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  • COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL

  • creative techniquesFOR RUG HOOKERS

    By Donna Hrkman

    COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL

  • Copyright © 2015 by Stackpole Books

    Published by STACKPOLE BOOKS5067 Ritter RoadMechanicsburg, PA 17055www.stackpolebooks.com

    www.rughookingmagazine.com

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    Printed in the United States of America

    10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

    On the cover: Steampunk Reverie, Cover design byTessa SweigertPhotographs by the author

    Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

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  • III

    CONTENTS

    Introduction ......................................................................ivElements of Design in Rug Hooking ....................................................................1Creating Depth and Dimension in Hooked Rugs ..................................................................6Adding Texture and Embellishment to Your Rugs .....................................................................17Special Border Designs ...............................................26Hooking a Realistic Wallpaper Background ................................................36Adding Text to Your Rug Design..............................42Basic Information on Hooking Realistic Portrait Rugs .................................................55

    Awareness Rugs: Create a Rug with a Message ..............................................................67Rugs with a Limited Color Palette, and Monochromatic Rugs...........................................74Hooking a White Rug, and What Came Next ............................................................81Steampunk Reverie........................................................91Mother Goose, or How to Revive a Lost Love..........................................99Conclusion.....................................................................110Gallery of Rugs .............................................................112

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  • IV

    apply them to the constraints of linen and wool. Ipush myself with every new rug to create some-thing different and wonderful. That’s what I wantto share with others.

    To be creative you must open your mind. Some-times it means taking a baby step into the nextlevel of imagination; sometimes it means taking alarge leap of faith. What I want to do is open thedoor a little wider and show you some of the tech-niques I use in my rug hooking. You may alreadyknow some of these techniques. What I hope to dois challenge you to see things with fresh eyes,whether it’s looking at your subject matter differ-ently or evaluating the techniques you already useand taking them farther. I want you to open thedoor to your creativity just a little bit wider to seewhat’s there.

    I’m offering suggestions and directions on howto get your foot through that door. I explain someof the techniques I use, like creating depththrough shading, hooking realistic portraits, creat-ing wallpaper backgrounds, and more.

    Come on in. Look around. See what you thinkabout these techniques and get ready to push thedoor open wide to your own creativity. I’ve gotsome keys right here . . .Rug hooking is more than a hobby forme. It’s a means of self-expression;it’s how I communicate and how Isee the world. I have learned somuch about myself and my art

    through rug hooking that I want to share what I’velearned over the past ten years as a rug hooker.

    Rug hooking is art. I have been an artist all mylife and have come to embrace the art of rug hook-ing as my greatest means of creative expression.Rug hooking includes all of the aspects of art Ineed: design, composition, color, texture, line,depth . . . Whatever I need to create, I can do itwith wool.

    I have a long history of exploring artistic ex-pression, starting with my fine arts education andexperience as a painter and sculptor. I haveworked in figural drawing, technical drawing, andportraits. I have used charcoal, colored pencil, andpen and ink. I’ve painted in oils, acrylics, watercol-ors, and temperas. I’ve quilled, cross-stitched,quilted, and stenciled. I have done freelance illus-trations for craft catalogs and designed clothingand home decor fabric for a major fabric company.

    These experiences have given me the back-ground and experience to be a rug hooker. I havelearned how to interpret artistic elements and

    INTRODUCTION

    IV

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  • 6

    Rugs have limitless potential as worksof art. Just like paintings, a hookedrug can be flat and two dimensional,or it can be so realistic that onewants to touch it to see if it’s really a flat surface.

    Realistic rugs are representational of a three-di-mensional subject, so creating depth and a believ-able look are important. Knowing how it’s done isnot as difficult as one might imagine.

    Artistic design elements apply to any creativeendeavor, whether it’s a drawing, a painting, or arug. These basic elements are the foundation formaking something look like it could come right offthe paper, canvas, or linen.

    Creating Depth and Dimensionin Realistic Hooked Rugs

    CHAPTER 2

    EXCEPTIONS TO THE RULE�� Primitive rugs are known for their simplicity,

    flatness, exaggeration of scale, dull colorsand basic shapes in design. They are not detailed or shaded to any great degree, andthey convey a certain naive quality that ischarming and historical. Primitives are highlystylized, which is to say that they are not representational in the subject matter theydepict. So the use of shading and dimensionare not of key importance in this style of rug.

