With the background village completed, (well I’ll likely still make some adjustments), I turned my attention to the ground and how I would hook it. My first thought was that I wanted it to be round stones to offset all the squares and rectangles of the archway. On the other hand if it was all circles, I’d have a lot of ‘grout’ or ‘cement’ filler to deal with. So I settled on ’round-ish’ . Rather than cobblestones, I think it is more flag ‘stone-ish’ . I took a soft pencil and sketched it in , soon deciding that it would be even less round than this. I’d “wing it” as I went along.
Next decision was what colour? I had dyed some gold/grey for the arch and subsequently discarded it, and considered perhaps using that…..
….and just as quickly threw out that idea…..far too strong. I wanted something light and with some interest, but not attracting attention away from the women or the arch. Hmmmm….that’s exactly what I had wanted for the buildings….and….I had lots of very pale tints left over….
That’s what I’d try. Now what would I use for the grout. I suddenly remembered the wool I had dyed to whip my Grumpy Owl.
Yarn would be much easier to handle than tiny strips ….and I had some left over.
To my delight, I soon realized that it was 2 ply and for the small further away sections, it could be easily separated to make the grout line even tinier.
…and for the nearer stones, I’d use the 2 strands for a bit more depth.
Finishing this should keep me occupied in my spare time over the holidays.
Wishing everyone a blessed Christmas, filled with peace, joy, and beautiful memories.
Thanks for stopping by.
….I didn’t like the pink effect at all and the perspective was all wrong, I did like the touches of light purple, so I searched my stash for some light mauve. 
I quickly realized that didn’t have enough light shades, so off to the dye pots and I dyed some very light violet and ‘cushing’ purple.
I wanted the roof of this building to appear to be of tile, and mused about the best way to create that impression. I considered using a light plaid and selectively using the strips, I considered separating rows with a tiny (#2) row of black, and finally decided to simply try this light mottled grey, hooking it in straight lines matching each loop carefully all the way down. Ta dah…the simplest solution worked. (love it when that happens)
I chose brown and yellow tones for the next building, with a bit of mottled taupe wool for the door and beams. 
One row of natural helps to highlight the corner of the building. I’m using quite a bit of antigodlin hooking for this ‘stucco’ and I find it harder on my hands. So….a day of no hooking yesterday and the sore finger feels much better. My plan is to use the mahogany tones for the third building (they turned out peachy pink) . I’m not sure how I’ll like that, but I’ll see what happens.
So as I carefully hooked the archway around her lovely red hair, I was so disappointed to see the flyaway curls I liked so well fade into obscurity. (sorry, but I neglected to take a picture of it at this stage) I wanted it to still pop out as it had done so well against the white rug warp. But it didn’t. I edged it with grey, which worked well for the wall, but the hair detail got lost. I tried Deanne Fitzpatrick’s trick of small dot of colour along the edge…nope! I tried some black, then some white, then I went in search for the left over wool from her hair.
With the bright vibrant orange/yellow added the curls popped back out. As so often happens with me, I had to see it wrong before I was able to figure out how to do it right. (my curse of being a visual learner).
Now to turn my full attention to the sky.
….but as I experimented, I didn’t like the effect of the very dark blues at all. I needed more pale shades. 
I took this photo awhile ago and I’m not sure why there are only two pieces since I actually dyed four light shades these being the lightest and darkest.
My biggest dilemma was this…….would I hook the sky straight across (bottom right sky sample) or wavy and directional (cloud beginnings). I thought about this for a number of weeks while completing the bottom roadside section. The answer I came up with? Do both. I’ll make the clouds contour the actual shapes and the sky will be pretty well straight lines. Every time I go through this sort of process, I think afterwards….that is so OBVIOUS! why did it take me so long to figure it out? So I’m on my way…
I knew I would need to dye more pale blue shades and yesterday was the day.
I now have a wide variety of blue shades to use in finishing my sky.
…two cuts and styles tried here and an attempt to catch the corner highlight……nope!
….a 6 cut and straight lines…..nope! ….but I liked the effect of the corner
….a 6 cut, straight lines and a much lighter wool (thinking of marble at this point)….then tried the arch in a 3 cut and a variety of mixed , darker colours.
.Hummmm I like the left, the right is too light.
It’s a large area, and a small cut, so I think I’m set with enough hooking to keep myself busy while watching the olympics next month.
The poor girl needed radical surgery, and for my peace of mind, she needed it at once.
….and it does, especially when viewed from a distance, but I’m still not satisfied with it. It will get makeover later when I have a better idea of what I want to do with it.
so I dug in my bits and pieces for something to give it more pizazz., and I came up with this
In the meantime, the background has been on my mind. I had several ideas, including being on a path with a misty background, a medieval castle in the background, doing a total disconnect with an abstract background of some sort…or?…. Then for some reason, I thought of having them stand in an arch, and immediately went in search of ideas for an “arch to suit”. These three caught my eye…..
….then posed them in front of the arches…..Arch number two I eliminated right away. Down to this one….
…..or this one….
……and the winner is this last one. I like the stone blocks, and the greenery hanging down.
I hooked just a small amount and wasn’t happy with it. I felt that it not only had no connection with the rest of the piece, but it was too bright and dominated far too much.
I thought about another option….If I used a pink, it would tie the two costumes together and make the whole thing more harmonious.
The extremes I used very sparingly, but they made all the difference.
I did a spot dye using Majic Carpet red violet, and Primary Fusion #12 (which uses Pro Chem magenta, blue, and black). Then I went through my stash and found all the bits and pieces that went with that. I had a good range of values, though not necessarily matching exactly in hue. The primary colour is the dip dye and I really like the highlights that it creates in the dress.
(I did 3 versions from dark to light), plus a couple of pieces that I had that went with that. (for some reason the camera bled the green out of the far blue….it actually goes with the rest much better than this photo shows) The second colour is primarily a cantaloupe and mustard spot dye done over both natural and oatmeal. 
I have no idea if this will work, but I’m set to try.