Shepherd's Bush Trip - day 3

Day 3 we spent the majority of our time in the host hotel.  We got up and had a quick breakfast.  We were prepared to be in line at 9:00 when the Shepherd's Bush girls opened the Christmas Shop in the hotel next door.  They set up shop with things the teachers bring specifically for the retreat and of course a few extra cute goodies just for good measure!

Well, we got down to the plaza and met a sister stitcher (my new friend Teri from Utah) who told us there was a sign on the door that said they weren't opening until noon!  What?!  So we marched ourselves, a little degected, back up to the room and stitched until 11:30.

When we finally did get to the Christmas Shop the line had already formed!  So we decided to hop in the hotel restaurant for some lunch and then we'd try our luck again.  Lucky we were indeed too!  I found several things that had been on my wishlist that I didn't find the days before so I was a happy girl.

From the Christmas Shop we went downstairs to open our registration packets and get started on our Welcome Projects! Our project this year was a Santa sack!  Well, I don't think that's the official name but that's what I'm calling it.  These are some examples the teacher's made ahead of time. They came in two colorways, red ticking or green ticking.

Of course you know I wanted the red one! I stitched on mine throughout the treateat and on the plane ride home. I've got mine done and am trying to decide if I want to put words on it or not. I'll show a picture of that later.

 

Inside the bag was all the floss you needed and a little handmade booklet with designs from each of the designers. You got to pick how you arranged them and which ones you wanted to use. There were more designs to pick from than there were squares to stitch thanks to Jeannette designing more than one. It was hard to decide which to pick because they were all so darn cute!

Here we are scooting back to our home away from home.  The building you see in the picture is our condo. We stayed on the mountain view side.  We called in a pizza for dinner before heading back for before the evening's group project and festivities.

We got to see a "preview" of Friday night's dessert project with Cece of The Threadgatherer.

Our class project with Linda of Chessie & Me.

R & R's class project.

Jeannette Douglas' class project.

Our evening group project was a "cookie exchange" or at least the idea of one! There were stations in each corner of the room where you went to make your "cookie." We were all given a Christmas themed tin and asked to put our name on stickers on both the bottom and the lid. Then we made our way around to the different stations.

This is the Sandwich Cookie and was hands down my favorite! It's made with two buttons and rounds of wool sandwiched between them held together with a ribbon and embellished with a charm. Is this just too dang cute or what?!  Here are the others.

 Pinwheel Cookie closed.

 Pinwheel open and it's a tape measure!

 A Truffle ornament.

 And finally, counting pin sprinkles!  So cute!

Here's our whole group!  The girls on the right side of the table are my peeps from the Russellville Retreat.  They came up from New Mexico and Texas!  It was so much fun having them there.  I miss them already!

Well folks, that's day 3!  I hope you've enjoyed our trip so far.  There's even more to come. So stay tuned!


More to come,

The Inspired Stitcher