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  • Creating Depth and Dimension in Realistic Hooked Rugs 7

    CONSIDER THESE DESIGN ELEMENTS AS YOU PLAN YOUR NEXT RUG:

    �� A focal point: an area withinthe design where the eye goesfirst

    � Overlapping visual planes: layers of depth that lie overone another from front toback or top to bottom

    � Prominent planes: bright andsharply defined planes thatstand out

    � Receding planes: duller andless defined planes that recede

    � Shading: objects that areshaded to create a three-dimensional look

    � Oriental rugs are also rather two dimensionalby design. They are rich in pattern and color,feature vividly created images, and are verystylized. They generally follow traditional pat-terns with fine detail, and a degree of shadingis found in those with floral or animal motifs,but the sense of depth is not as important asthe portrayal of elements in the design.

    Realistic rugs are representational of a three-dimensional subject,

    so creating depth and a believable look are important. Knowing how it’s done is not

    as difficult as one might imagine.

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  • 8 Creative Techniques for Rug Hookers

    to define the first level. They rest on the surface.Second, I further defined the surface of the waterwith a few circular ripples in lighter tones to intro-duce movement in the water. The lily pads overlapone another and fill the area in the corners of thepond design. They are important, but they are notthe focal point. The fish are the focal point, as theycircle around each other, mimicking Pisces, oneending where the other begins. This visual move-ment fits nicely within the square area of the pondand keeps the design from becoming stagnant. Thefish are the largest and brightest elements in therug and the only elements in motion. Viewers seethe fish first; then, everything else follows.

    The water below the two koi forms a secondplane. I hooked it in darker colors, using swirledlines to indicate the depth of the pond and providea foil for the brightness of the fish. If you lookclosely, you can just barely see a shadowy image ofanother fish, swimming beneath the yellow koi.He’s the scavenger fish, the one you see at the bot-tom of every pond, slowly circling the bottom forscraps falling from above. This fish helps to definethat lowest plane in the rug, giving the other levelsa range of depth.

    The outer border, the cobbled path, is also aplane. It becomes a frame for the pond and definesthe nearest plane for the viewer. A small frog sitsin the corner of the cobblestones, and he is thehighest image on the rug. He leads the eye to thecentral image of the fish, but he does not stand outas clearly as the fish do. He provides another ele-ment of layering that makes the rug seem to be di-mensional.

    These layered planes make a design image thatdoes more than sit flatly across the surface. By lay-ering planes, using variations in color and value,you can create your own dimensional surfaces.

    Iam a Pisces, so I am drawn to designs thatfeature water and fish. I decided to createa rug that would feature a koi pond, and Iwanted to capture the wonderful, multi-layered look of a small, controlled environ-ment. My goal was to recreate the visual image ofthe many planes of color, definition, and depththat make a koi pond so beautiful.

    The layout for the pond began with a clear rep-resentation of the fish. I studied several sourcesand decided to use to common breeds of koi: avivid yellow-orange with bright orange accentsand a bright coral red with patches of black andwhite. I knew these colors would enhance the de-sign and make the fish stand out clearly in the rug.

    The surface of the pond, my first plane, had tobe clear. I used a couple ways to make that firstplane clear. First, I added lily pads and water lilies

    AN EXAMPLE OF CREATING DEPTH AND DIMENSION

    Koi Rug

    These layered planes make a design image that does more than sit flatly across the surface. By layering planes, using variations in color and value,

    you can create your own dimensional survaces.

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  • Creating Depth and Dimension in Realistic Hooked Rugs 9

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  • 10 Creative Techniques for Rug Hookers

    design as the canyon itself. So this landscape pre-sented itself as a challenge to capture all those dif-ferent dimensions and planes, from the far awaybackground to the sharply outlined shrubbery inthe front of the photo.

    I used a grid technique to transfer the designfrom the photo to the linen backing. Once the gridwas in place, I had a good idea of the layout andwhat elements I would need to shade for depthand what areas would need to be lighter. I brokethe design plan into three main areas: the back-ground, the middle ground, and the foreground.

