This Week's Highlights

We had a great turnout for our First Tuesday rug hooking meeting this week. Tonia was whipping the edges of this small mat that she made - I like the squiggles - they add a lot of interest to a simple design.

Jennifer came to our group for the first time - I hope she can attend regularly now that her schooling is finished and her work schedule might permit it. She was working on a round mat with cute flowers on it.

Jeanette is making the cutest chickens from a Minick & Simpson design. I wish I had gotten a close-up of the middle chicken - she used a black & white fabric and it hooked up to look exactly like real feathers - perfect! That fabric was a little too thin for hooking so she cut the strips extra wide and folded them in half to beef it up more - I never would have thought of doing that! Good to know for future projects of my own!

Marliss has started an antique floral with a few animals in it. She decided she didn't like the light background, so will be pulling it out and redoing it with an antique black.

Marilyn is closing in on finishing the border of her sheep rug.

Angela is hooking this great floral - got her inspiration for the design & color from a quilt block.

Sandy is hooking a large rug that will be a reproduction of a stained glass window made by a local guy - she got permission from the artist to do this and it's going to be totally awesome! So far she has hooked a lot of the leading (outlines) and is using marbelized wool for the glass. After she cuts the wool, she keeps it in the exact same order so that when it's hooked, the marbelized effect is left intact. I look forward to watching this one progress.

Here's a close-up so you can see the marbelizing.

Kim is a brand new hooker who we all met for the first time - she's only actually pulled a couple dozen loops so far. But she had a hollyhocks design all drawn on linen - and borrowed a strip cutter while there so she could get her wool ready to work with. I love the colors she chose - it will have a dark background. She mentioned that she won top awards in high school (just a couple years ago - wink - wink!) for sewing a wool coat, so she's excited to be working with - and fondling - wool again.

On Wednesday at quilting, we got to visit with a friend we haven't seen for awhile - she showed us her newly remodeled kitchen that featured this great custom mosaic centered in the tile work above her stove. A lot of the broken dishes that she used have sentimental value for her and it was so fun to hear the stories behind each piece. I like the way the slivers of mirror really added sparkle to the piece.

She & her daughter started this mosaic on a birdhouse and incorporated some fun stuff into it also.

Janet's daughter is tyeing the knot next month so she's been making goodies for the wedding. These bride & groom dolls will be displayed next to the cake - their faces and other details were done with threadwork on her sewing machine - lots of detail! She said the groom doll actually ended up looking a bit like her future son-in-law!

And she's made all these darling wool flowers. The ruffley ones will have lots of company and be incorporated into the brides' bouquet. The turquoise zipper flowers will be the bridesmaid corsages, and the mustard ones will be boutineers for the groomsmen. (how the heck do you spell boutineers?)

I have the most talented group of friends - it's always so inspiring to see their new projects and learn new techniques from them!