Poodles and Poppies

So greatly remiss, am I, in my blogging that I never talked about the Diane Stoffel class and we moved right on to Pris Buttler this weekend.  I will try to catch up.

As usual, Diane Stoffel was her creative self at our three day class in July.  I wanted to hook Blue, so she suggested we make it a little more interesting by not using just Poodle colors.

She went to the bits and pieces bins and gathered up a small arm load of wool pieces.  She put them on the table in front of me and said "Divide those into groups of LIGHT, BRIGHT, DARK, and DULL.  I'll be back."

That went fairly well, but it certainly was a different way of looking at things.  Not blues, blacks, reds, etc……no…..LIGHT BRIGHT DARK DULL.  It became my mantra.

The darks, which were greys, blacks, purples, blues, reds, became the primary dog color.  The little spits of lights were placed inside the the poodle curls to give them movement.  The dulls, make things recede, I learned, and were used beneath the eyes and anywhere you wanted to hollow out the shape.   It was fascinating.  Absolutely fascinating.

The brights were used sparingly, but those chartreuse and neon colors gave his eyes a glow and also gave him tiny little whiskers.  There were bits of bright in his nose too, to give it that wet dog nose look.

If you look close, Blue is smiling, which is a normal Blue look.  He is 9 months old now and thinks everything is smile worthy.  He is in his teen months and is a bouncy little (huge) fellow.  He stands 29in at the shoulder and is a healthy 68 lbs.  He dad is about 30 in and 90 lbs, so our little man may still grow a bit more.  We had to take him off his puppy food, he was growing so fast that he was suffering from pan osteitis, inflammation in the bones from growing so quickly.

He remains the absolutely best dog!!!!  We start a tricks class tomorrow night, so I will update you on that.

Oh, before I finish today, I should mention the upcoming activities here at the store and our local rug hooking world.  The Omaha Hook-In will be October 3rd at St Robert Bellarmine Church, 120th and Pacific  from 9-4.  We encourage all to attend, it should be a great day with vendors, great rugs to see and fun to be had.  Right after the hook in, plan to wander out to Valley to attend our post hook-in activities.  We will hook Friday from 4-10, have food and snacks, door prizes etc.  Then Saturday we will have OPEN HOOKING from 9-6, more food, door prizes, a drawing for a $100 gift certificate and our Jan Goos Chalkware Santa class.

Jan has hooked up three different Santas in RED, BLUE and GOLD.  You get to pick your color, I will work up your kit for $50 for the pattern and wool and I will pay Jan to teach the class.  We are taking 25 for the class and have a full list now, but if you are interested you can call or write to get on the waiting list.  I am sure a few will have a plan change between now and then.

You can go to my website and visit OCT 3&4 to get a full listing of the days activities.  As always, I will be able to help with color planning and problem solving, so bring any rug that needs help!

Hope to see you then….
Janice