Stitchaway Retreat

I'm back as promised with tales to tell.  This year I was able to spend Thursday evening out in the woods as well as all day Friday and Saturday!  Some creative time management at work permitted this.  Yay!

When I arrived my peep, Marsha presented me with this belated birthday gift!  Just look at those yummy silks and those cute owls.  Swoon!  I have an idea percolating on what I'm going to do with them.  I just need to find the chart and some time.  LOL!  Thank you girlfriend, you know I love pink and silks!

Here's Marsha and our peep, Amanda.  This is just the best picture of those two!  We were having a blast.  Amanda got to come and spend the day with us on Saturday.

I hadn't been there long when Evie came in with this little cutie for me.  It's a belated birthday gift too.  I kinda knew it was coming.  Evie told me at the guild Christmas party I'd be getting something else later.  Isn't it just too dang cute?!  This was another thing I was eyeing at Shepherd's Bush.  It's so cute, I can hardly stand it!  Thank you so much, Evie!

Linda and Evie came in together and this is what Linda gave me.  See those cookies, those are airplane cookies!!!  Omigoodness, that just made my day!  I love, love, love airplane cookies.  You know the ones you get when you fly?!  Yes, those cookies!

I'll let you in on a little known secret, get thee to Walgreens!!  Yep, that's where you can go get your very own airplane cookies.  I made a run the next morning into town and bought three packages for your noshing pleasure.  We went through two full packages between all of us and could have easily started the third package.  Yes, they are that kinda good!

Here's the bracelet closer up so you can actually see it.  The charm says "live, love, laugh."  It suits me just to a "T."  I'm told you can add charms to this bracelet too.  I need to get myself to Hallmark and investigate this.  Thanks, girlie!  You made my day.

Last but certainly not least was this little cutie made by my peep, Patti.  It's a magnetic needle minder.   I think it's a good luck charm because the frog didn't visit me once all weekend.  Whew!  Love it!  Thanks, Patti!

Now for some stitching pictures.  This is Marsha's floss tag!  The motifs above and below the vine are the symbols from her chart stitched in the colors they represent!  Isn't that the neatest idea ever?!  Marsha says it's a bonus that came as part of the La D Da Margaret Cottom sampler she's stitching! I'm hoping she shows a progress pic over on her blog.

I had a proud moment when I saw this!  My friend Janis is stitching the Ellen Maurer-Stroh sampler I finished last month.  She was inspired to start hers after seeing mine grow all year.  I couldn't be happier that I inspired someone to do this sampler.  It truly is a fun stitch!  Janis got all this done at the retreat.  I'm so proud of her!  It looks great, Janis!

I made a promise to myself that I would give all my recent starts some attention while at the retreat.  I'm pleased to say they all got a little time with the needle.  This doesn't look like much but I'm now caught up to the February installment of our John Foster project.  I was very pleased when the borders matched up.   I should have made a victory lap around the room but I didn't.  LOL!

It's hard to tell from the picture but I did make some progress on the Hornbook Bestiary aka the pine cone angel.  I was able to fill in the far right circle and started on the right wing.  I have a feeling this one's going to be a slow go with all the over one on 35 ct.  I must have been crazy when I started this one!  I'll keep plugging away at it.  It looks great in person.

I also couldn't help myself and had to work on this one a bit too!  I limited myself to Thursday evening only or else I would have stitched only this one.  It's a lovely design and sadly I've learned that Barbara Bernard is now retired and unreachable.  Still, if you have this in your stash you really should get it out and work on it.  It's a blast to stitch!  I've gotten all the way around the red part since retreat.

I also started an exchange piece at the retreat and have since finished it too.  I'll be sure to post about it when I know the recipient has received it.  It won't be too long a wait!  The mailing date is coming up.

When I went to go stash shopping I was told my Secret Stitcher had dropped off something for me!  Look at all these wonderful goodies!  I've had my eye on that With My Needle chart for a while now as well as the companion rollup piece.  The tea pouch will come in handy too!  I always need needles,  fuzzy socks and Burt's Bees wax.  Thank you Secret Stitcher!  I love everything.

As promised, there was stash enhancement!  Barbara had a couple trunks of 50% off charts and accessories that were a big hit! I was lucky enough to find three Blackbird designs charts in there along with some other goodies.

This year there were trunk shows by Myrtle Grace Motifs, Stacy Nash Primitives, JBW Designs, Summer House Stitche Workes, Cherry Wood Design Studios, and at least one other I can't recall.  There was lots of stuff to entice you in the Keepsakes Annex room.

Oddly enough I didn't get that many pictures of show and tell this year.  I guess I just forgot.  This is a group of my peeps that challenged each other to stitch the Lizzie Kate Strawberry kit we got at last year's retreat.  Each of them did it a little differently.  I really wished I had gotten a picture of them together.

Photo credit

Last year's retreat theme was strawberries.  This is the design they all stitched.  We were given a black frame, floss, beads and the chart at last year's retreat.  I still have mine in my "to do" pile.  I'm told it's a quick stitch so maybe it will come out to play soon.

This year's theme was hearts.  All our freebies and make-it/take-it projects had hearts or the colors red and pink.  We got a sewing box with several freebie charts inside as well as snacks, we made a rag ball, we got kits for a covered button scissor fob, a tape measure roll up, a needle threader, a biscornu, a chart for the box label, a handmade necklace with hearts, and a pink cookie pinkeep.

These two were my favorites.  I love the little heart beads and the heart clasp on this necklace made by our friend Claire.  Can you believe she made 85 of these?!  Yep, one for everyone attending the retreat.  I also loved the red sandwich cookie pin keep.  It's similar to the one we made at Shepherd's Bush.  Love it!

It was nice to get away for a few days and stitch with my peeps.  We laughed, we ate way more airplane cookies than we should, we helped the shop's economy along in the Annex and we saw lots of beautiful stitching being created.  Most of all we got to spend uninterrupted time together doing what we love to do.

I hope you've enjoyed my recap as much as I enjoyed sharing it with you.  Thanks for sticking with me on this extra long post.  I hope everyone has a good end of the week!


Until next time,

The Inspired Stitcher