Seminar 2018 – Day One

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Today was the first day of my class – City Lake taught by Gail Stafford. It turns out that Sharon B is also in the class and is the Class Angel.

We were given a line drawn canvas with a few areas already painted. One of our first assignments was to paint the sky using acrylic paints. Painting is not one of my accomplishments so I was particularly intimidated but it turned out okay. We started on some stitching and then had to draw the outlines of the trees onto ultrasuede using carbon paper. Who actually remembers carbon paper?

Here’s my progress at lunchtime today.

D40F657B-4487-4C57-B477-A35EB1CC0D8CAfter lunch we painted the trees we had traced onto the ultrasuede. If I characterized myself as intimidated by the sky I would have to say I was traumatized by painting trees! We had to shade the trees and get some color variation as well. We will attach the trees tomorrow.

The rest of the afternoon was spent stitching other areas and there was a lot of random stitching, again not my specialty. But I think I’m off to a good start. So here’s my piece at the end of Day One. I’m going to clean up some of the spaghetti tonight to prepare for whatever Gail has in store for us tomorrow.

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Day One at Seminar

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I arrived yesterday by train yesterday with Jill and Diane.  We had dinner in the hotel and settled into our rooms.

This morning, I began my first class, Liberty.  Our teacher is Dawn Donnelly and she is wonderful! She handed out a line drawn canvas with a generous thread package.   Here is my progress so far.  I hope to tie off my stragglers before class tomorrow.

Happy stitching!

And You Thought You Could Dance…

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Hi Everyone —

Sue C and I spent the day sightseeing (and riding the METRO) in DC today.  We started out at the National Museum of the American Indian.  I wrote about the awesome Inka Road engineering in my other blog, but I saved the BEST for this blog.

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An Embroidered Collar

All of these are beaded!

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The US Flag done entirely in seed beads.  If you look closely, you will see the names of all the American Indian nations beaded into the white stripes using matte beads instead of shiny ones.  And note the quotations in the blue field.

A display of parrot feathers on the left and a tunic where the cloth is made of feathers on the right.

So — if you have a free day at seminar — this museum offers a wonderful array of stitching and other American Indian arts.

Cheers, Rosie

ANG Seminar 2018 – First Timer Report

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The big day has finally arrived – Mr. M and I showed up in Washington, DC today after visiting with Nora in Pittsburgh (hard to believe she’s starting senior year at UPitt). I have wanted to attend an ANG Seminar for many years but it has always conflicted with summer camp and then college move-in week. Since Nora has an apartment this year we didn’t have to worry about dormitory life.

We started out from Pittsburgh this morning and arrived in DC mid-afternoon. Since we hadn’t stopped for lunch on the drive down, our first order of business after checking in was to find someplace for lunch. Fortunately, the Lobby Lounge was open so we were able to grab a sandwich.

After unpacking I headed to the Registration Desk to officially start my sojourn at Seminar. I received my name badge, some goodies, and the Seminar tote that I purchased as a souvenir of my first (hopefully not my last) time at this event.

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It’s official – I’m registered!

Registration Goodies

Goodies – needle minder, scissors fob, post-it notes, and note pad (from First Timers Reception)

Tote Bag

Stitchers can never have too many tote bags – and this one has a zippered top!

I attended the First Timers Reception which was very informative. Members from National Board discussed what to expect at Seminar, including the Exhibit, banquets, stitching areas, and Expo! I am looking forward to attending all of the events, as well as my class, City Lake by Gail Stafford.

I have already come across a few people I know and I look forward to meeting some new stitchers as well.  The Marriott Wardman Park is a lovely venue with lots of areas that for meeting up with other stitchers.

More tomorrow on my first day at class!

Happy stitching!

August SOTM

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Hi Everyone —

We had a small but lively group stitching at Linda’s today.  Nancy brought us a homemade plum cake with whipped cream for dessert.  We decided that it was fruit so the calories didn’t count!

We have decided to stay with individual pictures of Autumn Kaleidoscope for the remainder of the year.  Several people have said that it helps them to expand the pictures and see how some of the challenging areas have been stitched.

Please enjoy!

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Diane’s Adaptation on the Original Colorway.

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Sue C’s Gray, Peach, and Blue colorway.  I think this is gorgeous and it is one of the only ones where the border really stands out to give a Frank Lloyd Wright-ish look!

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Janet P’s Original Colorway on Beige canvas.

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Amy B’s Peach and Mint colorway!

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Joan’s in Lorene’s Aqua Colorway!

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Rosie’s Raspberry Colorway!

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Linda M’s Original colorway on black canvas.

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Jill’s Aqua, Peach, and Ruby colorway!

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Janice’s Chocolate and Cherries colorway!

Ellen's Kaliedoscope

Ellen S’s Lilac and Mint colorway!  Ellen wasn’t able to attend the SOTM today, but she sent in her progress to include in this post!  Looking good!

Isn’t it fantastic to see how varied and beautiful all the colorways are?

Cheers, Rosie

Summer Salad Supper Recipes on website

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What a wonderful appetizer, salad, dessert supper we had at last week’s NJNA meeting.  There were an amazing number of wonderful dishes and I certainly did not go away hungry!

I have added 3 of the recipes to the Members Only portion of the NJNA website (njneedleartists.org) – Dee’s Bacon-Cheddar-Chive Scones, Mally’s Orzo Salad, and Diane’s Warm Crab Dip.  Members can and should check out all the  great recipes on the site.   Please contact Heidi if you have forgotten the password for the Members Only section!

