Rock Art

Hello my friends!  Thanks for visiting today.  As an artist - I get inspired with many different mediums.  I have loved the simple rock my whole life.  My last endeavor was to crochet around them.  But on Facebook a photo showed up of Japanese rattan cane wrapped rocks that just wowed me.  This below is my second one, the first one was less than satisfactory.  :-)

This is the photo that inspired me.  As you can imagine, I googled them and have seen some amazing examples.

First up - gathering the materials.  I actually found a small supply of cane.. where else but.. Amazon.  It was fairly inexpensive.  They sell it to people who do cane seats for chairs, plus basketmakers.  I have used this for several baskets I've made over the years.  I looked for the perfect rock around the farm and the best I could find was this one which was... on the bottom of the pond.  SO.. honey.. will you fish this out for me?  Thank you.  :-D  

Then I donned my shoes and found a pruning shear and trekked out to our large black bamboo patch. 

I wanted short pieces with nodes on both ends.  After some research I found out that the area of bamboo between the nodes is called the internode.  :-) I cut some likely pieces and snipped off the branches while standing outside.  Once inside I cut them into pieces.  As a side note, many people are afraid of bamboo as some are called runners and spread badly.  I have 5 different varieties, all are called "clumping" and don't spread crazy but are well behaved.

This is a closeup of the black bamboo and it's node, where new branches come from.  The canes grow to the girth of a man's thumb.  The canes turn solid black over time.  They start out green.

The label on the cane.  It comes from rattan cane and is stripped off and cut to different sizes.

OK.. materials gathered, time to get to work.

OK, my first attempt.. ummm.. I was ready to give up on the whole idea!

I found my second rock near the pond, it was smaller and much easier to work with.  I soaked the cane in warm water for 10-15 minutes before I began to weave.  

I think I will leave my first rock out by the pond.  :-)

I am very happy with Rock #2.  

Of course I had to photograph them on my big rock I had placed when our pond was built - it's my "sitting rock".

The photo below shows the size of rock that is optimum for doing this - palm sized.  

Some people look askance at me when I share my rocks.  :-)  The ones below are my crocheted ones.

So.. what do you think of cane wrapped rocks?  :-)  Would you ever consider trying to do one?  
((hugs)), Teresa :-)  

PS - I had a suggestion that I make my type larger so it's easier to read.  When I selected Large type it's huge on my screen.  Question, do you like it better the size I have used for 10 years or do like the bigger font?  Please let me know.