Hi Everyone —

What a great day we had in Debbie’s Asian Collage class!  We finished our last three sections before lunch — including the infamous double alternating nobuko (dark aqua on the left side) which I have been eagerly awaiting.  Very nice textured stitch!  So, after lunch, we stayed in our classroom and continued stitching whatever we needed/wanted to.  Debbie walked around and helped us and entertained us thoroughly!  I feel pretty good about the progress I made stitching today.

Progress at the End of Day 4!

Our class presented Debbie with a bouquet of flowers to thank her for an absolutely fun class and beautiful design.  We all want to do the companion piece next year — I even heard a few folks considering making a bid on a guaranteed first choice for Anaheim prize at the auction tonight!  They say that it typically goes for as much as $1000.

Debbie Stiehler with her flowers and Asian Collage

Our Awesome Class for Asian Collage

After class I managed about a thirty minute swim before meeting with the NJNA chapter attendees for a fun dinner at Copabanana and great margaritas and burgers!  Sue and Susan cabbed back early because Susan had a teacher’s meeting.  I forgot to get a picture with everyone, but here are Carol, Heidi, Robin, and me.  (You might have guessed that we were the four who ordered double margaritas!)

Robin, Rosie, Heidi, and Carol at Copabanana!

Now I’m off to beddy because I have an early morning wake-up for a tour of Winterthur.

Cheers to all!  Rosie

Today was filled with sweet and regretful feelings. I have finished my three day class with Joni Stevenson. I am eager to continue the canvas, but regret having to finish the class. She is not full of laughter, but she is serious and committed to quality stitching and to helping us achieve it. Joni calmly and thoroughly let us experience the piece, while also letting us learn by doing. She explained on the first day that she wanted to capture the cool Mediterranean and the hot arid landscape of Spain. I was awed by how the colors of warm and cool played off each other as well as contrasted each other in subtle application of stitches. I noted that there was a profusion of Scotch, Mosaic, and Cashmere stitches with overlays of colors and stitches. Joni indicated that she was capturing the tiles of Spain and that there needed to be a continuity of structure when including such varied colors. They may be known stitches but she combined them in new ways and combined them to create entirely new looks. It was a new look at established views. Today we started with the dowel embellishment that is attached to the piece, which I can not attach until I finish stitching the area under it. So I photographed the piece with the dowel on the side, yet to be attached. Joni went through the class patiently explaining the application to us in sets of two.

Andalucia Progress at End of Day 3!

After class I went to the silent auction and then went back to my room to pack what I didn’t need tonight and took a trip to my car, to make my departure tomorrow easier. Then the six of us from NJNA went out to a Mexican restaurant Carol recommended. They had great Margaritas so I was a happy camper. It was a fun mix of beginnings, middles, and ends. Carol and Robin had just arrived, Susan was teaching her class tomorrow, Sue and Rosie are moving on to new classes and I am heading home after my tour tomorrow. I don’t want to leave my sisterhood of stitchers, but I will pack my canvas as I head to Sanibel, FL. Thank you all for making these three days so fabulous!!!!

I am happy to report that today went much better for me. I actually was not one of the last ones done. That was probably because today’s tasks were ones that I was comfortable doing.

Day Two of Autumn Leaves

Today Susan H. joined Rosie and me at the RTM for lunch. Susan and I indulged in a dish of delicious ice cream for lunch. I left them there and came back to see the items in the silent auction. No, I did not bid on anything, but I loved seeing the different things stitched as well as the finishing techniques. I went back this evening to see the live auction items.  They were stunning! I bet that ANG made a great deal of money on the auctions. Next year maybe Heidi’s Grace will be there! Onto a new class tomorrow!

Sue

We just returned to the Marriott from my favorite quasi-dive restaurant where we enjoyed awesome margaritas, burgers and fries. The camaraderie was great. Thoroughly enjoyed hearing about the classes everyone had already taken since I start tomorrow – then I’ll have my own stories. Can’t wait!!!

It is now Tuesday afternoon.  I think I will go blind or batty if I have to look

At instructions for another day.  So I have taken an hour off

to get some reading done.  I was able to go to lunch wih Sue and

Rosie – luckily they invited me.  We met up with Cindy and Pat who

are some of my favorite pilot stitching people.  It was intersting to hear

about the Judging program – Cindy is currently enrolled.

I am now ready to go to the Master Teacher program meeting at 5 pm.

After that I will be ready to have dinner with the NJNA group!

I was very fortunate to hear a presentation on Dresden Lace last

night ( reason I did not make the officers meeting).  It was very

interesting and quite informative.  Always something to learn!

