I wasn’t trying to make a Year of the Snake fingerloop braid when I made the first of these curvy braids last month, shortly after Chinese New Year.

I was experimenting with color-linking in a solid-rectangle double braid. I liked the way the color-patterns turned out, but the braid itself didn’t look right…it was sort of straight, but not quite. Slightly uneven along the edges.

It was only when I started ‘plumping’ the braid up and down after it was finished*¹ that the curves developed…The braid seemed to want to deform into regular waves. So I just helped that along, and then wet the braid and let it dry on a towel. I made a few more in slight variations of the same kind of alternating side-to-side linking, and all were easy to loosen up into wavy, undulating braids after they were made.

The color-linking in these braids is done a little differently than I’ve shown before. What I’ve already demoed is how to link different-color loops together during the final loop exchange move—the last move of a double braid. It’s in my flat double braid tutorial (I also used it for several braids in my hollow double braid tutorial–all the braids that have a different-colored top and bottom).

But these curvy braids require color-linking during some of the loop transfers, not at the loop exchange. The orange, yellow and gray flat double braid in my right sidebar→ also has this type of color-linking. In the curvy braids the linking shifts from the left to the right side of the braid, and then back again – which must be the reason the braid ends up being wavy.*² Flat braids with this kind of color-linking end up straight, not snaky. I assume that’s because after the braid is done, and the two layers of the braid are spread open (book-like), any tendency to curve on the left of the midline is cancelled out by the mirror-image tendency for an opposite curve on the right.

Update: I now have two tutorials that teach color-linking as part of the loop-transfers, one for 7-loop braids and one for 13-loop braids. Both are flat versions of square braids, whereas these “snake” braids are double braids of the ‘solid rectangle‘ shape, but the linking method is essentially the same for both. In flat braids, it’s always the case that any linked areas have mirror-image symmetry on the left and right sides of the braid, which must be why those braids do not deform into curves, while tightly-braided solid-rectangle versions without mirror-image symmetry do curve.

Btw, Laverne Waddington gets the credit for matching up these braids with the Chinese New Year—I never would have made the braid~snake~new year connection myself! I showed the braids to Laverne at a weaving workshop she taught here in California a couple of weekends ago, and she immediately said “Snake braids–for the year of the Snake!” So it’s because of Laverne that this post has a more interesting title than, say – “Curvilinear Double Braids.”

If you want to learn how to make the curvy braids, it would probably be best to try this kind of color-linking in a straight braid first. Which is one of the many tutorials I’ve been trying to decide on—which to make, that is…

My to-do list is getting scarily long:

• Kaitlyn’s color-pattern for a 7-loop flat ‘square’ braid (fun and easy):

• The flat version of the 7-loop Spanish braid (plus other shapes)
• Unorthodox braids
• Single-layer plain weave braids
• Color-linking in other places than the loop-exchange (see braid in right sidebar→)
• Odd-number-of-loop double braids (good to know — makes a more balanced double braid) *³
• 10-loop 17th C. Letter-braids [update: Done! click preceding link] I’ve made several posts about the 14-loop letterbraid, and a tutorial for its component 7-loop spanish braid. I’m not planning to make a tutorial for the 14-loop letterbraid as a solo braider technique until after I’ve taught a few braiders how to make the 10-loop ones. They only require holding one loop per finger — and thumb, so are a lot easier. (they’re definitely more complicated than 10-loop double braids, though, because they have twice as many loop transfers.)

So here’s a poll: Which one do you want next, if any? There are also the rest of the 12 different double braid shapes, I’ve only covered four so far.
(leave your vote in the comment field below this post.)

Realistically, it isn’t possible for all of the tutorials in the list to be “coming soon.” Especially considering how easily I get distracted…I need to prioritize somehow.

At least lately I’ve been distracted by braiding, instead of my usual distraction—wasting time on the internet! On that same off-topic, I’m back home again after being gone for a month at my mother’s (she was sick, but is now much better). It was amazing being almost completely away from a computer for a whole month. Even though I watched a couple hours of tv a day with my mother, I was more productive there than I am at home. I’m thinking of trying out a program called MacFreedom that somehow helps you set limits on the time you spend online…