MONDAY MONDAY

Wasn't that a great song?  I started to title this post Manic Monday but my day has been a good one so far so I don't dare say that !

I am feeling a bit tired today after having a GREAT weekend at the rug hooking retreat at the Olde Green Cupboard.  Got a lot done on the rug I pulled out of hibernation.  I have not worked on this runner since I started it two years ago.  Always seems to be something more important for me to focus on.  I do love this rug and I did meet my goal in my class to finish all 6 of the faces - I thought that was the most challenging part for me and after 2 years - I still like the faces - I was not wild about the colors initially but I do love Diane Stoffel my teacher on this project.  She has done several other rugs for me that I just adore like my mermaid.  I am not a blue/purple person and there seems to be loads of blue type tones in this rug.  So I had all sorts of apprehensions about whether I would like the finished rug well enough to use it and in my old house - I just didn't have any place in mind to use it so I was unmotivated to work on it.  So it was relegated to the bottom of the wool cupboard along with my other hibernating WIP's.  However when I was searching for something to take to this retreat - I ran across it and thought hummmm - that is pretty dang cool and I have the perfect spot for it high up on the wall in my wool room.  So without further ado - here is the "Harkening of Angels" - the canvas is by Bea Brock - a texas designer - she just calls it "Angel Sampler Runner" but I like my name better.  It is done in all new wool - mostly spot dyes mostly in a 4 and 5 cut with some 3 cut for fine detail.  I wanted an angry night sky look for the backround and I think Diane nailed that perfectly - don't know if you can see any of that but I did start putting it in the upper left corner. 

My fear is that the brown twigs and vine stem is not going to show up well against that backround - I might have to pull that out and put in a lighter shade of brown or go with a different type of green.  I feel most of what is already hooked will show up against the backround.  I know we have some budding rug hookers out there in blog land and this is just another good reason to start putting in some backround as soon as it is possible instead of waiting till you have most of your motif (s) finished - at that point a change in your backround plans might be necessary instead of just altering some of your motif colors.

This rug is extremely busy - that is another thing that I wasn't quite sure if I was crazy about.  I love the angels - here is a shot of the center guy.  His one foot is WAY too long so that needs to be fixed and I ripped out part of his one hand because it looked more like a paw LOL - you have to take a lot of creative license when doing commerical hooked rug patterns I feel and most of the designers realize this and are happy for you to make it your own.

Here is the right side of the rug - I started filling in the motifs this past weekend on the left side so it is far more filled in than the right -

Here is another close up of the left side - so half of the angel motifs are finished now and if I make this my "take to guild" carry around project - I can start filling in the backround on that left side - sometimes it's nice to just take only pre-cut backround wool to work on at a guild meeting instead of having a huge color plan to work on.

If the colors look garish to you - I think it's probably because they are !  I think that very dark backround is going to tone down some of those crazy bright colors like on #6 angel.

DF Susan came to this retreat - she is an awesome rug hooker and also a teacher.  She was almost finished with this rug by Karen Kahle - using a special technique called marblized wool.  Some of this wool was Susan's creation - mainly the backround and the greens I think she said.  Now I am dying to take a workshop from Karen Kahle - not that I am interested in dyeing but I do love this backround technique - Susan said it was somewhat a pain to execute but the results are stunning.  Susan loves primitives and she hooks mainly with an 8cut.  Those flowers were all the marblized wool.  TOO COOL!

Another friend Dottie was hooking these awesome cardinals.  They re in a 3cut I believe on a colored wool ground which is intended to be left unhooked.

Last is a photo of new hooker Vicki's "Harvest Good Things" rug by Lori Brechlin - Not Forgotten Farms and the color plan is by Dianne Kelly.  She was in her class this year at Off the Ocean and sat next to my DM.  Vicki is doing great on her rug and I love the warm rich colors on this one.

I should not have said last because there is one more photo to show you - it's bunny time at the Olde Green Cupboard - they are wrapped in spring splendor right now - bunnies, chickies, duckies, lambs galore - This neat gal came into the shop on Saturday to bring Gloria some primitive loverlies that she makes in her little prim store in St Mary's GA - it's called Feathered Nest - WOW - what awesome creations and great prices for the quality.  Here is a photo of my Harriett Bunny on her tuffet and mom's black bunny girl who is unnamed - I should have turned her face towards the camera.  Someone said she reminded them of Uncle Reamis so maybe we'll call her Auntie Reamis.

I don't have any knitting progress to show and stitching progress is even worse.  I will say that hanging around the OGC so much has caused me to fall into quilting purgatory.  I'll save that news flash for a future post but it's SO NOT GOOD!