Get Away 2009
I spent last weekend at a get away run by one of my Local Needlework Shops. The retreat was held at a conference center just a little bit north east of this fellow:
I arrived Friday night just five minutes early from the report in time and found that I was one of the late arrivers! I checked in, got my room assignment and then found a place for all of my stuff in the stitching room. There was cake and plenty of snacks that everyone brought for the weekend:
The theme was revealed for the weekend and it was Bees! We were all Queen Bees for the weekend. First we got our nametags:
Then we got our first project for the weekend and settled into stitching. Here are the threads that came with our kits:
And me all settled in to stitch:
While we were stitching, we did a round of introductions and there were some give aways. I only stayed up until midnight stitching.
Saturday we got up early to get to the dining hall for breakfast, then it was time to get the second project for the weekend. I designed this project, but hadn’t stitched it. Here I am holding the model:
I finished the first project sometime after lunch on Saturday, but I confess I deviated some from the model. First, I accidentally swapped the yellow for the bees with the yellow for the honeycomb. I didn’t feel like frogging, so I just went with it. Then I didn’t like the ways the wings were done, so I altered them:
(Mine is the one on the left) I managed to corrupt several of the people sitting near me to do their wings the same way.
Saturday morning was mostly occupied by stitching, a gift exchange, prize give aways, and more stitching. In the gift exchange, I received a lovely Chinese tea set in a really cool box! (Which I forgot to take a picture of).
Here’s our stitching room:
And the rabble-rousers in the back corner:
Saturday night was the boutique. Here are people perusing the Cross Eyed Kat charts!
Here’s what I bought (I was pretty restrained):
I only stayed up until 2 am Saturday stitching. One thing I found really interesting was watching how people stitched the same pattern. For the honeycomb scissor keep, many people started at the top and worked their way down, stitching the honeycomb color and then going back to fill in. I started in the center with the green part, then proceeded to work out doing all the different details, leaving the honeycomb to fill in last. I find this easiest, since it leaves me with little counting in the end, just filler work. I will say, my hand was tired when the stitching got full – we were using perle 5 cotton on an 18 count fabric. I switched to other projects after finishing the first one. Watching people stitch the Saturday project was especially interesting since I had designed it. It was a needle keep with a design on both sides. Most people started stitching on the right side design, with just a few starting on the left with the flowers and cat.
Pictures of a CEK design being stitched! Very exciting for a designer!
Sunday morning, it was again up bright and early for breakfast. After breakfast, we received our third and final project for the weekend. Then a little bit more stitching, a few more give aways, and it was time ot pack up.
Here is the obligatory group shot:
Here is all the loot I came home with:
Here’s all the stuff that was given away for attending the get away (honey roasted nuts, honey, and other bee-themed things):
Here’s the stuff I won as prize drawings:
Here’s all the project stuff
I’m ready to go again, but I have to wait until next year.
April 3rd, 2009 at 10:56 am
That looks so fun… I love stitching retreats! Your design is really cute