Three projects…

Thanks to Jeni for reminding me I had not posted my finished rug of the René Lalique jewelry design. Yes, it is all done, and I like the way it came out. Here is a close-up where you can see a few of the five “pearls” I did in the sculpted Waldoboro technique:

In person, the sculpted pearls do add something special to the rug. Doing Waldoboro is challenging and fun, but I do not see myself doing a project with lots of it! And starting with such a lovely, graceful design by Lalique, I did not have to worry about the design or the composition itself – just focussed on the colors and the hooking!

And my Tuesday morning rug group was invited to do an exhibit over the summer, on the theme of “Red, White and Blue”. I have my flag rug that I finished this spring, but not much else where those colors are dominant. So I pulled out a small oval pattern I was given, “Charlie Brown Christmas Tree” and used the oval linen and bunting border to design my own pot of red and white flowers instead of the spindley tree. It was fun because, once I decided I would use a background of hit or miss blues, I really could make it up as I went along. Here it is, just finished this weekend:

It only took me about two weeks to do this, and I found it very relaxing. And it did help to get me through two of our recent snowstorms…

So now on to my next project! My good friend Sue Hammond (one of the original founders of the Green Mountain Rughooking Guild, and one of the real emotional and creative anchors of our Tuesday morning group) had drawn out a tree, with birds and leaves of many colors. I loved it, and Sue kindly agreed to draw it out again on linen for me to make. So I am working on a Sue Hammond original!

It will be fun to do, and I will mostly delve into my basket (ok, baskets, baggies, and plastic boxes) of cut wool strips for making the leaves. Here it is, with only the tree, one of the ten birds, and two leaves done:

I’ve decided to take Sue’s advice and add background to each hooked element as I go along, so there is not quite so much background later on! And both Sue and I are already enjoying how our hooking strategies are different. I definitely wanted to do the entire tree first. She did one small section – tree, birds, and leaves – all at once, then went on to the next small section. And her background is a very pale blue, while mine is a medium-dark green. It will be so interesting to see them, side by side, when they are both done!

Hope you have a good project or three to be working on, during this last cold spell (please make it be the last one!) before real spring arrives.