Pandemic projects: From wine barrel rings to dream catchers

A fortuitous trip to Walla Walla provided the inspiration for Craig Condron’s pandemic project.

“Just as the pandemic was starting, my wife and I were in Walla Walla sampling wine,” said Condron. “We walked by a store selling wine barrel bands (rings). I said to my wife ‘Hey, I could make dream catchers out of those!’ ”

He bought six of them and brought them home.

Condron has long enjoyed woodworking, but this new project required some research.

“I knew some of the history, but I wanted to get a feel for the tradition,” he said.

Dream catchers are associated with Native American culture in general and are believed to have originated from the Ojibwe tribe. They feature a handmade willow hoop on which is woven a net or web, and may also be decorated with feathers or beads.

Traditionally, dream catchers are hung over a bed as protection. Good dreams pass through and gently slide down the feathers to comfort the sleeper below, while bad dreams are caught in the webbing.

Wine barrel rings in hand, Condron set out to get the rest of the materials he would need.

“Originally, I wanted to wrap the metal rings in leather strips,” he recalled.

Intervention from a clerk at a local craft and hobby store resulted in a change of plans. When the clerk learned what he wanted to use the leather for, she set him straight.

He smiled.

“She said, ‘No you don’t want to do that, you want jute.’ ”

So he bought several 900-foot rolls of jute twine.

String for the webbing was easy to come by, and his son and other hunter friends provided plenty of turkey feathers for the decorative touches.

His creativity came in handy when it came to the beads. Because the barrel hoops are 26 inches in diameter, he needed large beads.

“I made them out of alder branches and painted them in traditional colors,” Condron said.

To make a dream catcher, he first drills eight bolts into the ring and paints them dark brown. Then comes the laborious process of wrapping the ring in jute.

“I wrap it really tight,” he said. “I use 300 feet to do one. It takes three hours just to do the jute.”

Next, he wraps the string around the bolts to create the webbing. A wooden ring in the center provides a hub for the loops.

“The webbing looks different from different angles,” Condron said. “I add the feathers and the beads last.”

After the tension on the webbing is to his satisfaction, the dream catcher is complete.

It takes him about a day and a half to make one – not that he keeps careful track.

“I’m retired,” he said. “I don’t have to finish in a set amount of time.”

The project has kept his mind and his hands busy and kept him out of his wife’s hair.

He laughed.

“I’m not sure if they are pandemic projects or get-out-in-the-garage wife projects,” Condron said. “We’ve been married 53 years – we don’t need that much time together.”

He’s made well over a dozen dream catchers, donating them to fundraising auctions and gifting them to friends.

“Giving them to people is the most enjoyable thing,” he said.

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Correspondent Cindy Hval can be reached at dchval@juno.com.