    Elements in the background are the least de-tailed. While they are still catching light, the linesare soft and the shading is blurry. One can still rec-ognize the cliffs and clouds, but they do not con-tain the amount of fine detail and shading as thosein the nearer portions of the rug.

    The middle ground is deeper and darker as itencompasses the floor and walls of the canyon.Deep rich reds with veins of lighter shades run di-agonally through the image, leading the eye backinto the mountains and cliffs. The middle groundis more richly colored and shaded than the back-ground, and it comes forward ahead of the distant

    Remember: Brighter, more definedimages advance or come forward inthe design, while duller, darker im-ages recede. Elements in the designthat are meant to be focal pointsshould be more detailed and shaded to create thefeeling of a three-dimensional object, with high-lights and shadows in the appropriate places.

    In Grand Canyon Rug, the depth is essential toconvey the vast expanse of the landscape. Wherecan one find a more dramatic range of color, tex-ture, and sheer beauty? In order to represent theremarkable depth and width of the canyon, I hadto find a good source photo and draw it to capturethat amazing feeling.

    I found a photo taken by a nature photographerand asked his permission to use it. He was morethan happy to share it with me, and once the rugwas completed, I sent him a color photo of the fin-ished piece. He was excited to see his work inter-preted in another form.

    The photo was of a wide expanse of the canyon,and I wanted to incorporate the darker depths aswell as the sheer drop of the cliffs. The clouds inthe distance were as lovely and as integral to the

    CREATING DEPTH AND DIMENSION IN A REALISTIC LANDSCAPE

    Grand Canyon Rug

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  • Creating Depth and Dimension in Realistic Hooked Rugs 11

    cliffs by virtue of the deeper shades and colors.The foreground is the clearest, brightest, and

    most detailed area. It is the frontal plane of thelandscape. Here we find a stony, graveled outcrop-ping of rock with a scraggly bush atop it. From thisvantage point we see the entire expanse of thelandscape. By hooking the foreground lighter and

    with more detail, the viewer can see beyond whatis directly in front of her and over the edge, intothe deep reaches of this wonderful place.

    The depth, the breakdown into three planes,and the use of light and dark contrast work to-gether to making a believable landscape.

    Grid layout of GrandCanyon

    Grid with theGrand CanyonRug well underway.

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  • 12 Creative Techniques for Rug Hookers

    When hooking animals, the easiest way to convey a three-dimensional look is throughdetail in texture and shading.If you are hooking a furry ani-mal, like a dog, cat, or llama, keep in mind that thetexture of the fur or fleece makes all the differencein the world in creating dimension. It’s importantto keep in mind that how you portray the animal’sfur will determine if that animal becomes believ-able and real.

    Birds have their own variety of textures. Feath-ers can lie flat and smooth or they can be ruffledand fluffed like a turkey. How the feathers lie andtheir direction creates patterns and textures thatwe can duplicate in our rugs. From the tiniest de-tailed wing of a hummingbird to the gloriousplumes of an ostrich, the way we hook the linesand textures will make our creatures come alive.

    CREATING DIMENSION IN HOOKED ANIMALS

    Owl Rug

    DON’T SKIMP ON SHADINGWe shade subjects to make them believable.

    �� Heads look rounded if they are highlighted from one side andshaded on the other.

    � Shading follows contours; it’s not just a gray line around anelement.

    � Shading can use many colors that blend into the shape of thesubject.

    � Reflected light isn’t just a white highlight; it can also be abrighter tint of the colors of the subject.

    How feathers lie and their direction creates patterns and textures that we can duplicate in our rugs. The way we hook the lines

    and textures will make our creations come alive.

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  • 14 Creative Techniques for Rug Hookers

    a sunny day, or maybe the longshadows of trees cast by the set-ting sun. We see these every day ofour lives and don’t think twiceabout them.

    Shading and shadows are im-portant in rendering realistic sub-jects because they define objectsand solidify them in a given space.Shading indicates texture, shape,dimension, and surface. A shadow

    beneath an object gives it a foundation andgrounds it in the environment.

