A method of making a fabric-creped absorbent cellulosic sheet includes compactively dewatering a papermaking furnish to form a nascent web having a random distribution of papermaking fiber, applying the nascent web to a translating transfer surface that is moving at a transfer surface speed, fabric-creping the nascent web from the transfer surface at a consistency of from about 30 to about 60 percent utilizing a patterned creping fabric that is traveling at a fabric-creping speed that is slower than the transfer surface speed, the fabric-creping step occurring under pressure in a fabric creping nip defined between the transfer surface and the creping fabric, such that the nascent web is creped from the transfer surface and redistributed on the creping fabric to form a creped web with a drawable reticulum having a plurality of interconnected regions of different local basis weights.