Cindi Gay Rug Hooking

Southern Woman

I’ve been away this week and just now figured out that if I sit in the small lobby here, I can get on the internet. Once a year I attend Southern Teachers’ Workshop in Ripley, West Virginia. I received my certification several years ago and attending every year helps to keep me current with all the new stuff happening out there.

I can now reveal the project I hooked on in January before I started the “Woman with Baby.”

My teaching assignment this year was “wide cut woman.”  I decided to see if I could get the shading I needed using just textures. In the next few posts, I will show my progress steps with this piece. The “Woman with Baby” still is not finished.

When I begin a new project, I try to use all the colors right away.  Here I have a bit of the value I intend to use for hair on the left.  This is actually a piece of dark green wool.  It is there to help me see the value that I will use later.

I hooked the face values first and then I  hooked the eye just before I took the picture. I need a bit of a warm up before I hook the most important part, in this case, the eye.

To hook the eye I follow these steps:

• Hook the upper lash line with a dark wool.  I used a dark brown herringbone.
• Hook the iris.  This is rarely a full circle.  The top part is usually cut off by the upper lash line.
• Hook the lower lid using a face color.  This can be light, medium or dark, depending on how you shade the face.
• Fill the pupil with a dark.
• Fill the whites of the eye with white.  I used a white herringbone texture that is far from white.
• Add the highlight.

In this photo I have both eyes hooked.  The light wool under the woman’s left eyebrow looks odd, but I will leave it in for now and re-evaluate this later.   I’m not crazy about the nose at this stage either, but again, I will look at it again later after the face is completely hooked.

The lips are hooked by hooking a dark center line.  This is better if it is not completely straight.  Every mouth is different.  Look at your subject matter and hook it as you see it.

The upper lip is darker than the lower lip.  Often it is smaller also.  I hooked one row, turning the loops to create a cupid’s bow at the center.  You will be able to see in the next photo, but her mouth is quite crooked.  Again, I will not attempt to fuss with this until the face is completely hooked.

Notice that I am continuing to fill in the face, and I am using small tight squiggles to hide the rows of hooking.  I don’t like to see rows on faces.

Before forehead adjustment

After forehead adjustment

Now I have the face completely filled in so I can make some adjustments.  The curve on the forehead is bothering me.  I ripped out where the two colors join and move the line to make it softer.  I will probably move hair onto the forehead later, so I am not too worried about the little jag at the top.

I added a strong highlight to the lower lip just under the dark line where the lips meet.  I used the lightest flesh color for this highlight.

I am not sure about the dark circle under her eye, I will wait to adjust that.  Adding hair and a neck may make this look different.

Added hair

Notice how different she looks when I add the hair.  I kept the forehead shape as it was hooked in the last post.  I may decide to soften that later.

I removed the one holding line I had hooked in the first step because the shape of the line was not quite right.  I concentrated on value when I chose scraps out of my scrap bin.  The right side of her head (the left side as you look at it) is hooked in cool dark colors, using a lot of blue and purple.  A bit of green was added also.

The other side is hooked in oranges and reds with some green.  Here I chose values that are a bit lighter.

Notice that I have the dark skin value where her hair meets the face.  This helps to give the hair dimension and keep it from looking like a helmet.  The hair is not hooked in rows.  Think about how hair grows and hook it that way.

I brought the hair forward on her face so that it would be in front of the ears.