MORE VIRTUAL SHOW AND TELL..

During these days of isolation I have divided my spare time between hooking and punching, dyeing, gardening and oh my gosh, COOKING! If you know me at all, you know that cooking is NOT one of my favourite past times – nor is it something I excel at 🙂 .However, it is amazing how my talent in the kitchen has taken off! I have learned to take whatever mystery packages abound in the freezer and turn them into something actually edible – Freezer Surprise! Now I don’t want Gord thinking that this will become a way of life – just short term necessity! I still like frozen pizza for dinner or a can of pork and beans for lunch! But, since we have decided to eat our way through the freezer as part of our social distancing and spring cleaning, ready made foods are in short supply (as those went right at the beginning). Yesterday, I threw together a can of lentil soup, left over ham and sausages from the freezer, grated up carrots, chicken stock, stewed tomatoes, extra lentils, half a jar of left over tomato sauce and cumin, curry powder and garlic and made a rather delicious and edible soup. Neither of us got stomach cramps! Watch out Martha!!!!

So a few pieces to share in our virtual show and tell:

Liz with a helper for her new rug… Karen hooked her Karla Gerard pattern in record time – love that sky… Well I guess I won’t inherit that beautiful trampart frame after all – Wendy’s punch needle pieces all finished up – the one on the right is a Lisa Ferguson pattern I carry in punch needle and rughooking… the back of her pillow … Nancy finished her Tom Thomson… with a little help!!!… Jackie’s lovely pieces… and ohhhh how I love this piece (one of the Karla Gerard patterns I carry) hooked by Arlene…   we still have about 15 deer coming daily for their feeding – but the grain is running low and they will soon have to fend for themselves – hmmmm I see the one in the rug is eyeballing someones garden!!!

MORE VIRTUAL SHOW AND TELL…

THANK YOU TO EVERYONE for sending your pictures to share.  I truly believe our beautiful rugs and quilts and punch needle pieces are inspiring and create positivity when it is hard to find.  So here are some of the beautiful pieces people have shared:

Many years ago, after emailing back and forth for quite a while, I met a lovely lady from BC by the name of Sylvia.  She and her husband were visiting Ontario and while her husband visited family, Sylvia came to stay with me – we spent a couple of days dyeing wool for her future projects and in return I received an absolutely stunning quilt that she had made (which now hangs in our stairwell). It was exactly my colours! How did she know? I have treasured the quilt and the friendship for many years since… Recently Sylvia sent me pix of some of her finished quilting and wool appliqué pieces – they are amazing!… Note – these are not prefinished panels!!! they are all pieced and appliquéd and are stunning!…

Lynne tells about the inspiration for her beautiful rug…”I attended The field rug course last fall with your sister and friends. I was one of the nine who opted for the large size rug. Finished and hung! It was a great way to spend a winter. I chose colours based on all the wildflowers growing in the fields around my cottage. The barn and wooden silo are on Althorpe road on the way to Perth”…

Lisa’s lovely pieces…

Tiger will be a round neck support pillow called ‘love and support’…a small wrist doodle bag…
“A meditation on marriage”…Kaffe Fasset inspired pillows and Karla Gerard mat…

WESTPORT HOOKIN…

Temporarily postponed. We have made the decision to postpone our hookin to a time when normalcy will have been reestablished and it will once again be safe to gather in groups (though maybe smaller).  We will keep you posted. We are so sad to make this announcement as Carol and I look forward every year to seeing so many of you – for us it is always a very special time. And it will happen! – we will host a Post Covid Celebration!

Be safe – stay home and HOOK! Here is a picture of Tara’s Covid Anxiety rug – a great way to destress and use up ALLLL THOSE WORMS…

I am inspired to hook my own worm rug with a speech bubble entitled (see the. most recent Rughooking magazine article by Ellen Banker about Speech Bubbles) THIS TOO SHALL PASS…

 

PLAYING IN THE POTS…

🙂 DYE POTS  that is… The last few days have been soooooo lovely and warm that I have been cleaning up the gardens. They finally thawed enough that they did not feel like rock when I was turning the soil and little wonderful sprouts are coming up everywhere. Yeah, because we spent a ton of money and time redoing the gardens last year and I would have been devastated if things had not come back.  Such a wonderful feeling – sun beating down on my back and fresh air. And I see my deer are well trained –  not only did they cut back all my gardens overnight for me last fall but during the winter they have fertilized the gardens! Yeah – free fertilizer!

