Oh the frustration!…having just spent 2 hours writing this blog…. I went to save it…and the entire thing disappeared into cyber space….disgusted, I walked away….and now ….many hours later, I’m starting again….convinced I’ll never be able to say it the same way again.
We are home from our camping trip, and although I took lots of hooking with me, I didn’t pull one loop the entire week.Now in the air conditioned comfort of my hooking room, with Wimbeldon tennis to keep me company, I’m back at hooking my footstool. I think I’ve done as much pulling out as I have hooking. So many colours seem like a good idea until I see them hooked, and then I realize they aren’t right. I’ve tried a number of variations on the scroll, and finally dyed wool for it using Gene’s dump dye method and three colours of green.
Now I’m experimenting with how best to use it .
I recently received a wonderful thank you gift of wool from Allyson Marcolini, and as it happens, it works in beautifully on this piece, and gives an added spark to my colours. Allyson , you must be psychic! The rose/wine mottled piece not only works in this flower by itself, but ties the colours together when it is used with my raspberry pieces in the large red flower.
Allyson..I’d love the recipe you used to create the muted yellow..I’ve never had a colour like it and it is perfect in highlighting without overpowering. I’m outlining all of the flowers with a light version of Taupe, so that they will stand out from the background darker taupe colour.
Another piece sent by Allyson was a dark turquoise/ blue mottled wool. Since turqouoise was one of the colours I wanted for this piece, I dyed several more pieces myself…mine are more of a green/turquoise but I like the effect of them all being used in this flower. I think it gives it lots of life. I used my newly acquired ‘grasshopper’ pro chem dye for the lime green. That’s one of my favourite colour combinations.
Thanks again for your amazing gift Allyson.
My first chore when I got home was to complete the whipping on the canoe pillow. This pillow is the result of a request from a dear friend. She sent me a picture , and asked if I could hook a pillow from it , in memory of her son ( and my former singing student) who tragically died of cancer. It is to be given to her daughter as a special memento of her brother, who was an avid canoeist.
By far the hardest part of this pillow was whipping the hooking to a pre-existing pillow cover. I was able to buy a sharp ended thick needle with a large eye that would accomodate both the bulky wool, and pierce the closely woven silky background, but each stitch was difficult to get through, and I could only do a couple of inches at a time before my fingers gave out.
Watching me struggle with this at a Sunshine Hookers meeting a couple of weeks ago, someone (I wish I could remember who) suggested that I use elastics on my fingers to increase the grip on the needle. I used two of those wide elastics that come on bunches of fresh broccoli and finished the whole thing in no time! The picture doesn’t really show it very well, but I’m pleased with how the whipping melds the red border to the back of the cushion. It has been a labour of love.