Monday, June 11, 2012

Rug hooking: yarn or fabric?

A few weeks ago, I posted about starting a hit or miss kind of rug with odds and ends of hand spun wool yarns I deemed tough enough to be rug-worthy.  I had some questions about using wool yarn instead of wool fabric, but turned up little in my brief search on the internet...so I purchased Judy Taylor's updated edition of Joy of Hooking with Yarn.

While I'm waiting for a lightning bolt of design inspiration to hit me, I've been plying skeins of singles into two and four ply yarns to use in whatever this next rug will be.  One day, while peddling my little heart out at the wheel, I had a minor epiphany:  why the heck am I buying wool yardage to cut into strips when I am about buried in wool and wool yarns?  Hmmmm...well...maybe because my first and only attempt at hooking with yarn left me feeling a bit unsatisfied.  Maybe because I feel like it will take longer (not a valid excuse in my book)?  Maybe because I've not been particularly inspired by the pieces I've seen, so far, hooked with yarns?  Maybe I like the look of rugs hooked with wool strips better than those hooked with yarns?  Or, as my new hooking friend Andy mentioned, am I a wool snob of some sort???

So that's what's been on my mind, while I've been busy packing up the last of the mess that's moving home from the former yarn shop, or pulling some weeds here and there, which is somehow therapeutic.

What do you think???


1 comment:

Caroline Dlugy-Hegwer said...

I used to own a yarn shop, and a few boxes of yarn left over. I thought it would be nice to some of the yarn in rugs, but I am too much in love with hooking with wool strips to even try a rug with yarn. Maybe you will inspire me!