I have completely finished the hemming of the Little Blue Carpet (designed by C Soubzmaigne) and am pleased to show you my finished piece. 

​As I said in a previous post, I have also posted a photo of the top and bottom of the back of the rug, so you may see the signature lines I stitched now that they have been freed from the fringe and pressed toward the back.

I enjoyed stitching this rug and wish to thank Karen for giving me the pattern. I stitched the rug using my own color combinations and am pleased with the overall effect.

For the next little while, I will be stitching some test pieces for some patterns I have had in the works for quite some time.

Yesterday, I finished the tabby weave, signed my rug and decided to experiment in the placement of the information. Usually, I sign my rugs along a long side so that I can fit everything on one side, then I turn the gauze under, hem and cut around the gauze I have used for the signature and trim all of the rest of the gauze close to the edges.

This rug is different for me because it is someone else's design. I feel it is important to give credit to the designer, along with information on who stitched it.  Since I like to trim the long sides as close to the hem stitches as I can, I decided to try putting the information and signature along each of the short edges. When turned, the information will show up against the tabby weave and I can stitch the gauze down to hold it in place.

I graphed the information out using letters that are 5 stitches tall and 3 stitches wide (except for letters like M or N which are a little wider). I also stitched them so that when turned, the information will be the same direction and face vertically toward the top of the rug.

Once completed, I stitched the fringe over the signature lines.  

Here is the rug completed now as far as I can until I can purchase the dark blue.  As you can see, the fringe covers the signature information. However, once I cut the fringe across the extreme ends, it will release the gauze under the fringe and I can turn it over, fold the gauze toward the underside and iron it carefully to leave the fringe out and the words of the signature visible on the back of the rug. 

Once I have blocked the rug and completed the hemming, I will post a photo of the back of the rug so that you will see the signature lines.

For now, I will put this aside and work on some designing!

At long last, I have now finished everything I can do in the center until I am able to purchase some more dark blue.

In the meantime, I will be completing the tabby weave and fringe so that I will only have the dark blue, blocking and hemming to complete once I can get the dark blue thread.

This rug has been a little bit of a challenge to stitch, especially the red border, but I have had fun with it.  I changed the direction of the stitching when doing lines, according to the direction the line was going so that I didn't have a "railroad track" effect show up.  I am happy with how it turned out.

​If I am able finish it in time, I will bring it with me to the OMEGA show on May 4th this year.

I have also been designing another rug, which I hope to have ready to unveil in the next couple of days.  Stay tuned!

Progress continues to be made on my little rug as well as my designing efforts.  My days have now fallen into a little routine since things have settled down tremendously over last year.  I now have time to balance my crafts and housework, so that I have time for a little bit of everything in my day.

The Little Blue Carpet is still making steady progress, but I have run out of the dark blue for now and haven't been able to get to a store to get some more. No worries, I am focusing on the other colors now and am a little over halfway finished the center. 

​I have decided to put a fringe onto this rug, so that will take a little while before I am ready to block the rug. Unfortunately, it won't be ready for the OMEGA Miniature show in May, but I may bring it along with me to stitch while I am there. 

Introducing my newest rug pattern, the Nadareh. This rug has been about a year in the designing and test stitching, and is now finally ready for purchase!

Inspiration for this little rug came from a photo of the oldest known rug to man, the Pazyryk rug, housed at the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, Russia.  

The original rug is approximately 2,500 years old. The scholars debate on whether the origin of the rug is Turkish, Armenian, Persian, Siberian, or of another Eastern origin, but the two locations considered most likely to be the origin of the Pazyryk Rug are Persia and Armenia. The original rug is now housed at the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, Russia.

I spent the last few weeks test stitching the various elements included in the rug to test colors and shapes of the design elements. The horses, people and animals all underwent several versions while I tried to decide which versions I liked the best. I have digitally combined the final ones I chose here in this photo so you can see that the colors all look good together.
This rug has been quite a challenge and I had to leave out some elements, most notably some deer, due to the fact that the rug would have been just too large.  If interested in reading more about this rug, please visit the listing, located here: Nadareh 

Here is a tiny sneak peak at some of the testing I have done. More will be told when I have finally decided how each element will look in the final pattern.

Working the center of the Little Blue Carpet, designed by Catherine Soubzmaigne, I find it is going quite quickly.  I am now approximately 1/3 finished already!

I am now taking a break for a few days while I work on some test stitching for a new pattern I am designing. I am almost finished doing the testing, but there is one element that I stitched yesterday that I am still not happy with. Today, I hope to fix that, and then I can make the modifications to the pattern and get it ready for the website! I am very excited about this because I started designing this rug in March 2024 and it will finally be ready!

I am now fully finished all of the borders of the rug and am going to start the center of the rug tonight.  I am glad to be finished with this stage of the rug and look forward to starting the center. It will be fun seeing it take shape.

Even though my mini-stitching vacation is now over, I have been finding several hours a day to devote to stitching. I am hoping to finish this rug in the next few weeks and begin doing the Tabby Weave and Fringe.

I do not think it will be finished in time for the OMEGA Show in May, but who knows, if I push myself hard enough, maybe it will be!

My mini stitching vacation ends tomorrow and I must say, I am very happy with the amount of stitching I was able to accomplish. my red background has now been stitched around all of the motifs in the inner border and I will now be starting the next inner border.

The next inner border is the last one I need to stitch before I can finally begin the center. Luckily for me, the next border is a repeat of the outer one, so it will be easier for me to stitch.

I am enjoying stitching this rug, but I must say, it feels vastly different than stitching one of my own designs.  I keep seeing areas where I would like to change little details, especially in this last border that I stitched.  With my own designs, for the most part I try to make my borders even and the corners similar to each other. This rug

It is amazing how much one can get stitched when on vacation! I decided to take a break from daily life and give myself a mini stitching vacation. I pre-cooked my dinners for 2 weeks and froze them so that I don't have to take time out to cook each day. I am not doing and renovation projects and am devoting my time solely to stitching. I have had so much time to stitch lately that I have completed adding the colors to the little motifs in this inner border. 

My background, variegated blue is very close in color to the solid light blue that I chose, so it is sometimes hard to see the difference between them. It is visible in real-life, but not so much in this photo. I am hoping that it becomes more apparent when I stitch the background in the center.  The yellow and cream motifs look good next to each other.