Once I ripped out the olive toned leaves I hooked using the dip dyed swatches that I had hooked the scrolls in, and I found the results made more sense to the overall color theme.
 I pulled a lot of leaf color swatches when I was color planning this rug. The ideea was to have the scrolls in a different color way than the leaves. Once I began hooking the leaves the olive tones were too distracting and seemed incongruent with the remainder of the rug. So, I pulled them out and began again. . . . and again.
 Jubilee is a rug that I began during the two-day class at South Central McGown Teacher Workshop. Kathy Kovaric and Jude Vegso taught the two day class. I started with a set of dip dyes using Hunter Green Cushing dye over a variety of mill-dyed yellows, blues, green and pinks. I dip dyed each of the mill dyed wools so that just the tips of the fabric retained the original color with the dip slowly progressing to the darkest color at the bottom.
Halloween Pins Class at Sauder |
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It is a gorgeous day in Colorado today. Trees are finally budding out and there will be actual leaves in a couple of weeks. My iris are also starting to bloom and the lilac bush is so fragrant it is intoxicating.
I finished another rug yesterday and am so excited that my to-do list is getting shorter.
A few years ago I set the winter aside to read some of the classic books like Treasure Island, Count of Monte Christo, Tom Sawyer, Huckleberry Finn, Frankenstein — there was a long list. During that time I also read a copy of Wind in the Willows. Toady's adventures fascinated me and I decided to depict Toady in washer woman clothing after he fell into the river - before Ratty rescued him. I wanted to create an abstract looking river with Toady flailing about up at the top. I had a great time using all kinds of fibers in the water. . . velvets, silks, sari ribbons, and even some wool and acrylic yarns. It was a lot of fun just imagining the swirling waters and weeds under Toady.
I finished another rug yesterday and am so excited that my to-do list is getting shorter.
A few years ago I set the winter aside to read some of the classic books like Treasure Island, Count of Monte Christo, Tom Sawyer, Huckleberry Finn, Frankenstein — there was a long list. During that time I also read a copy of Wind in the Willows. Toady's adventures fascinated me and I decided to depict Toady in washer woman clothing after he fell into the river - before Ratty rescued him. I wanted to create an abstract looking river with Toady flailing about up at the top. I had a great time using all kinds of fibers in the water. . . velvets, silks, sari ribbons, and even some wool and acrylic yarns. It was a lot of fun just imagining the swirling waters and weeds under Toady.
For the ATHA Kansas City Biennial coming up in 2021 - September 8-11 — Topsy Turvy K.C. Kat is the project that I will be teaching. I hope you will join me!
Like many people across the globe, I have used this time of isolation to complete some of the projects that have been patiently collecting dust. This is a rug that began life as a pattern from a class I took at Teachers Workshop with Christa Bowling. I did the basket in her class.
Then I started carrying that piece of linen and used it as a demo piece to teach students in my classes about different embellishment techniques. Pretty soon the look of the linen had no resemblance at all to the original pattern. BUT, after several years in an unfinished state, I finally took the time to complete it.
Then I started carrying that piece of linen and used it as a demo piece to teach students in my classes about different embellishment techniques. Pretty soon the look of the linen had no resemblance at all to the original pattern. BUT, after several years in an unfinished state, I finally took the time to complete it.
I am finally completely done with this project. It took me so much longer to flatten 500 bottle caps than I anticipated! Of course that could be due to the number of times I hit my thumb with the hammer. The flattening was done and then I punched two holes in each cap so they could be attached. One by one they finally encircled this rug like our society encircles the homeless population.
Due to the heavier weight of the project with the addition of the bottle caps, I wanted to ensure that the integrity of the linen is not compromised. So I flipped the rug over and stitched Rug tape all the way around the rug, and then every 6 inches along the length of the piece. It looks like this.
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Once the bottle caps were in place it was time to finish embellishments on the figures.
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Author
I am a fiber artist and sculptor living in sunny, Tennessee. I have a home studio where I dye and sell gorgeous wool fabric.
Teaching rug hooking, sculpting and how to dye wool are some of my favorite things to do!
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