Whip it, whip it good

I am trying to finish some projects that have been on hold for too long...I am afraid that there are too many to count!

One is a small oriental-style rug. It was started by a dear hooking friend who no longer cared to finish it, so  she passed it along to me. That was in late 2011 and it landed in my lap at a time I was between hooking projects. It was really nice just to have a project to hook on, so I took to it quickly. I think I finished the hooking in less than a few weeks. But once I finished the hooking of the piece, the actual finishing of the rug held little allure...

So, now I'm finally finishing it which involves an entirely different mindset than actually hooking it.

I prefer using the excellent "fold-forward finish" of Cindi Gay which she outlines in her rug e-school on her website cindigayrughooking.com.

Edge of rug, ready for whipstitching

This finish involves sewing around the entire piece multiple times and hand-basting the backing twice toward the right side of the rug. This helps to form a firm edge to whipstitch over. There is also no need to use cording to give support to the edge with this technique, which is a huge plus to those of us already averse to finishing.

Whipping in progress

One finished corner, three more to go...

I use three strands of Paternayan Persian tapestry yarn from my stash to whip the edges of the rug. It was an expedition in itself to find the correct shade of navy from my numerous storage boxes of tapestry yarn that live in my garage. I guess when I labeled  the boxes "blues", I failed to see the need to be more specific. The perfect match was found in the 6th box of "blue" yarns.

The whipping process is tedious, but necessary for a nice finish. It's also a treat to see the rug starting to look more and more complete as I cover the burlap backing.