Peglooming...

I need to tell you about another thing I've  been up to during my prolonged silence... I've been peg-looming! 

You might remember that for Christmas D gave me a beautiful peg loom that he'd made himself. Although I wanted to start a rug there and then I didn't want to rush into this project without considering:

a) the size of the rug

b) the right materials (the string to use, the fabrics)

c) that I had enough fabric

d) where to work on this presumably quite lengthy and also quite bulky project

e) a good time to start the project so it wouldn't languish in the corner of the room, half-finished because of other more pressing commitments

I did fairly well with most of these points. I waited until I had enough waste fabric (the moment came when our childminder arrived with 2 bin bags full of old bed linen that she had sorted out and offered to me for use in the rug), I sourced and bought enough strong string, I considered the size of the rug that I wanted, I found that the dining room table was ideal for the task, and that when not in use the project could be rolled up and tucked away quite nicely against the wall of the dining room. The only thing I wasn't so great on was timing. 

Of course this is not usually my strong point, so this is not too surprising. 

That said, this rug-weaving is a lot quicker than I anticipated. 

It's also quite messy. The dining room isn't looking its best... 

The boys thought it was hilarious and they played 'cave' under all those sheets all day (believe it or not, there is a boy under there...). Ocasionally one of them crawled out and helped me rip strips of fabric. I think they quite enjoyed the fact that they were allowed to rip fabric to pieces...

Bus as I said, it's fairly quick as a project. This picture was taken a couple of hours after I started:

I at least waited until a relatively free weekend about three weeks ago to start this. It's not finished yet, but I suspect that if I hadn't been quite so busy these past few weeks it would be finished by now. It's taken an insane amount of fabric, but I'd like the rug to be nice and thick (this has the added bonus of really squishing that fabric together so you can't really identify all those ugly 1980s sheets anymore!).

I anticipate another two or three hours of work on it before it's done. 

A belated Christmas present...

On Friday I had a tonsillectomy. Not a big procedure, I am told, but fairly unpleasant anyway, so I've been feeling rather sore and groggy. I'm at home, and D is looking after the boys, and I'm taking it easy for a while, until I've got the general anesthetic out of my system and the swelling in my throat has gone down a bit. The consultant advised to take 2 weeks off after the op but I'm really hoping that I won't need quite that long - there is a lot to do this time of year and the start of term is just round the corner...

Anyway, as things are this gives me a chance to show you a belated Christmas present. D actually started this before Christmas and he showed me a photograph of the 'plank of wood' he'd got me on Christmas eve, but with us being in Germany this time round it really didn't seem sensible to carry a 2 m long piece of wood there and back. When we got back here I had some time to admire the beautiful plank of hardwood that D had managed to get the local joiner to plane for him before he whisked it off to the shed to drill holes and make pegs.#

Here is how it looked when he brought it back inside:

Yes, D made me my very own peg loom! Isn't it awesome? It's far longer than any of the peg looms that you can buy, so it will be just the right width to make a big rug for the living room. There are three rows of pegs - two in the same size but with different spacing, and one row with smaller pegs and spacing. D was going a bit crazy by the end with cutting and sanding all those little pegs, lol, but it's done now and I'm so in love with it! 

Boy #1 immediately commandeered the loom to make little coasters - one for grandma for her birthday, and one for us. The process is ever so easy, and he had a lot of fun. 

Not bad for an hour's work, right? I think it might be quite useful to put hot pots or pans on when they are brought to the table... 

Now it's up to me to make all those rugs I've been promising D over the years. He's announced that by this time next year he's expecting rugs in every room of the house! ;)      Although that's perhaps a bit over-ambitious this should be a lot quicker than my braided rug, which I've been working on for a couple of years now (!)  - I'll show you some pictures of it if I remember...