Folk Art at Old Crow Farm in Vermont

Sunnie’s Hooked Chairpads with Leftovers – Rug Hooking

Sunnie-oldcrowfarm — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 14:00:44 +0000

I am continuing to paint the dowel and ends for my Seasons Banner as it needs several coats of paint! I am sewing the hanging sleeve on the back today. I like to use felt for my hanging sleeves to avoid having to turn in raw edges!

My “finishing” project for yesterday was another of my Chatting Chickens” chairpads using the leftover woolworms! I finished the background on the new one and it is shown with the earlier one I posted. All I have to do now is steam the piece and redo a couple of wool strips…then to finish the edge and I have another project finished!!!! Hooray!

It is very bad weather outside today here in Vermont’s Northeast Kingdom. The ground is a sheet of ice, we are having freezing rain and I am thinkful for sand and salt (our little bags!!) and also the road sanding done by the workers who keep our dirt road safer for us all Winter long!

I need to change a couple of the strips in the aqua chicken’s head!!!! The head looks a little odd to me!!! LOL Why would I worry about a couple of strips looking odd when all of the chickens look odd!!!

Happy Hooking, and I hope your weather is nicer than ours today and you have sunshine instead of gray skies!! Sunnie

Sunnie’s “Leftover Woolworms” Rug with Penny Tongues – Rug Hooking

Sunnie-oldcrowfarm — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 15:27:01 +0000

While I am finishing up my Seasons Banner, I am posting a few other things you might enjoy seeing. I am always thinking up rug designs for using leftovers so this is the one I took to ATHA when I took the class “Adding penny rug tongues to a hooked rug” class with Carrie Martin. I think I posted this earlier but didn’t show where I was using this piece. We have a little wooden chest in our bathroom and this is what I wanted the mat for. I put penny tongues only on one side as the other side is right by the shower curtain!!!

And the top of the mat…

Happy Hooking, Everyone! Sunnie

Sunnie’s Hooked Rug Valentine – Rug Hooking!

Sunnie-oldcrowfarm — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 14:13:48 +0000

I’m sewing away on my Seasons Banner binding on the back of the piece… and have decided how I want to hang it. I’m using a dowel that I will paint dark and attach simple decorative wood ends to the dowel. I am sewing a hanging sleeve on the back and I think we have some old fashioned nails to put into the wall to set the dowel on. If not, I will try to get some wrought iron hooks to hold the piece.

I thought you might enjoy seeing a rug that I designed and started some years ago…called, “Be My Love, A Fraktur Valentine”. I think it was in 2008 when I started this although it might have been earlier. I find a lot of inspiration from old frakturs and samplers, and there are many examples of couples in these designs. I designed my own and, of course, added a little humor in the process. The diamond ring the ardent young man is offering his excited “bride-to-be” is large enough to go around her neck! As you know, it helps to enlarge something to call attention to it!!!!

I also thought that, although the young man is dressed very nicely, he is wearing what looks like rain boots or garden boots! Perhaps he is a wealthy farmer?

I used some leftover woolworms in the rug and was experimenting with plaids. (A Lot of plaids in the background!!!!!…and in the border!!!!) LOL

I have finished the hooking and am in the process of steaming this one and getting it ready to add the binding and do the whipping! Maybe next Sunday when we continue with “Downton Abbey”!

I have several other rugs planned that use antique motifs from frakturs and samplers…I love doing them so I have a lot to look forward to.

Happy Hooking! Sunnie

Sunnie’s “Chatting Chickens” Chairpad – Rug Hooking!

Sunnie-oldcrowfarm — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 13:22:30 +0000

Happy Tuesday!

Since I am doing some steaming, back finishing and deciding upon the best way to hang my Seasons Banner, I thought you might enjoy seeing what I do with some of my leftover “woolworms”!!!

I designed a couple of different patterns for my “Chatting Chickens” chairpads a few years ago…so I used one of them to use up my leftover wool strips!!!! LOL They are a little goofy at the best of times, when some colour planning has been done…but when simply using leftovers, they can be really goofy!!!!

Here is one…

These are fun patterns because I can use wild colours, prim colours or lighter colours and still have my funny chickens! One other pattern has the chickens wearing hats…and, of course, that means more fun with embellishments!!!

It’s rainy, icy and gray here in Vermont’s Northeast Kingdom today…I’m off to my studio to do more sorting , organizing and hooking! I will post a rug that I am finishing up tomorrow…I started it several years ago and have been working on it off and on for all that time! No rush, no hurry…and I enjoy the theme…”Be My Love, A Fraktur Valentine!”

Happy Hooking, Sunnie

Sunnie’s Seasons Banner – Almost finished! – Rug Hooking

Sunnie-oldcrowfarm — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 16:01:08 +0000

Well, I spent about 7 hours on this banner yesterday!!!

Finished the hooking, hand-sewed the wool for the binding all around the piece, and whipped the edge!! Whew!!! LOL Thankfully, we are Masterpiece Theatre followers so had two hours to continue to whip while watching Downton Abbey!!

This picture is taken before the piece is steamed so it is not perfectly flat against the wall…but wanted to post it today! I will steam the piece later today and sew the loose end of the binding down on the back tomorrow. Also, I’ll sew my label on the back.

Here we go…almost done…

You might just shake your heads (or bang it against the wall..!!!) but my choice for the border of this piece was a plum plaid. This wool is nowhere in the banner except for a tiny leftover piece in the bird’s tail. I chose the plum because it “reads” as a dark, a brown-ish, etc. and it has a glow that black does not have. It also has tiny bits of colour in it from the plaid lines.

