The Craftiest Workshop

I received some lovely macrame Christmas oranments from my sister in-law. It got me searching online for some ideas of different patterns to make. My Jan. 28 calendar task was to make a heart out of wood, paper or canvas so I thought….why not yarn?

I seem to always go to yarn as my medium in Jan/Feb. Last year was making yarn pom pom animals. This year I decided to do some knitting and try these macrame hearts.

I found a video that I was pretty easy to follow, pausing as I went.

After making a couple while watching the video and pausing as I went along, I decided to write down the pattern for myself in case I make more. Once you understand that four strands are used to make a knot, you just have to know which four to knot together in each row.

You start with a dowel, stick or even a thin broom handle. You need to tape it onto two objects so the string can hang. I chose two boxes of the same size on top of my counter.

For each heart, you need 12, 100cm pieces of yarn. The chunkier the yarn the closer to 100cm you will need. I probably could have gotten away with 80cm with the thinner yarn.

In the middle of each piece of yarn, tie a cow hitch or lark’s head knot around the dowel, stick or handle.

Continue adding all 12 pieces of yarn to the dowel. When you are done you will have 24 strands of yarn hanging down.

For the sake of following the pattern, I numbered the individual strands 1-24 from left to right.

I would recommend watching the video to learn how to tie a square knot. Every knot is a square knot so once you get it, you just need to know which four strings you are knotting. Here is how to tie one knot. I just isolated four strands so you can see better how it is done.

Last step is to bring the knot together

The first knots for the top of each heart bump (5-8) and (17-20) must be the same distance from the dowel.

You don’t pull tight but leave 1-2 inches for the heart to hang.

Below, for each row, I refer to which four strings to use to tie a knot.

One more note, when adding a string that has not been used yet, make sure you slide the loop on the dowel in close to those already knotted. Otherwise you end up with slack on that strand.

PATTERN

Example: to start the first row take the fifth, sixth, seventh, and eighth strands and make a knot as above. Next, you count from the left again and find the third, fourth, fifth and sixth strand and make a knot as above (you already used the fifth and sixth in the first knot; use them again).
Row 1: 5-8, 3-6, 7-10, 17-20, 19-22, 15-18

Row 2: 1-4, 5-8, 9-12, 21-24, 17-20, 13-16

Row 3: 3-6, 7-10, 11-14, 15-18, 19-22

Row 4: 1-4, 5-8, 9-12, 13-16, 17-20, 21-24

Row 5: 3-6, 7-10, 11-14, 15-18, 19-22

Row 6: 5-8, 9-12, 13-16, 17-20

Row 7: 7-10, 11-14, 15-18

Row 8: 9-12, 13-16

Row 9: 11-14

Here is the completed heart.

I cut the bottom strings differently than the other two I made.

I carefully transferred the loops onto a smaller piece of dowel and attached another piece of yarn as a hanger piece.

I find tying knots to be very relaxing and I plan to try some other macrame patterns in the near future.

These easy to make macrame hearts are a beautiful addition now hanging above our fireplace.