    Shading defines the shape and dimension byshowing where the object exists in space. In thisrug, dark shading in the lower parts of the dogs indicate that one dog is standing closer to theviewer than the other. The shading beneath themindicates that they are standing knee-deep inwater. Their ears create shadows on the fur oftheir necks, and the wavy lines of shadow showhow their fur grows and hangs from their bodies.

    The contrast of dark versus light, no matter how subtle, makes the difference in distinguishingdifferent areas of the rug and makes the main subjects stand out. By using a consistent locationfor the light source, you can shade areas for believable dimension and depth.

    THE USE OF CONTRAST TOCREATE DIMENSION

    Shading becomes a key element in sev-eral different ways in Dogs in the Water.The white dogs aren’t actually white.They are a combination of many shades,including cream, beige, tan, gray, blue,green, and yellow. They stand in water and theirfur is dripping and hanging in strands, not fluffyand dry. Notice the variations in how their colorsreflect in the surface of the water and how thewater is reflected in the colors of their fur. Keep inmind that the colors and textures allow these dogsto look as if they could step right out of the waterto be petted.

    Shadows indicate depth in portraiture, makingit seem as if the subject is ready to step out of theframe. When you hear the word “shadow”, you arelikely to think of a silhouette cast on the ground on

    Dogs in the Water

    SURROUNDINGS AND BACKGROUND ARE IMPORTANT

    �� If you are hooking an animal in its natural habitat,hook in a believable background. A polar bear in atropical setting won’t make sense. It pays to dosome research when hooking wild animals to makesure you get it right.

    � Do not let elements of the background become toodetailed or bright, because they will come forward inthe rug. The elements of the background should giveyour creatures a sense of place, but don’t make thatbackground too busy.

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  • Creating Depth and Dimension in Realistic Hooked Rugs 15

    Using contrast is another way to create depth and dimension. Color becomes a nonissue in amonochromatic rug, like NativeAmerican Boy. What defines theshape and dimension of a subject in any rug, colorful or monochromatic, is the amount of detail and degrees of contrast in the composition.Elements of design, like clear lines and a great difference in the degree of dark to light, will enable the artist to make an image look real andsolid.

    I hooked Native American Boy in a deep purple/brown color that encompasses nine levelsof shading from the darkest value to the lightest

    in white. This range provides a degree of shadingpossibilities that let the image become believableand real.

    It was important to me that the boy have astrong presence. His deep, penetrating gaze waswhat drew me to this image initially, and it wasimportant that I capture that depth. If the eyes aretruly the window to the soul, then this child had adeep and serious soul. So my challenge was to usethe range of values from dark to light and combinethem in a believable, realistic composition thatwould bring the beauty and spirit of the boy andshow the depth and dimension of his appearance.He was captured in his own place and time, and Iwanted to be respectful of that.

    I always start with the eyes in my portrait work,and with this child, it was a serious task to capturethose eyes. If they did not convey his expressionfrom the photograph, then the whole spirit of therug would be lost. So I drew them carefully andmade certain that they were perfect. I hooked thepupils and eyelids, and then hooked the iris usingseveral shades of the brown to make it look dimen-sional. I added the highlights—that burst of lifethat indicates moisture in the eye, and makes itlook real—last. Once the eyes were properly inplace, I moved around the eye sockets to the noseand mouth, and then I filled in the rest of the faceaccording to the shading and highlights of thephoto.

    One of greatest areas of contrast in this rug is inthe blanket wrapped around his shoulders. Inorder to create a blanket that looked real, I studiedhow the folds of the blanket fell and where theyoverlapped. The deepest contrasts are between theshadowed folds and the more exposed areas wherethe blanket is the whitest and most brightly lit.

    CREATING DIMENSION IN HOOKED ANIMALS

    Native AmericanBoy

    By using techniques that create distance, depth, detail and dimension, you can create a realistic piece of art that is deep,

    believable, and visually textured.

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    USING CONTRAST

  • 16 Creative Techniques for Rug Hookers

    a flat, two-dimensional rug design into a rug thathas that richness. Keep in mind that the focus ofyour rug out can be enhanced by using color, shad-ing, texture, and line.

