We have exceeded our expectations!!

As mentioned earlier in our blog, we had a deadline of the end of September to finish the hooking of our rug. You will see at the top of the picture that just a little line of blue has to be done but I have just heard that it is all done! We have done it!!!!!! Now we have to dye our whipping wool and whip the edge of the rug so that we can take it in for appraisal. A group of us are going up to Ottawa to the Museum of Civilization to find out what they look for when a piece of art of considerable value is done. This should be a very interesting experience for all of us. We are all so proud to be a part of this project.

Our Neighbours to the South

We have been very fortunate to come in contact with some very friendly and creative women who, like many others, come to summer in the Thousand Islands. There are a few who, like us, make this area our home, but others come from New Jersey, Pennsylvania, etc. etc. We have been attempting to have a connection with each other so we invite them over for a day of rug hooking and they do the same. We had the opportunity in July to visit with them in Stone Mills, NY (this is always a bit entertaining when you tell customs your reason for visiting). We took our project rug to show them and their response was so encouraging and inspiring. Many offered us suggestions as to how we could market our rug on completion, in fact, many felt that they could pass the project information on and hopefully we just might connect with a proud recipient of our treasured rug. Who knows!!

Operations Control Director

Our group has been blessed to have a number of rug hooking teachers. Again, everyone who hooks knows, or should know, Joan Boyle....another wonderful rug hooker, teacher, designer and now she can add to her many hats, our "Operations Control" director. Joan has been instrumental in getting all of us coordinated and on track. Along with Rhonda Kellett, who has really been the mastermind behind this project and also a teacher, Joan oversees our dying of the wool and all the different elements that come in to play when one is hooking a rug. A tough job for sure when you are handling 20 plus strong minded women. Joan has done a lot of the hooking and is helping many of us novices who also take our turn hooking on the rug. We were over to the Clayton, NY area recently to visit with some "seasonal" rug hookers and they were sure that only one person had been hooking on the rug. A real compliment to our Operations Control Director.

Jeanne Field and Rittermere Hurst Field

Rittermere Hurst Field has been our saviour!! Jeanne Field is a very well known and dedicated Rug Hooker and designer who, along with her daughter, Andrea, have a business in Aurora, Ontario where many of us venture to or order our rug hooking materials. Jeanne has been teaching for years and everyone, and I mean everyone, knows or should know Jeanne Field. A woman from our group went up to Rittermere one weekend to purchase some supplies and told Jeanne about our project. Kim asked if there was anyway that Rittermere could help us out. Well, help us out they did. They provided us with 10 yards of 100% wool, our linen backing, our whipping wool, you name it. Needless to say we were all over the moon about this. What a way to start "women helping women". We are just so thankful for their contribution to our project.

Logo Design by Karen Kaiser

Just wanted to say a few words about our logo at the start of this blog. This was designed and hooked for us by Karen Kaiser. Karen is a graphic artist by definition but an absolutely wonderful rug hooker who has won an award just about every year at our Ontario Rug Hooking Guild Annual held in May. Her designs are exquisite and she is now selling her designs through Rittermere Hurst Field. Karen just happened to be with us one Monday hooking when we were starting our process for the rug and offered to design our logo. She came back to us two weeks later with the design and it all hooked. Needless to say we were all delighted with what she had done. You can visit Karen's website or blog. Karen is in the process of setting up weekends just for hooking with instruction which is a new endeavour for her so we encourage people to try them out. Her email is woody.kaiser@gmail.com or go to her blog at Artworks by Karen Kaiser.com

This is how far we have come.

We are all very excited about our progress. We were anticipating a completion date of January 13, 2009 which is the first anniversary of when the program first aired but I think we are going to outdo ourselves. We have been asked to do an article for Rug Hooking Magazine and they have requested that it all be hooked by the end of September so we are women on a mission. Please let us know what you think!!