One of my very first experiences when I moved to Seattle three years ago was a trip to the Pike Place Market. I walked around the market, talked to people, shopped, and generally did the tourist thing. I was over by the totem poles when a Native American person stopped me. He wanted to know what tribe I was from. I'm not actually a Native American, but am often mistaken for one. We talked for a bit. One thing he said has always remained in my memory. He told me "This is the Land of Dreams. Follow your dreams." To follow our dreams, it helps to catch and examine them first.
Dream catchers—if you haven't heard of them before—are round, web-like structures you hang over your bed to catch dreams in. See Figure 1. They are made by different tribes all over the North America. In the United States the Navajo, the Sioux and the Zuni, among others, make them. In Canada, the Cree and the Mi'Kmaq also do. The mythology of the dream catcher varies with the tribe that made it.
The secrets of dream catcher construction were given to the tribes by gods. Which god, again, varies, but spider gods such as Grandmother Spider and the trickster Iktomi the Spider Man are the most common. The purpose of the gift is always to filter dreams. The undesirable dreams are caught in the web, and good ones escape. In tribes from the eastern United States, the good dreams flow out through the hole in the center of the dream catcher. Western tribes—which usually fill in the hole with feathers, rocks, shells, or just a tighter weave—believe that the good dreams trickle out of the feathers or leaves attached to the bottom of the dream catcher for that purpose. The bad dreams remaining in the web are always destroyed by the first light.
All this is reversed by the Lakota tribe who believe that you use the dream catcher to catch good dreams, as you would use a net to catch fish. In this tradition, the good dreams in the web condense into pure drops of water shining in the morning sun. Then you drink the water.
Dream catchers are often used to catch the nightmares of the children, but adults can also use them to stop bad recurring dreams. Just hanging one will raise the percentage of good dreams one has, since any random bad dreams in your area can be caught and destroyed. The myths did mention, however, that a dream catcher will not stop a dream sending aimed specifically at you.
From North America, dream catchers have spread all around the world. I've kept my eye out for dream catchers for years and have seen them as far away and in as diverse settings as in an art gallery in Germany and over an environmental base camp in Australia. The design is almost always the same, although the construction materials vary wildly.
Before diving into construction, I want to talk a little about why we are looking at dream catchers. We are pagans and witches here. We honor the Earth. Part of that honoring includes honoring, when possible, the traditions of the people indigenous to the land we live in. When traditions are relevant for our modern pagan practice, it behooves us to try to understand and use them. In this case, it is Imbolc, a quiet time of dreams and magick for us pagans. Learning about dream catchers gives us a new way of looking at our dreams.
To make a dream catcher, you need wood and string. The wood should be a flexible branch or stalk about 3.5 times longer than you want the dream catcher to be across. A three-foot branch, for example, makes a dream catcher about 10 inches across. The branch needs to be flexible enough that you can tie the ends together. Willow is traditional, probably because it is long and easy to work with. Twine works well for the string, although just about anything will work. I've seen wonderful dream catchers made with copper wire.
Without cutting the string from your spool, tie the ends of the branch together to get Figure 2.
Then start going around the circle, tying the string to the wood as you go. If you want to honor Grandmother Spider, attach the string to the wood in eight places around the circle, one place for each of Her legs. If your dream catcher is bigger than about six inches across, however, you will probably want to tie it in more than eight places. After you go around, your catcher should look kind of like Figure 3. Notice that when you finish going around, you do not end where you started.
The easiest way to attach the string to the wood is with a simple over and under loop like Figure 4.
The ring knot in Figure 5 will make a more stable, if more difficult to tie, pattern.
Now go around again, but this time tie the string to the middle of the string next around the circle one loop back. At the end of your next circuit, you will get a pattern vaguely like Figure 6.
As you tie onto the middle of the earlier strings, tie tightly and those earlier strings will bend inward giving the classic dream catcher form that I can't easily represent here (see Figure 1 for guidance). Use the same kind of knot you used to tie to the wood. Figures 6 and 7 show what ties to what, but not what it will actually look like.
Keep going around a few more times and you will get something like Figure 7.
Keep going until you get to the near the center. If you want a hole in the center, stop going around when you reach the desired hole size. Tie it off with a more secure knot, like a square knot.
If you don't want a hole, go all the way in. As you approach the center, you will have to start skipping a segment or two here and there just to keep the pattern from getting too crowded. Tie off at the center to whatever you want to place at the center.
That brings us to the question of placing objects in the dream catcher. You can weave whatever you want into your dream catcher. Rocks, feathers or leaves are traditional. Beads and crystals are common. Just thread whatever you want to weave in onto the string in between one knot and the next. If there is no hole on your object, just tie the string securely around it. Remember, your good dreams will pass though these objects on their way to you, so they should be symbolic of what you want in your dreams.
If you want a hole in the center, you are done. If you are filling in the center, you should have placed a bigger object there. You also want to add feathers, leaves, or anything generally arrowhead shaped pointing down hanging from more string tied to the bottom of your dream catcher. The good dreams you catch will trickle down through these objects into you.
Your finished dream catcher should look kind of like Figure 1. Hang your dream catcher over your bed when you sleep, and enjoy. Remember, this is the Land of Dreams. Now that you have caught and seen your dream, follow where it leads you.
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