What's up with this rug?

I belong to a rug hooking guild.  Next year is it's 50th anniversary, and the club is doing a huge show at the art gallery.    There are going to be 2 rooms, one for the history of rug hooking in our area and the other to showcase members rugs.  We have some spectacularly talented rug hookers.   I'm a rank beginner in comparison.  However, most of my rugs are my own design.  There's one in particular I've been asked to finish up as it's a bit of a different design.   I drew my own pattern and dyed much of the wool used for it, so it unique in a number of ways.   

Phil sleeping on the rug while I made tea

The border is fairly simple, just flowers with the dark blue background.  I wanted to use Shisha mirrors as the centre of the flowers, but the only ones I could find were going to have to be ordered, with a stupid long delivery time.  Instead I substituted these huge sequins.  The sequins worked, although steaming will likely be an issue, that the real mirrors wouldn't have.   Sewing them down didn't quite work.  Although they were secure, having only a single sewing hole, they kept flipping up when I was hooking.   I added a glue stick, but it wasn't secure enough to hold it while I was working on it.  In the end I had to use E6000 glue and let it dry overnight before using it. The glue works incredibly well.  It holds the sequins securely while I handle the rug.  

Unfortunately, the drying time is an issue. One thing about this rug is that the cats have taken a liking to it.   With all the wool blankets I leave all over for them to sleep on, it's curious to me as to why they've taken a liking to this particular rug. All that needs to be finished is the border.   I started on it and set it down to go make tea and came back to find Phil had settled on it.   He was probably awake but refused to open his eyes and move.  He'd settled in quite nicely.

Because of the way I'm working this, I'm only gluing on the sequins onto the side that I'm hooking.   During the drying time, Kevin has decided that this rug was a good place to nap.    He would move if I chase him off, but he was sleeping  nicely and the rug needed to dry until the morning  anyway, so I left him to his dreams.

It was fine for a few days, and at least I didn't see any kitties sleeping on it.  I got some hooking done.   Some will have to be redone because those flowers have been a learning experience.   This morning though, I went to set the rug up on the hooking frame and what did I find again? Yep, Kevin has decided that this is his rug.  I thought it was safe as I'd had it in an out of the way spot.  I hadn't bothered to roll it up properly because I've been working on it most evenings. I can't leave it in the frame or hoop because it could stretch the backing and leave marks.   I have learned that if I don't want cats sleeping on it, then I need to put it away properly.  couple of days, but then it was obvious that Kevin really likes this rug.   It's now rolled up and inaccessible to kitty naps.

Scarves and Cookery books

The grey scarf is off the loom.   I've twisted the fringe and it just needs a quick wet finish.  I may hold off wet finishing for a bit and just save up whatever I weave that needs to dry on a line or flat, until the weather warms up.   It will be much easier to dry them outside than find a place where the cats won't decide to sit on them inside.   It turned out quite nicely.  It was a fairly sticky yarn because it was loosely spun.  It didn't really cause an issue until the last bit of the scarf, when I'd woven about 3/4 of the scarf.   Then the fuzzy bits on the yarn started sticking together and I had to watch for skipped stitches.   The yarn is really soft and it drapes nicely, plus the greys are pretty neutral, so they should go with almost anything. 

This pretty blue scarf is an acrylic wool mix.  It's exceedingly lovely to work with.  It's soft, well spun, and the colour is nice.   I decided it had too much white in it though, so I'm cutting the white out of the weft as I'm winding the shuttle.  The white was washing it out too much and didn't make me happy.  The yarns feels really nice.  There is enough wool in there to make me want to touch it, which makes it a yarn that I enjoy working with.  I started dressing the loom almost right after the grey one was off the loom.   

We had a weather watch out for yesterday, but I think the system mainly hit someplace else.   There was a short bit of freezing rain, but by the time I needed to head out to the rug hookers meeting it was just raining.   Raining a lot actually.   People were getting drenched just coming in from the parking lot.  One of my friends there found this little book that she thought I might like.  It's a 1911 edition of Soyer's Paper Bag Cookery.   

This cookery book is touted as being ideal for flat dwellers, girls and women living alone in single rooms, clerks, typists and teachers.   It promises good results if you can but procure the new paper bags and remember to use a broiler.   This sounds more like a broiler pan, rather than putting the oven on broil! 

  So far it's been an interesting read, with recipes which sound fine to the bizarre, such as cooking 3 or 4 eggs in a cup of ketchup!   Also, for all these girls and women living in single rooms, what would you do with an 18 lb roast of beef?   It's a really interesting bit of insight into a kitchey little cookery book, that must have cause a few oven fires.  I'm totally enjoying reading it.  I'm starting to totally understand the lure of original cook books.  It's a tangible link to the past.

 

Weaving update

 The double weave project is off the loom!   Yay.   I thought it would take me much longer than it did to finish it.   I played around with how much I could weave without hurting my healing hip and straining my muscles, and then kept to that schedule most days.   As I was more comfortable with the process, it became faster and easier.

I wove it to 74 inches long and it lost almost 4 inches when I took it off the loom.    It was 24 inches wide single and opened up to and 46 inches wide. I fixed about 3 errors on the top layer and a good few more than that on the bottom layer.   This included 2 skipped warp threads which were easily repaired by threading an extra warp thread between them. Because it was fairly loosely woven, it was the easiest fix.   There were some other skipped threads from my not picking up the 1st shed on the bottom layer.   

It didn't take long to fix the skips though.   My biggest issue was a big, furry kitty butt that parked itself on top of the new blanket and tried to claim it.   So after the repairs were made, and I'd double checked the machine stitching on the ends to secure the threads, I tossed it in the washer to slightly full the blanket.   This was before hemming, because I really wanted it safe from kitties and the loose thread ends would have created all kinds of interest for the kitties. 

   I tossed it in the top loader washer and set it on a light load wash cycle, made a cup of tea and promptly forgot to check it.  I pulled it out of the washer and it was well fulled, although not horribly felted.  The looseness of the weave allowed for a lot of loss though and it ended up at 40 inches wide and 60 inches long.  However, that size was in the ballpark of what I was aiming for so I'm not sad.   It's soft and cozy and the perfect size for a lap blanket.  It needs a bit of a press and steam as the cats dragged it down while it was drying and slept on it.

I took a couple of days off from weaving and tossed on this simple scarf.  It's Ferris Wheel by Lion Brand.  It's a bit loosely spun to make it a really easy weave.   I had to cut a scarf off earlier because it was so sticky, it made for miserable weaving.  However the scarf I'd woven  before it, with the same yarn was okay to weave, although a bit delicate.   This is the same as the first one.  It requires a bit of care as the yarn is subject to a bit of abrasion  and  drifting apart when the spinning loosens.   Both of these are easy to deal with as long as you watch for them.    Advance the warp every few inches of weaving, which is reasonably good advice anyway and if the yarn is drifting apart, mainly while hem stitching  or winding on the shuttle, then manually add the twist back in. 

 I do like the greys though.   It's a soft, easy care acrylic and works nicely enough on the rigid heddle loom.  I wouldn't use that yarn on my floor loom though.