Monday, February 22, 2010

Progress on the Welcome Rug

I thought that I would show you my progress on my little Welcome Rug. So far - so good I think. I did the lettering first to make sure that it was fairly even before the other hooking distorted it a bit.

I dyed the blue for the background the other night using a Cushings dye and I like the effect of having to slightly different tones for the higgly-piggly, or C's and S's, that I am hooking for the sky. I loved that effect for my Halloween Rug so I thought that duplicating it for the sky would be nice.

You can see the "bead-stitch," or as GRS calls it "alternating loop stitch," around the inner boarder of the rug. I love those two colours together so I decided to do a couple of the leaves in that amazing chartreuse green. I'm not sure what I will do for the final boarder ~ maybe a darker blue. We'll see!

Thursday, February 18, 2010

Last Rug

I just wanted to quickly share this amazing link to a great rug! The site is called Mom's Rug and it is a site dedicated to a woman's last rug that she will probably make. It shows a hooked rug by Adeanya Hunt that is 10 x 11 feet and depicts Audubon birds and wild plants and it is absolutely spectacular! She started it in 1969 and finished it in 2006. Since she is now in her 80's she thinks that this will be her last rug. It really is something to check out ~ the site is very nicely done and the rug is a real hierloom that will be treasured for generations to come.

Sunday, February 14, 2010

Getting Rid of the Hand Quilting Frame & Commision Baby Quilt

Well I have a bit of a confession to make. Ever since I really took up rug hooking I haven't been hand quilting on my frame at all! I mean not at all. It's horrible - I haven't sat down to quilt on this frame for well over 2 years and I have been feeling really bad about it for a long time now. My quilt frame has become a storage area that looks like a junk pile and is a constant source of nagging anxiety. You can see the frame in the same position in January of 2006!!!

So! I came to a decision. In my regular, weekly, quilting bee I am up next to put a quilt on the frame. I've been getting so nervous and anxious because I don't have a quilt top ready to put on the frame. Today I took this quilt off my hand quilting frame, so that I could bring it to my group to be hand quilted, and, we took down this frame. Yes, we actually took the whole frame down. I cleared out the stuff and freed up the space in my quilting studio. I actually freed up 4 feet by 10 feet of space that was doing nothing but collecting junk for a couple years. I feel really good about my decision. I've actually removed two sources of undue anxiety from my quilting life by allowing the quilt to be done by my group instead of expecting myself to do it. I'm not sure what I want to do with the quilt frame yet though. I may keep it - who knows maybe I'll start hand-quilting at home again. Or, maybe I'll get sell it or give it away. I can always get a quilting frame top to my rug hooking frame if I decide to start hand quilting again.

It was a hard decision to make - to realize that I might never sit down at that frame again - but that the quilt was still there calling to me LOL! I feel much better though. Now to rearrange a few things and make some use of that space! I feel the need for some storage units :D

This was a baby quilt I made for a lady's new grand-daughter. It is a commission piece that she picked the pattern (yes the 4-patch, 1-patch) and the fabric for and I did the work! I'm really happy with how it turned out and I just love the colours. Even though I am not usually a pink person - I do love the softness of this quilt. The back is a beautiful soft pink flannel that a little baby will love to cuddle up in.

I love making baby quilts :)

2022 Christmas T-Shirt Quilt Gift

As promised - here is the T-Shirt Quilt Christmas Gift from 2022! I did share this on my Facebook page but not on my blog, (whoops sorry!) s...