 

SOTM – July 2018 – My Progress

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As we decided to come up to the lake this weekend, i was able to get this month’s SOTM directions from Linda to work on remotely at the same time as our regular SOTM.  Since we had rain off and on Saturday, i was able to do the stitching in between outside chores and the rain. I was amazed how quickly it went and that i was able to finish all the sections on Saturday. I love being able to complete the work on this project within a few days, see the progress, put it away for the month, and work on all my other projects!

While starting on the herringbone, i really missed being with the group to figure out what went where! In addition to the camraderie and discussions, getting each other’s thoughts and ideas on the same project is the real benefit of our SOTM group.

Working with the original colorway, i changed the overdye and threads to pick up more yellow/gold and merlot/burgundy instead of the teal and purple pop colors, while keeping the original autumn colors as the base.  I kept all the main threads the same and continued with the black canvas and changed the pop color threads but kept the same type of thread. It is interesting to compare it to those doing the original colorway since it is so similar yet different.  Here’s my progress through yesterday.

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SOTM – July 2018

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It was a warm day but that didn’t stop nine of our SOTM members from gathering to continue with our projects. Eight of us worked on Autumn Kaleidoscope by Lorene Salt and Dee continued her considerable progress on A Different View from Kurdy Biggs.

This is picture-intense; we’ve decided to take individual pictures each month as it is difficult to get a good photo of all the canvases together. So, here goes.

Dee is continuing her work on A Different View, which was our SOTM a few years ago. This is one of the suggested colorways although it is up to the stitcher to choose the elements. Isn’t this just gorgeous and so rich-looking on the black canvas?

July 2018 - Dee

Several stitchers are working Autumn Kaleidoscope in the original colorway, or a slight variation thereof, while others have chosen their own colorways. Even the pieces being stitched in the same colorway look different depending on how the variegated threads are placed.

Janice is stitching her own colorway, dubbed “Cherries and Chocolate”. She started with a variegated thread from Colour Complements and then picked other threads to go with the colors in the base thread. Interestingly, her concept is based on the colors and not on the type of threads, so she makes choices in each box. This really does look like chocolate cherries!

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Rosie is also stitching her own colorway. While she started with a concept of substituting colors one-for-one, she has improvised along the way depending on how she thinks the areas work in relation to each other. The colors are really vibrant.

July 2018 - Rosie

Marge has been traveling a lot this year so she is just starting out. As a result she’ll get the benefit of the group’s experience. Her colors feature pinks and magentas, with some “pop” colors (apologies for not taking a picture of her threads). But she is off to a good start.

July 2018 - Marge

Robin and Janet started with the original colorway for threads but changed the canvas colors (the original was stitched on black). Janet is stitching on ecru and Robin is stitching on a darker beige.

Janet changed out some of the “pop” threads and made some other adjustments in colors. It is really interesting to see how the threads look on the ecru canvas.

July 2018 - Janet

Robin went rogue and used the solid pearl cotton on the inside borders, rather than the variegated thread, as well as changing the canvas color. The result is more of a stained class look. She also changed out some of the purples and blues.

July 2018 - Robin

Mally, Nancy, and I are all stitching the original colorway on the black canvas. However, even though we are stitching the same colors, our pieces look different due to placement of variegated threads.

Here is Mally’s piece – note that herringbone stitch in the lower right quadrant. That was our “challenge” stitch this month!

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Here is Nancy’s stitched piece.  Look at how different the center bargello section looks (and it’s not due to the quality of the photography).

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Finally, here is my piece. Again, it’s in the original colorway on the black canvas.

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Please don’t think that I finished all of this month’s sections in one sitting. I finished stitching after everyone left, so I waited to take the picture until then. I lost some time during the afternoon session – I had to leave to rescue Mr. M who was in a car accident. Fortunately, he is okay although the car didn’t fare too well.

It’s hard to believe that we are more than halfway through this project. Everyone is enjoying this project immensely, and I think we are all in agreement that each month’s “assignment” is a manageable amount of stitching that doesn’t consume us, enabling us to stitch on all those other projects. We love getting together each month to chat, stitch, and enjoy each other’s company. And, we are really thrilled with being able to talk through stitches and colors and techniques with each other. Perhaps that is the most valuable part of our SOTM group.

We encourage those SOTM members who weren’t able to attend this month to share photos of their progress as well.

Happy Stitching!

June 2018 SOTM

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Hi Everyone —

We all had a great time figuring out the new installment of Lorene Salt’s “Kaleidoscope” yesterday in Mendham.  What a wonderful array of colors, both Lorene’s originals and our own creations!  Even more exciting, one of our distant members, Tina, checked in with her status and showing off her colors!

As special eye candy, I’ve decided to post individual pictures of our current progress so that you can see just how beautiful this piece is turning out in a myriad of colorways!

 

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Tina’s Red Colorway

 

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Linda M’s version of Lorene’s Autumn Colorway

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Rosie’s Raspberry Colorway

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Sylvia’s Lilac colorway

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Jill’s Aqua colorway

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Sue R’s Earth and Sky Colorway

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Mally’s version of Lorene’s Autumn Colorway

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Janice’s Own Cherries and Chocolate Colorway

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Ellen S’s Own Pastel Colorway

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Joan’s version of Lorene’s Turquoise Colorway

In addition, we had two stitchers who are continuing work on the 2017 SOTM “Stars of the New Millennium” by Tony Minieri.

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Barbara L’s Stars

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Margaret’s Stars

So — as usual, a good time was had by all!

Cheers!

Rosie