I have finally whipped the finish on a rug. I wanted to have it done for the annual southeastern Michigan hook-in and it's finished. I found I don't like whipping. It took as long to finish the rug as it took to hook it and I don't think the whipping added anything...

I have not had much time to hook, although I have been gathering a lot of recyclable wool. Getting the wool washed and taken apart has used up all of my meager spare time. Early this week, I bled some blues and aquas for sky and water. I had a lot of fun making blue and aqua primitive swatches. This is the season of rummage sales, so my truck is squashed full of wool and books - I almost didn't have room to squeeze in the great blue blanket I found on Tuesday - it's almost exactly the same blue as my hard-earned primitive blue swatch! I've been so involved with getting my mother settled into an assisted living situation that I haven't had time to unload my truck and gloat over all my findings.

Today, I went on a field trip with four classes of Third Graders to the same place where the big hook-in will be held on Saturday. The trip is annual and is called RED Day - Rural Education Day. We went to the county farm fairgrounds where we walked from station to station to see and hear about Michigan farm products. We met rabbits, turkeys, steers, goats, chickens, one very small horse, and even some wee little newborn quail. We observed an arena size model of the state of Michigan with the hundreds of products created by Michigan agriculture. We learned that Michigan is second only to California in farm produce. The really wonderful part of the trip was that one of the farm producer/demonstrators was my first rug hooking teacher! She was spinning llama wool, but I recognized her anyway - her name is Marge and she used to have the rug hooking shop called Ewe and Me. After concentrating for months and months on how to teach hooking and how to teach teachers to teach hooking, it was refreshing to remember that my first hooking lesson lasted all of about two minutes. I bought a kit from Marge and she told me to pull up a loop and then skip a space or so and pull up another one. That was it, the whole lesson - and it was certainly good enough to hook me permanently. Maybe the whole thing about teaching such a simple skill is overdone...

Well, the trillium are bursting out all over the hillside behind my family home and I'm sure the trout lillies are making a beautiful spotted carpet in my back woods. Blue Cohosh, from a few roots I ordered from Vermont forty years ago are beautiful behind the barn at the lake and next to my house at the farm. My mother is happy in her new apartment and I'm ready to enjoy the springtime!