Keep away nightmares and rest with good dreams by placing a dream catcher above your bed. Dreamcatchers have various parts to them, each with a purpose. As good and bad dreams fly through the air, they find their way to the dreamcatcher. As dreams glide through the dreamcatcher’s boundary and webs, the good ones make it through while the bad ones get caught in the net. Strings with feathers and/or beads hang from the bottom of the structure. This allows the good dreams to make their way through the hoop and glide down the strings and into your sleep, so make sure to hang the dream catcher above your head! Bad dreams get caught in the webbing, stored until morning when they are destroyed by the morning sun. Dreamcatchers can be found in lots of different places from museums to knick-knack shops, but do you know about their history within the American Indian community?
There are several legends for which tribe the dreamcatcher originated from, but it is most commonly attributed to the Ojibwa Chippewa tribe. The Ojibwa tribe is from the area that is now the Midwestern US and southern Canada. In the Ojibwa tribe the original word for dreamcatchers is asabikeshiinh which translates to spider. The Ojibwa had a legend of the “Spider Woman”, a protector of their tribe. The legend goes, as the tribe began to grow and spread, she could not protect her dispersed people. From this, she made the first dreamcatcher, something that made it possible to keep her tribe safe, even if she was not there. The dreamcatcher continued to be a way for mothers to keep their children safe from bad dreams. Now, children and adults alike hang the figure above their beds to ward off bad dreams. Want to keep nightmares away? Make your own dreamcatcher with these simple steps. You’ll need:
- String
- Sticks
- Beads
- Feathers
- Gather your materials.
- Place your sticks in desired shape. Tie the first two ends together with the string. Loop down one side of the border. At the next corner, wrap the two sticks together securely. Continue on every side and end with a knot.
- Start your web-go around and loop your string on every side, make them as evenly spaced or not as you like. We recommend aiming for the far opposite corner and working your way towards the middle of each side.
- Continuing looping the string through the sides.
- Once a small triangle appears in the middle, create a knot or loop back up to the top corner to knot.
- Cut strings of desired length to hang from bottom of dreamcatcher (with a little extra room to tie it onto the dreamcatcher).
- Tie one end of the cut string to the core of a feather. Once secured, slide on the desired number and color of beads.
- Tie onto bottom of dreamcatcher.
- Create a loop with leftover string to hang the dreamcatcher from the top.
- Hang above bed and sleep peacefully!
