Hooking Circles Tutorial

Recently someone wrote me saying her hooked circle on a rug pattern she purchased and hooked curled and made a hump.  Yup, been there done that.  This is not a problem with design of the pattern but with the hooking (sorry). 

I've hooked lots of circles.  The rug below is a design by Fredricksburg Rugs.  I loved it, still love the design and didn't have a problem with hooking the circles.  The problem was using MONKS CLOTH.  I hate monks cloth as it stretches too much for my liking and it is too easy to pack the wool strips because it does stretch.  Now I use only linen as my backing of choice.  And it is the regular, natural primitive linen and NOT the hairless stuff.

If you crochet or knit you know what happens if you don't increase stitches  as you go around ~ you end up with one long tube.  Same thing with hooking a circle.  You must increase the outside loops so that it doesn't become a hump but a gentle flattened out circle.

Okay, in full disclosure, I am NOT an accredited teacher, NOT McGowan trained but rather self-taught and trying to help others thru their struggle like I did but without blog help.  However I've attended numerous rug camps and have had some magnificent teachers in the past several years.  Therefore I've learned something from them as well as the students who attend the camps. 

Okay, that said...the FIRST RULE is:  there are NO rules or right or wrong.  Do what works for you. 

Some people/teachers may say to start in the middle of a circle.  But then what about the primitive style of "outline and fill"?  In the picture below I did an outline of the center circle, joined the wool and snipped it off at the join.  The circle on the right was started in the middle as you can see, and snipped off.

Continuing in the middle circle with the light texture I hooked all the way around but didn't cut off at the join (you'll see why in next photo).  The circle to the right I hooked all around and cut off the second row at the join.

For the center circle I just continued in a spiral and ended up with one tail up in the middle.  For me, this way I can control the circle better.  And, if I should decide to pull out loops to change to another color... my wool strip will be longer to use again.

For the circle on the left I did the same spiral thing.  This outline and fill works best for me.   

In the photo below I did the continuous spiral on the circle to the left.

For me personally I like doing the outline and fill.  That way I can not only control the size and shape of my circle, but have already constructed the outside circumference.  Which means that there's limited space inside the remaining circle and no way I could pack my loops to make a dome.

Hope you all have a great evening.  OH!!!!!!  And I've lost my ability to receive comments into my personal e-mail.  Does anyone know what is up with Blogger why this function would be disabled??

Saundra