Okay. I’m now on a race against the clock.
A few weeks ago, I started work on a very intricate latch hook rug, with the image based on a 1960’s NEBA Roast Beef / Mike’s Giant Submarines sandwich building that was possibly located at the intersection of Central and Colvin Avenues in Albany.
The goal is to get this thing completed as close to Competition Season 2022 as possible, but it won’t be easy. My biggest problem is that once I run out of a certain color – and I’ve got 68 different shades that make up this artwork – I have to wait for a shipment from Herrschner’s, an online craft and yarn dealer, to ship me another pack of a certain color.
But as much as I love Herrschner’s for their quality and their care in shipping me what I need, they offer only one shipping option. Five to seven business days. So if I start running low on a color, I need to order it NOW, and hope that the new packs arrive before I run out.
And I promised myself that I would only work from bottom to top. No completing squares in weird unconnected areas of this rug, and then having to rip the yarns out because I mis-entered the data.
So here’s how far I’ve gotten, and you can compare last week’s efforts to this week’s completion. Thanks to the wonders of WordPress, you can see the progress by sliding the slider left and right.
So you can see more of the NEBA restaurant’s reflective roof lamps, along with a replication of one of the garbage cans at far left. I’m waiting for a few more packs of navy blue, so I moved over and added some portions of the reflection off of Mike’s Submarines’ roof.
You can also see the black-white piping along the bottom and left sides of the rug; as I mentioned in last week’s blog, I wanted to add this piping so that there is a distinct and crisp border to the rug. You know, for aesthetics.
So now it’s time to check my square-count. Every blue-bordered square on the canvas equals 100 yarns. And I’m equating my progress with this goal. Every day, clear at least one 100-yarn square. If you clear two 100-yarn squares, you’ve improved your target goal by a day.
As of March 4, last week’s blog post, doing one blue-squared area per day would set my final target at March 3, 2023.
After last week’s output, it looks like I could actually hit my target by February 3, 2023.
It’s a great push, but I’m still months behind in my goal. Finishing the rug by mid-October 2022 could get it entered at BUILT. Finishing by September 1 could also give it a chance for an appearance at the Durham Fair. If I can pull this together by August 1 … hello Altamont Fair.
Just checking the mailbox now. Hoping for a package of navy blue strands. Or some bronze, or light lavender, two other colors I ran short on with this project.
Let’s see if we can reach those goals.
Chuck The Writer 
If nothing else, your posts make me feel both nostalgic and HUNGRY.
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Yep, it was located right there at the intersection of Central and Colvin, right across from Armory Garage. Bob Daubney’s was right behind it on Colvin. What a great, classic, mid-century design. As a Big Dom’s employee, I always envied that store because Big Doms had nothing like that (ironically, both went out of business in 1990).
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