    By using techniques that create distance, depth,detail, and dimension, you can create a realisticpiece of art that is a deep, believable, and visuallytextured. It’s fun to make something so successfulthat you know someone will have to touch it to besure it’s really a rug!

    The lines of hooking had to match the contours ofthe wool blanket as it wrapped around his shoul-ders. The bands of dark stripes in the wool blankethad to match up and make sense as they weregathered and folded. By creating strong areas ofdark versus light, I made a striped blanket thatlooks like actual wool.

    These techniques will work for you too whenyou create a rug that cries out for a feeling ofdepth and dimension. It doesn’t take much to turn

    Detail of Native American Boy

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  • 67

    Awareness Rugs:Create a Rug with a Message

    CHAPTER 8

    Iam an artist and came to rug hooking assuch. My background as an artist has givenme an advantage in some respects, but inother ways I’m on the same playing fieldas other rug hookers.We all love the process of creating our rugs. We

    love the challenges, the design, the colors, the sit-ting down, and the pulling of loops. There’s a fa-miliar thrill every time we pull that first row ofloops, hoping this will be a good rug, our bestachievement, the perfect expression of our artisticabilities. This is what we rug hookers share.

    Having an artistic background does have bene-fits. In spite of studying art and knowing aboutcolor and design, I don’t sit down to create a rugand construct it by formula. I don’t say to myself,

    “Hey, divide this into thirds and establish a hori-zon and use diagonal elements to create tension.”I’m just not like that. I visualize an idea and then Isketch and check resources and then I draw a de-sign. Then it’s color planning and dyeing and a cut-ter and I’m off to get those first promising loopshooked in.

    My rugs all start as mental images. Some comefrom dreams. Some are inspired by a favorite songor poem. Sometimes a photo image grabs my brainand won’t let go. And sometimes I have a causethat haunts me until I grab it and pin it down andmake a rug that illustrates it. Illustrating it makesit real. Illustrating it makes it visible to others.Making it real raises awareness.

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  • 68 Creative Techniques for Rug Hookers

    Selecting your topic or cause should bethe easiest part of creating an awarenessrug because it will be something impor-tant enough in your life experience tobe an automatic choice. The cause willbe different for everyone. My causes are the resultof my own experience, and yours will be also.What’s important is that you pull deeply fromwhat you know and express it in your rug.

    SSize doesn’t matter. You can get a message acrosswithout creating a billboard. My Alzheimer Rug isabout 18" x 24", and yet the message is loud andclear. Work in a format that is comfortable for youand that allows you to express your thoughts andfeelings without constraint. If it’s a giant rug, thenmake it so. If it’s something you want to containwithin a smaller area, that’s fine too.

    I begin any new design with drawings and re-

    TOPIC

    Alzheimer’s Rug. Designed and hooked by Donna Hrkman, Dayton, Ohio.

    search. I check my own resources of photographsand see which I can use. I ask people to pose forme as models for future projects. I also search theInternet for copyright free images when I needone.

    I suggest you compile a collection of images andthoughts and start a folder for an awareness rug.This will keep your ideas and impressions in oneplace when you’re ready to build your design plan.When you feel like you have a good base for yourdesign, use your favorite technique to composeyour design. Whether you use an overhead projec-tor, grid, or a printing shop, or make your drawingfreehand, get something on paper that you feelgood about. It doesn’t have to be perfect, and youshould be flexible at this point about keeping youroptions open. If you intend to use lettering, figureout where you want it to go.

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  • 72 Creative Techniques for Rug Hookers

    The lettering is done in red for the main quote,while the words that her abuser uses are in shadesof gray. They are part of the image, but not as boldas the quote.

    Using color to put your message in context isimportant. Think about what your image is tryingto say, and choose colors, or sometimes a minimal-ized color palette, to make it work.

    Colors set the mood and tone of a rug. Bright,cheerful colors are happy and fun. Bold primarycolors are solid and vibrant, lively, and vigorous.Dark colors are somber and can be either dulleddown to indicate a quiet or sad mood. High con-trast between colors can create tension and unrest,and a contrasting color can make an element standout.

