures. I will let you know if the rest of them are made with triangle shapes too, again, I can't tell from the pictures. The weaving gets confusing when you turn the corners, but I think I got it right. The first try I got about a third of the way done, and took everything out to start over again.

I was thinking that you used bands with even numbers between your centers, and pentagons with odd numbers of centers, but maybe it is triangles for even numbers, and pentagons for odd numbers, bands or not. The orientation is different here, on the long lines of the pentagons instead of the short lines, like the previous one, around the outside of the centers.

(Clear as mud, right?)



I was thinking that you needed this orientation for odd numbers. This is the beginner's multi-center I was talking about on the Temari Challenge group. The pentagons are oriented on the short lines of the 12 centers and are all inside of the 12 centers.



Thank you for listening while I think out loud about this pattern. It helps a lot. I will let you know if my guess about triangles vs. pentagons (even vs. odd) is right.