I chose to whip the piece with charcoal gray wool yarn to bring a different touch of darkness to the edge. I am hoping that the edge just surrounds the piece and sets it off. I don’t want it “noticed”..!!! :) (From an observer…”Isn’t that a lovely edge on that piece, whatever it is!!”) LOL

For the binding, I used a loosely woven wool…I learned the hard way to not use a tightly woven wool to try to whip over!!! I did have to switch to a pointed end, not my usual blunt end whipping needle when I used the tight wool…I learned my lesson!!!! I’ll check the piece after steaming and see what I need to fix or tidy up or???? Then, I’ll sew a hanging sleeve on the back and hang the banner on my Mud Room wall!!!!

I’ll be getting ready to do a Mystery Rug soon…and will be doing some finishing up on some other rugs that I will post! We’ll have fun!!!

Happy Hooking! Sunnie

Sunnie’s Seasons Banner/Spring Almost Finished! – Rug Hooking

Sunnie-oldcrowfarm — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 14:12:42 +0000

Hooray!! Coming along well…Spring is almost finished..!!!

I will take a good look at all of my blocks and see if I need to change anything before finishing the banner up!

Here is a close-up of my Spring block…I will finish it today as I have some time set aside to hook!!!

Hope you have some hooking time today…Happy Hooking! Sunnie

Sunnie’s Seasons Banner-Spring Progress – Rug Hooking!

Sunnie-oldcrowfarm — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 14:11:52 +0000

I’m zipping along with Spring! I took time to make the changes I have been deciding upon as I go.

I like to use the pattern as a guide and change anything that is not to my liking or is not working!! Of course, if you were doing the “deciding”, you might choose differently. Or…you might like what I did Before I made the changes!!! LOL ( It’s always fun to see what different people do with the same design…when they don’t know what the others are doing!!!!)

Here is the new Spring block…

I changed the beak to a little smaller as I thought it was a bit too big, for the size of the bird. I outlined the feet so they didn’t get lost on the branch and I’ve been working on the wing and the rest of the body! I don’t want too much detail as this is a primitive or simple design!!!! I am happy with the block so far…but might change something again if I think it will be better..!!! As you can see from the full banner below, I am using some of the same colours in (or similar) in each block to carry them through the whole banner!!

This is such fun!!!!!

Happy Hooking! Sunnie

Sunnie’s Seasons Banner/Spring block – Rug Hooking

Sunnie-oldcrowfarm — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 14:22:58 +0000

Beautiful Sunshine today here in Vermont..!!! And I’m glad we have snow!!!

I hope to have some time today to hook…I know I’ll have at least a short time to do some hooking…and I’m really having fun with this simple piece! It does us good to hook something fun and simple from time to time…especially in the middle of cleaning, sorting and organizing!!!! My studio is looking better and better so I am encouraged to keep on going until it is all finished.

I am changing some things on my Spring block…I have outlined the yellow beak so it shows up better and will outline the feet so that they don’t get lost in the tree branch!! LOL

Here we go…

Happy Hooking! Sunnie

Sunnie’s Seasons Banner – On to Spring! – Rug Hooking

Sunnie-oldcrowfarm — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 15:37:49 +0000

Welcome to signs of Spring!!!! Hooray!! (Well, I do love Winter so I don’t want real Spring to come just yet!!!!) LOL

I have chosen some “sweeter” colours for Spring to start and I will change anything I find not to my liking later on!! Any of you familiar with my hooking style and methods know that I don’t do much, if any, colour planning when starting a rug. I choose a colour or two and just jump in!!! LOL I like to be surprised at the direction my hooking takes me.

I think I will change the bill of the bird to a yellow…the bird is like a Robin (God makes the Robin prettier than mine!!!) so I will hold the bill shape with the brown and find a yellow that will show up against my blue sky.

I sit back and look carefully at my work often to see if the colours are pleasing together or are showing up properly. Some colours are sweet and some more primitive. Some are “clean” and some “dirty”…some make us think “antique” and some “clear, modern”, etc. And, some colours used are purely personal…what we like. I also take the whole piece and look at it too…not just the part I am working on. I want the blocks in this piece to be different to give my interpretation of the Seasons…but I don’t want one block to dominate all the others!!!! I started with Winter and went “backwards” to Spring. I could have chosen to start with my favourite season “Autumn” (beautiful here in Vermont) and gone to Summer…whatever I wanted.

I’ll post my changes here in a little while to see if my bird looks better!!!

Addition…Here are my changes…I like the bird better but I might have to outline the beak!!!!

Happy Hooking! Sunnie

Snowing, snowing…Sunnie’s Seasons Banner Progress – Rug Hooking

Sunnie-oldcrowfarm — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 13:19:02 +0000

Hooray! I was able to hook for 3 or 4 hours yesterday and so have completed the Summer block!

As you can see, I have adjusted colours for this block to make it look more “summery”!!! LOL After hooking the darker green leaves, I knew they did not give the effect I wanted…but left them in place to hold the motif until I had hooked the background around it. Although with the camera flash, the green looks like it shows up OK…just looking at it in person shows it to be darker than I wanted. So a lighter green herringbone wool gave me what I wanted!!!

Here we are so far! I’m happy with everything now…so on to Spring!!! (and then the little border…that will be thrilling, I am sure!) LOL

Cold and Windy today…time for hooking!! Happy Hooking! Sunnie