So, a few lovely finished pieces to share in our virtual show and tell:

And if you need a good laugh in these sad times check out this youtube video – I have watched it many times and each time it makes me laugh and laughter is a good thing…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xgJ2tihTL-E 

This pattern by Marjorie Swift punched by Trudie…A wonderful Anne Hallet design hooked by Beth…
Dianne has finished hooking her minis for her Stocking Stretcher… Elizabeth send me a picture of her gorgeous shoe rug – and her daughter’s family shoes that inspired the fun rug… and her objet Trouve mat…
and her punch needle pieces with THE perfect hanger… Rochelle completed these two pieces – first from Olde TatteredFlag and second is a Michelle Palmer design…

Isabelle punched Brightly Shining – a Marjorie Swift pattern…

 

and then a rainbow of hope!and Kim finished her colourful Karla Gerard rug…

IN THESE SCARY TIMES…

We need to keep busy and create some beauty in our lives. We are so lucky we have such an amazing art form to hunker down with while we are in lockdown. I even hear that many groups have formed virtual hookins and are sharing their work that way… So here is my mini contribution – a few finished and in-progress pieces to share below.

Please refer to my events page for news on show cancellations. Anything in the coming 2 months probably has been cancelled. Our guild normally holds our annual auction in April but with the closing of our facility we will postpone this to June and fingers crossed! – hopefully by June maybe we will be through the worst of this sad time in our history. But I think we all need to be prepared for a long haul.  So once again a reminder that all my patterns are 10% off and all my rughooking kits also are 10% off and hmmm I realized I have an overabundance of miniature punch needle kits on which I have also reduced the price by 10%. Just email me with your order and address and I will get it out in the mail to you as soon as possible.

Dianne show bound her Night Time House kit… She picked out the perfect blue strip wool to show bind this piece…
Rosalind finished her chairpad and ingeniously hung it on the back of the chair where it could be seen!…And Barb sent me this picture and info on the design “The piece came from an Inuit colouring book design I acquired at an art gallery in Port Hope, of an artist Mary Pudlat, 1995, from Cape Dorset.  Throat singers.  Titled” A Joyful Song”. Got permission from the curator to do a piece.”

Tom is working on River Otters which is coming along beautifully… I love the way each one turns out so differently…

 

Sherri is working on her Floral Runner – the colours are wonderful jewel tones and textures…Cynthia’s lovely tea cosy…

CANCELLATIONS…

Sadly, we are seeing more and more events in the next few weeks or months being cancelled. I just received notification that our OHCG Annual Rug Show at Deerhurst Resort has been cancelled. As shows that I am involved in are cancelled I will indicate this on my events page. So much work goes into preparing for these shows – on the part of the organizers, teachers and vendors – and also the sites holding the events. My sympathies to everyone involved in events that will now not take place or may be postponed indefinitely. But we need to be safe and flatten the curve so large gatherings need to be curtailed…

To brighten our day, a few lovely pieces to share:

Chris finished her compilation Christmas rug…

Dianne’s first piece – she learned to hook in January and came to visit me a few days ago with 3 finished pieces that she wanted to show bind – welllll they are finished and hung…

What is on my frame … Purple Rain – a pattern by Sharon Smith – that I am hooking for a friend (I won’t show you all the other pieces that need to be finished 🙂 )…

 

To keep you all hooking I am going to continue my 10%  off sale on in stock patterns and kits indefinitely. We all need a project on our frames to help us see some joy in these troubling, sad times. I have had a number of people asking if my prices are in Canadian dollars – yes they are – so if you do a conversion from Canadian to U.S. dollars you will see an additional savings of over 25%. So send me an email and let me know if there is a pattern or kit you are looking for and as long as postal services continue to be available they will get out to you pronto!

 

PETERBOROUGH SHOW CANCELLED…

Although there are currently no incidences of Covid19 in Peterborough, the city and the organizers have decided to cancel the show tomorrow.  So very disappointed as this is such a wonderful show – but in light of the current climate of fear and uncertainty and the possibility of exposure or infection this was a wise move on everyone’s part.

So, sadly, NO SHOW! TOMORROW.  Hopefully, everyone who was planning on attending is checking the websites or with their favourite vendors and will get the notification in time.

We were checking and rechecking yesterday and this morning, packed the car yesterday and finally left at 10:30 this morning only to get about 1.5 hours into the trip when we got the email advising us of the cancellation so back we came and now we are busy schlepping suitcases and goods back down to the studio.

Now, of course, I have a HUGE inventory of kits, patterns and wool.  So, for the next week I am offering 10% off on all in stock rughooking  kits and patterns. Send me your email pattern or kit request and address and I will let you know if I have it in stock.