    SOURCE PHOTOSAs you plan your awareness rug, remember thatyou are delivering your message visually. Combin-ing text and color is part of the delivery, but find-ing a strong image will bring it all together.

    Your choice of colors will help conveyyour message. Think about what yourgoal is and plan your palette accord-ingly. In Women of the Congo (page70), I chose a beautiful natural settingof the Congo’s landscape behind the woman be-cause I wanted her to be safe and in her own place.But at the bottom of the rug, I used dark colors andblood red letters to convey the horror of her story.

    In Alzheimer’s Rug (page 68), the woman is por-trayed in realistic colors, but the background isdark and threatening, with diagonal lines slashingacross the rug. Diagonal lines suggest turmoil andunrest, and she has a future that is dark and uncer-tain. Using bright, cheerful colors would have con-fused the image and would not have made sense.

    In Abuse(page 71), a black-and-white colorscheme sets the tone for a woman who has becomecolorless and invisible. I chose not to use actualcolors because I wanted to minimize the effect ofher bruised and bloodied face and focus more onthe sadness and despair in her eyes. The eyes arerendered in green, the only color in the portrait.

    COLOR

    Veteran’s Day

    Another rug I created has importantmessages of its own to share. Veteran’s Day was inspired by a rug hooking challenge held annuallyat the Sauder Village Rug HookingWeek event. Each year there’s a challenge, which I usually dismiss at first and later decide to do.This particular challenge was “Happy Holidays,”and I knew the majority of rugs would be Christmas or Halloween or Thanksgiving. Iwanted something different, and my choice wasVeteran’s Day.

    Most of us, if not all, have either had a familymember or friend in the military or have evenserved in the military ourselves. It’s somethingpersonal, yet the importance of service connectsmillions of people. My rug is a tribute to those who

    have served, but it also contains other messages.The soldier in the rug is Joseph Ambrose. He

    was a World War I veteran. His photo is in thepublic domain, and the original shows him stand-ing as I portrayed, but there is a crowd of peoplebehind him. I eliminated the clutter of the crowdand focused on him. He represents the proud sol-dier who served his country, the traditional manwho has saved his uniform and pulled it out ofmothballs for a tribute parade or Veteran’s Daymemorial service. The uniform has holes in it, theepaulettes are sprung up without buttons to an-chor them down. The sleeves are frayed and worn.

    But he wears it proudly. The medals he earnedare still attached, and the belts and sashes arethere. He’s wearing the helmet, but the leatherchin strap is cracked and worn. He is standing at

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  • Awareness Rugs: Create a Rug with a Message 73

    Veteran’s Day. Designed and hooked by Donna Hrkman,Dayton, Ohio.

    attention and he’s proud, but there is somethingelse in his eyes. There is a sense of profound loss.He lost friends, compatriots. He’s holding a foldedflag, too, which was taken from his son’s casket,the son who died in Korea. He’s proud of his service, but he knows the bitter sadness of loss,what war takes from us.

    I replaced the people in the original backgroundwith a stormy sky. The diagonal lines of the cloudsrepresent unrest and disharmony. I felt that asunny sky or a sky filled with puffy clouds wouldhave betrayed the message. The rest of the back-ground is tranquil and still, an autumn day, apeaceful landscape. This is, perhaps, where Josephwill find his rest.

    WHY A MESSAGE RUG?So many elements go into creating a rug with a mes-sage. The rug becomes the vehicle for your emotionsand beliefs and ideas.

    I ask one thing of each of my students: I ask thatduring their rug hooking careers they make one rugthat is an outreach, a message, an awareness rug. Itcan be a rug that raises awareness about a cause thatmeans the most to them. It could be for an animalshelter, a library, autism, poverty, whatever strikes achord in their heart.

    And when they make that rug, I ask them to shareit. Their rugs hang on loan or as a donation in thelocal school or library or women’s center or retire-ment home. Their rugs present a message that peo-ple see and relate to, and the rugs make people stopand think. These are messages that need to beshared.

    Try an awareness rug. You will feel good abouthaving done something, about creating a work of artthat has a deeper meaning and connects to others. Itwill give you a sense of having done something prettywonderful. Really wonderful.

    Some messages don’t need words; the image conveys all that needs

    to be understood.

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