A New Version of Mary's Runner

I love to see people's interpretations of my designs.  It's always nice to know someone likes my patterns enough to hook them, but its thrilling to see them hooked up and bound and ready for the floor.

Rona bought my pattern Mary's Runner several months ago and brought the finished rug to our guild meeting Tuesday night.  Isn't it stunning?

I love that she hooked crosses into the circles and I love her color choices.  The red yarn she chose to whip it with is the perfect frame for the rug.  Well done, Rona!

If you would like to see what other members of our guild, the Peconic Ruggers, have been working on, click on over to the website here: The Peconic Ruggers.  You may be tired of hearing me say it, but this is a great group of women.  The group is a stand alone guild -- we don't belong to a national organization -- which allows us a great amount of freedom in how we work.  We are very relaxed -- no Robert's Rules of Order here!  We do manage to get through business each month.  We produce a rug to raffle each year and have a rug show every other year.  Hook ins are always fun and we have them in the winter and in the summer.  Sometimes our coffers are full enough to sponsor a class or a guest speaker.  Most of us don't see each other outside of guild functions, but we really enjoy each others' company when we do get together.  I was a founding member of the guild about 15 years ago, and the past couple of years have been the best.  If you don't belong to a guild yet, I highly recommend it!

Mary's Runner Yet Again

I have to say: It is just too cool to pose a question to the ether and get so many responses back!  People are actually listening!

I appreciate each and every comment I received and I am so curious about who some of you are and where you live and how long you've been hooking . . .  but I guess that is another post altogether.  So here's what I've been doing and thinking in regard to Mary's Runner.  I ripped the plain border out and replace it with the colored strips, my original idea, to get a better idea of how it would look.  I read everyone's comments and decided to sleep on it, get up and hook some plain border at the other end of the rug and then make my decision.  

To save time and effort, I laid strips of background fabric along the border.  It's not a bad choice: the plain border would make a perfectly nice rug.  But -- the plain border is too predictable for me.  Then my friend Carol -- an artist, formerly my across-the-street neighbor -- suggested a red border! A completely different color!   Threw me for a loop (excuse the pun)!  So I laid some strips of red fabric along the border.

My photograph doesn't do the red justice; it looks much darker and richer in real life.  It, too, would make a perfectly nice rug, but it doesn't feel right to me. But Carol's idea then led me to try orange, to match the single row I hooked around the circles, which I really like against the dark green of the background.

The orange isn't bad, either, but it doesn't call to me.  But I really like that Carol's idea opened my mind to other possibilities.  I have decided that the border that is best is the one that makes me smile: the stripes, my original idea.

The corner isn't right -- I'll rip it out and rehook.  I'm also going to take out those few pieces of bright blue in the circles -- they are really bothering me when I look at the photo.  Perhaps Mary will choose to do a plain border when she hooks her pattern.  I'll keep you posted on her choice, and also on my progress.  Thanks again for all the help!

More on Mary's Runner

I received a phone call from Julie in Maine last week, asking if I would have a pattern available of Mary's Runner.  (Julie reads my blog (Hi, Julie!) -- how cool is it that she took the time to call and talk?)  I will have one shortly that measures 18 by 36 inches, the size Mary requested, but after talking to Julie, I am going to make a larger version for the floor as well. 

Julie also asked me what I was going to do with the border.  My original idea was the multicolored border you see above.  Julie hoped that I would not take away from the circles in the center of the piece.  That got me thinking . . .  maybe it should just be a plain and simple border, to anchor the whole design.  Now I can't decide what to do.  I thought if I hooked a bit of both and took a photograph, I'd be able to see which would work better, but I still can't decide.  I am thinking I shouldn't have hooked the two choices so close together . . .   So I am going to rip out the plain border and re-hook it on the other end and take a couple more pictures.

I could use some help making this decision -- does anyone have any suggestions?  Julie, are you there?