Yes, antique black is it!

I've finished the main background area around Mr. Baaaa.  That's the sheep's name so far.  It may change, but for now it's Mr. Baaaa.

I love the antique black background mix surrounding Mr. Baaaa.  It sets him off  so well and when you are close to the rug, looking at the mix of different wool textures is so interesting.

As I mentioned in the last post, the antique black mix is made up of many various wool strips.   Out of curiosity, I pulled a variety of strips from my big bag of worms that I use for the antique black background to examine the mix more carefully.  I  easily found 20 different strips that comprise the background.  They blend together well if you use short bursts of each strip.  In hooking a space of two square inches there may be 5-8 different wool strips due to hooking just a few loops of each strip of wool.

Here are some pictures of the mixture but the camera flash distorts the actual color.  They appear quite dark in person, verging on black, but not true black.

The browner strips are more pronounced due to camera flash.

Camera flash makes the strips appear brighter and more washed out than they really are,
but this will give you an idea of all the textured wool going into the background.

And here is Mr. Baaa with the antique black background.  I love it!

Hmmm, as I inspect this picture I see a strip that may have to come out.
In the lower right corner, just below the flower, there's a long discoloration strip.
I'll have to check this out for possible reverse hooking.  This is why standing back from your work is important.
You can spot pieces or sections that are not blending well.  

A close up of the bird so you can see the play of different dark strips of wool.

Lulu approves.  But of course, she's a herding dog so sheep are in her blood!

And speaking of sheep, did I ever show you the completed Peaceful Valley sheep pattern?  I don't think I ever posted the final pictures of this rug.

Next, the triangles on Mr. Baaaa!  Ugggg!

Tinkering

It's hard for me not to tinker with my hooking.  By tinkering, I mean reworking parts of a rug as I hook the pattern.  I do this quite a bit; more than I'd like to admit.

I was loving my sheep, but I wasn't totally loving my brown background.  It wasn't making my heart sing.  I decided to pull a bunch of the brown background and get out my very large collection of dark worms for an antique black background.  I proceeded to hook a large portion to the left of the sheep to decide if the antique black won out over the brown.

When I talk antique black, it's not really, really black.  Yes there is some black in the mix, but it's more like 25 different types of dark wool that is truly dark brown to black.  My mix includes all kinds of wool.  Some is teal, some is dark olive green, some is tweed, some is nearly straight black or brown and a lot of it is a texture that has brown, black, blue, red or gold running through it.

Here's the differences in the background; brown before (right side), antique black after (left side):

Some of the original brown wool is still in the background on the top, right and under the sheep.  This is all coming out.

I beaded around the gold bird.  This picture was taken while the brown background was still around the bird.  

I'm liking the antique black.  It's staying in the rug.  It is very rich and interesting.  I'll take some closeups of it when I get back to hooking more of it.