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Inspired to Hooked Rugs at Pastimes PEI

4 Aug

People often ask us how and where we get our patterns for rug hooking; there is a simple answer: we live on PEI. We simply take our cameras everywhere and voila ….. another bunch of ideas for rugs takes shape; they often remain ideas in our binders of “Ideas” for awhile.  Yesterday Barry and I made our way all the way up to the beautiful town of Souris, PEI. We stopped at the Lighthouse craft Shop and took this picture of the lighthouse that sits on top of the hill for all mariners to see. a light for mariners up east on PEI

one of the beacons of Souris PEI

If you spend any time in Souris, you will always find something to do; there were lots of people on the main beach on the way into the town. We chatted for awhile to Camella Cheverie at Naturally Yours Antiques and Collectables  just off Main Street.  We ate at Sheltered Harbour Restaurant overlooking the Magdalen Island Ferry and saw all the RVs coming to our Island.

Last Tuesday we demonstrated our hooking at the Artisan Day at nearby Orwell Corner Historic Village; some folks even tried their hand at hooking.

Demonstrating rug hooking at Orwell Corner

Bette shows a young girl how to hook

We had a chance to see the sights and sounds of the village ‘as it used to be’.

Historic Village has a water pump that works!

The old village pump is seldom idle when the kids arrive.

And back here at Pastimes PEI in my yard all the lilies are in bloom.PEI Lilieswe hook the flowers from our gardens

Our new pattern is called Waterside Tulips. It is named for the fields of Vanco Farms tulips that grow just down the road from here.  Yes, we are surrounded by the glorious beauty of PEI so all of our rug hooking creations are our way of “showing off” our home.

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Prince Edward Island’s Historic Rug Hooking Connections to the New England States

21 Mar

 While I am not much of a traveller myself, I do know that this is a great tour for rug hookers of Prince Edward Island and the rest of the Maritimes.  People who went on last year’s tour tell me that they couldn’t believe how much rug hooking they saw in such a short time. http://www.targettours.ca/destination/72/New-England-Rug-Hookers-Tour

 This tour gves me the opportunity to talk about my interest in the rug hooking history of PEI.

Pastimes PEI gallery wall

My quest to fnd out more about the history of rug  hooking started a long time ago – when I started hooking n 1975.  If you are familiar with the history and culture of rug hooking, you will know that it seems to have ‘started’ in the Canadian Maritimes, Newfoundland and Labrador, eastern Quebec and the New England states. No one knows for sure because, like many things that women did in in the household, it did not make it into the history books. (That subject can be left for another wntery day.)  I can tell you that just as rug hooking culture runs deep here on the Island, so does it just south of the border, not far from here. 

 Much of the rich PEI rug hooking history has not been recorded.  Heather and I  interviewed just a few Island rug hookers way back in 1991 as part of an art class we were taking at University of Prince Edward Island. In 1999 we created a slide show about the people who hooked on PEI.  All of this was before technology – we used a plain old 1990s camera and took real ‘slides’ of the rugs and the women…. but at least we did that much way back then. I promise to keep you updated on our quest to gather up more Island rug hooking history.. if you are nterested.  We have presented our new version of the presentation to a couple of local rug hooking groups but it is still a work in progress.  The more people tell us about our history, the more we all will come to know and appreciate our past rug hookers.

Meanwhile, online, you can read Anne Nicholson’s detailed and very informative series of topics on the culture of PEI rug hooking with separate articles on some of  the people who hooked great rugs: http://www.gov.pe.ca/firsthand/index.php3?number=43723&lang=E

Jack and I have to get a move on today and finish a little rug for a new little beginner kit called 1-fish 2-fish using two new Dorr wool textures and plain Dorr blue – all while we watch the Canadian women’s curling team in the World Curling event:

Jack is supposed to be helping me hook the sample for the new beginners kit....

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Some history of PEI hooked rugs or mats as they are called

19 Oct

Not much has been written down about the ‘everyday work’ of women. We have found out what we know in bits and pieces over the years. Our desire to know more all started with my paper for a PEI arts course  at the University of Prince Edward Island way back in the nineties. I wrote the paper before I knew anything about the deep traditions of PEI and Maritime rug hooking.  But once Heather and I started finding out little bits and pieces about the women and their rugs, we wanted to know more. Luckily for us, Heather always took pictures. The pictures were a great way for us to talk to the people who had hooked the mats. They couldn’t believe we wanted to take pictures of ‘those old things’. There are a couple of places that have information on the history of hooked rugs. One is this article by Anne Nicholson of PEI whose short history of PEI mats is: http://www.gov.pe.ca/firsthand/index.php3?number=44601&lang=E

My paper on Rug Hooking is in the Island Collection at the UPEI library. One of these days I may get it retyped and on here for you to read directly.



Jack likes the vintage look, the Cavendish Mat




This is the new Cavendish by Heather

 You can read about our lives as rug hookers today at this site:
http://seaandbescene.com/2011/10/three-sisters-one-success-story-pastimes-pei/

We also had the Great Canadian Adventure guys visit us in September; they are getting their PEI stories on line. I am waiting with guarded anticipation for their story about Pastimes PEI and our collection of Barry’s machinery outside the studio.