Making Rug Labels

Jackie, a loyal follower of mine suggested I do a tutorial on making rug labels.  But before I get to that wanted to let Jackie know that I tried to respond to your message but you ARE one of those unfortunate people who has that dreaded "no-reply" blogger.  To learn how to correct it so you don't miss any giveaways or personal help when asking for it, do a google search or scroll thru my old posts to see how to correct it.  It is easy to do.

Anyway, there are a couple ways to make rug labels and I've done it two ways now.  The first way was to cut freezer paper 8 1/2 x 11 to and a piece of muslin ripped on the straight of grain across and down to fit that sheet of paper. 

If you want the muslin a little tea stained I'd do that to a larger piece to allow for shrinkage and then rip/cut to fit the freezer paper.  Then you iron the slippery side of the freezer paper to the fabric using a hot dry iron. 

The label for the the McCue Eagle was done using the technique described above.  Since I was planning to hook several of Magdalena Briner's designs wanted to provide adequate information on the back so did a form and hand wrote the information in after each was hooked.  As you can see below it isn't as nice since the ink pen ran and the writing isn't as structured as the print.

If you look at the label above closely you will see that I also indicated the original size of Magdalena's Eagle and the size of mine.  Wanted to show the year the original is to have been hooked as well as the year I hooked mine.  Since all that information was available to me, thanks to the long and tedius research of my friend Evelyn Lawrence, I felt it should be on my label.

So now the more current rug labels I've done; you saw one on the back of The Cat's Meow in a recent post.  Here is a label I just attached to the back of a previously hooked Henny Penny design by Woolley Fox. Notice that mild green in the background ?  The name of it is Irish Eyes and was purchased from Betsy.  I LOVE that wool and am using it in the Pot of Flowers that I'm presently working on (flower buds, leaf, thin row around flowers) and it was used in the duck on Magdalena's Farm rug.  It is a 'must have' wool in my estimation.  Not sure if she has any left but if not and it is ever re-milled, make sure you get some.  Now she'll shiver if she doesn't have any in stock and she gets e-mails. 

This is the product I used to make these last labels.

I

I purchased this at Hancock Fabrics but am sure other fabric or craft stores would have a similar product.  This is NOT a shiny or rubbery product but a muslin and just what you want.

So this is what I do to design the information on my piece of paper:

~OPEN a new document in Windows Word
~ make MARGINS the narrowest so there's more room for the labels.
~INSERT "Table" and I used two across and 4 down per sheet of paper.
~TYPE your information using the font you desire and info you desire
~COPY and PASTE a picture of your choosing.

I will fill out one square with information and then copy and paste the info into the other 7 blocks.  If the 8 labels runs over onto a second page then I know that I've to reduce the font size or reduce the size of the picture (if there is one).  And, sadly am normally behind in labeling my rugs so that I know the name and information for all 8 rugs.  That way I use up the whole sheet and don't waste the product.

Oh, and I save that into a document so that when I'm ready to label the next 8 rugs all I have to do is change the name and the information.  Also be sure to leave adequate space above and below each label for cutting and stitching.

What you will need to do is test to see which side the fabric enters the printer.  You will notice that I made a note and wrote it on the package so next time I know to place the fabric side down so the printing is on the proper side and doesn't gunk up my printer.  It was much better using this product than ironing on the freezer paper to cotton.  But that was a cheaper way to go.

After printing out the fabric I waited for it to dry and just for safety sake I took a plain sheet of paper and placed it against the printed side of the fabric and ironed it with a hot dry iron.  Since I wanted to stain the fabric I wanted to be sure the ink wouldn't run.  Thankfully something worked because it didn't run when I dipped the labels in coffee.  Now, I DID cut my labels while they were attached to the paper to make it easier and make for a straighter cut. 

Hopefully I've explained everything well enough for you.  And feel free to write me with questions but just remember, if you are a NO-REPLY blogger you'll never receive my e-mail.

Have a great evening everyone.  And please be kind to one another; as the old saying goes.... "you can catch more flies with sugar...."  Besides, it makes me happier to be nice.

Saundra