Monday, September 2, 2013

Tooling Around the Lake

As we were tooling around the lake last week, I saw these big red boulders in the lake. It caught my attention as I had never noticed them before. At the same time I was trying to figure out why I had been so totally clueless the last time on the lake, my husband chimed in "hey look at those cows over there in the water!" I couldn't help but laugh at myself, red boulders - cows, they kind of look alike...at a distance anyways.
We tried to get closer to snap a picture of them but this was a close as we could get without driving them back on land. Hmmm cows in the water or on land, the more I thought about it, I was ok if they ambled back onto land.

Despite the cows, We enjoyed the day swimming, snorkeling and hooking. 

Pretty good spot to sit and hook wouldn't you say!
 


While on vacation, I was able to color plan several rugs and even finished a little mat that I'll share with you in the next couple of days. Thanks for stopping by, Maria

Friday, August 30, 2013

Calling all dog lovers

I'm so excited to be carrying this new pattern from Pam Watkins. She designed this rug for camp at Holland this past July. It was such a darling pattern that it just had to be shared with other dog lovers! This pattern is of a dachshund but it can be customized for your breed of dog. It will be offered on my website soon.

Contact me if interested in purchasing the pattern. Thanks for stopping by, Maria


Wednesday, August 28, 2013

Check out the latest finish

Gail sent me this photo of her finished Garden Rabbit rug and I just had to share it. The colors she chose are terrific! I love the pink in her flowers. She worked on the pattern in Punderson this spring.



Thanks for sharing Gail! Keep those photos coming ladies! Maria


Saturday, August 24, 2013

Hooray for Carolyn!

I received an email from Carolyn Saturday regarding a rug I designed for her last June for the Tyler Star of Texas rug camp. The Kirby Hooking Circle in Houston had its annual June Hook-yin. There were about 70 hookers plus vendors and Carolyn's Trick or Treat Halloween Rug won Viewers Choice Award. Way to go CAROLYN! The rug looks fantastic...
Carolyn's rug is awesome but I would be remiss if I didn't mention what a sweetheart this lady is! A true southern lady...what a gem.





2013 Sauder workshop

I was fortunate to teach a one day workshop at Sauder village this year. The class was called turning flat into Dimensional.  The participants had their choice of the samples shown in the first two pictures. 
Most of the participants chose either the owl or the snowman with the hat. The owl was pretty awesome if I don't say so myself, because he had this wonderful yarn for his chest area.  We did have a rebel in the Group who decided to do the pumpkin and wait till you see it.  Four people completely finished their projects during class and many of the other participants were well on their way to completion. 


My samples.....
Two more choices for participants.....

Isn't the pumpkin Just the best?  Kathleen really embellished this guy to the hilt! 

She even used a real pumpkin stem!  Don't you just love the beads on the back? JACK! 

And look what Diane did with her owl.  I had an antique masher as a prop to use. Well Diane very cleverly turned it into feet for the owl!  How stinking cute is that?  

Mary's snowman is adorable as well!  
Here is a picture of Diane with her owl!
What a great and creative class!  Thanks for stopping by, Maria 

Monday, May 13, 2013

Sheep Mat for sale

It has been a while since I have sold a rug. Early in my hooking career, I used to sell most of the rugs that I hooked but when I started my business kept the rugs for samples. Lately, I have been hooking small mats mainly in an effort to use all those worms that accumulate from hooking larger mats but don't have the space to keep all the mats.  So I'm giving my readers and followers the option to purchase before I list on ebay. 
 
Here is hooked sheep mat using my worms. (I hardly made a dent in the pile!)
The first picture was taken inside and the second outside.  I'll confess that I am not the best photographer as the rug looks so much more primitive and rich in color in person. 


 
  It measures 12 x 14 and it is $150 plus shipping. Email me at starrugcompany@sbcglobal.com if interested. Thanks for stopping by, Maria

Thursday, May 9, 2013

Punderson 2013



What a fun week spent with wonderful ladies at Punderson! The class was full of the loveliest gals who were also rug hooking machines. Just check out the rugs. This is Gail's Garden Rabbit (we had three of them) and her colors were soft and old looking. The second picture is her rabbit completed. Isn't it grand?





The next picture is Patti's Garden Rabbit. Isn't it wonderful as well? We had a few laughs in class about the little rug the rabbit was sitting on.  .  . a rug in the garden, seriously ladies (* wink, wink*)? I'm still chuckling about it! Patti is a hooking machine and I'm sure this rug is completed.


 
Jamie's Garden rabbit was so wonderfully primitive! Love, love, love it as well!


 
Don't you just love Nancy's primitive version of this pattern? I just love the rusty red wool for Santa's jacket and grungy background wool. Aren't the teal mittens just a great surprise of color?


Nancy hooked the beard in a higgly piggly method to give the beard texture. Fantastic, right?

Oh and I so loving Liz's Chief Massasoit. The colors make my heart go pitter patter!

 
D'awn and Chris both hooked the pattern, Ohio is my Dwelling Place ( which could easily be changed to "This is my dwelling place" for all you non Ohio people!) and did an awesome job.
This is D'awn version of the rug and the colors are really warm and primitive. She came up with idea of putting rolled circles in the border and it is going to look really neat when done! I love the way the house glows. It looks like the lights are on in the home!
 
The picture below is Chris's version of Ohio is my dwelling Place. Chris was trying to match the colors in the rug to an antique painted chest that will be in the same room. Her colors are warm and primitive as well!

Sue chose to hook the liberty rug below and she was hooking it so quickly that I was afraid she would finish it before class ended. We discussed adding a hit or miss border to rug and Sue was a trooper and agreed. And I just love it! I liked the rug before but this border enhances the rug so much! Thanks for being up for the challenge Sue.

Rebecca was hooking the "Sweet Bea" pattern and was going to town on the rug. Did I fail to mention this was the second pattern she worked on during class? She finished Freida the Friendly Witch pattern but had taken it to her car before I got a picture of it.

Linda designed her own pattern and it was as sweet as it could be. Click on the photo to see the closeup of the squirrel. Linda hooked her loops higher to make the tail fluffy.

The next two rugs were designed by Judy for she and her sister to hook. Judy is a fine hooker and was doing a lot with shading and sculpting to give her pumpkin a lot of dimension. Isn't he wonderful?
 
Lou on the other hand, was looking for a rug in a little bit of a wider cot and was letting the design of the rug dictate the character.

These two rugs and the sisters who were hooking these rugs just make me smile.

And last but not least is Lana's rug. Lana designed this rug herself and it is a pine tree with all kinds of different animals nestled into the branches of the tree .  .  .   And animals not necessarily indigenous to pine trees.
 
See what I mean?  Awesome rugs from incredibly talented and creative ladies.  How lucky was I to spend a few days with these ladies.
Thanks for stopping by, Maria