Ok – off to the MTP meeting!  See you all later………

Brought to you by Rosie, due to technical difficulties!

Heidi’s Post:

Today started early.  I left my Room at 7:50 to go to my car four blocks away and pay cash for the next two days.  I knew I would not be able to get lost in stitching until I had settled that.  It started to rain as I ran back, but I figured it didn’t matter because the rest of the day was about being inside or in Andalucia.  We covered seven new areas.  I stitched on six of them and finished three.  I have such respect for Joni Stevenson as I stitch this canvas.  It is so well thought out.  I love the subtlety of colors and stitches contrasted with hot colors and muted with layers of cool colors.  This canvas I will work on once I return to NJ.  I have learned so much from her.  I might even check out her blog, which is a huge venture for me.

Progress on Andalucia — End of Day 2!

At lunch I finally touched base with my husband in Aspen.  Then back for an afternoon of stitching.  After class I went to the officers’ meeting.  I was the only one there from NJNA.  Thank heaven I took my canvas to work on while I waited twenty minutes for the meeting to start.  Then twenty minutes of info and questions for the security of ANG.  Get real ladies, you are in a city.  I then tried to go to the exhibits but they closed at six and I was ten minutes late.  That is my project for lunch time tomorrow.  So I cleaned up my canvas while I listened to the news and then met Rosie and Anne Carol from St. Louis, who is in Rosie’s class.  We went to an Italian place across the street while Sue was at the Cyberpointers meeting.  It was wonderful to get a new perspective from Anne Carol about chapters and stitching.  Now it is time for bed.  What a good day!

Heidi

Hi, Everyone —

Today was another fun-filled day at seminar.

My class continued to be  a great experience — being with Debbie is almost like being at a party!  But with stitching progress:

Asian Collage at End of Day 3!

I am absolutely loving both this piece and the class.  Only one more day to go — but I’m finally going to learn about double alternating Nobuko!

Speaking of class, at about 10:30 this morning, we had another fire alarm.  Apparently morning fire alarms are announced at 1 dB and midnight fire alarms at 150 dBs.  We didn’t have to evacuate and after about 5 minutes they announced that it was a drill.  (I can only surmise that something went wrong with the Marriott process on Saturday night!)  Even more twilight zone, we were talking about Saturday’s fire alarm in our class when today’s sounded.  It was almost like we conjured it up!

About an hour later, a friend of one of my classmates stopped in to say that her elderly room neighbor on the 23rd floor (a stranger to her) knocked on her door and said she was scared and she wanted someone to evacuate with her.  So, this lovely needlepointer walked this elderly woman down 23 flights of stairs!  Apparently they aren’t strangers anymore!

We continued the tradition of having lunch at the Reading Terminal Market.  My favorite is a booth called “Tea Leaf” which has about fifty kinds of loose tea.  I’ve been having Darjeeling which is my all time favorite!

My back was sore after stitching this afternoon, so I put on my swim suit and did my 45 minutes at the hotel pool.  It felt marvelous!

Sue was attending the Cyberpointer’s Meeting tonight since she is an active member of this virtual chapter.  They were trying to hit 400 members after tonight’s meeting!  This meeting went on until 9:00 PM, so I met Heidi and Anne Carol (a woman from St. Louis who is in my class) and we went across the street to Maggiones Little Italy for dinner.  We sat outside on their patio and had a lovely dinner.  This is Anne Carol’s tenth seminar.  She is a physician and she “calendars” seminar week a year in advance!

Anne Carol, Heidi, and Rosie at dinner on the patio!

We had hoped that Sue would join us for dinner, so we sat for a while and then had dessert!  What is vacation for, after all?

I came back to the room and found Sue diligently writing her post for tonight!  A number of additional folks from NJNA should be joining us tomorrow afternoon!

My Roomie — Helping with the Blog!

Good night all!  Cheers, Rosie

PS — You can click on these pictures for a larger version!

I started my two day class this morning. You can see from the picture that it involves shading. What we had this morning and for an hour this afternoon is the extent of the shading part. I am going to need some help when I get back! Then we colored two of the blocks. It took me longer than most as I have always had trouble staying within the lines! The vinyl is a new technique to me where the canvas is covered with a light weight sheet of vinyl to protect the sections that you are not working on and to protect the thread from catching on the canvas. Clever, huh? As you come to a square to stitch, you cut a door in the plastic.

Vinyl Coated Canvas with Painted Portions!

Stitching on a shaded, autumn leaf!

I went to a CyberPointers Connection this evening (talked Rosie and Marge Kelly into joining me for a while). It was nice to put a face to the names I have “seen” at meetings on the Internet!

More tomorrow! Sue

I made it to seminar around 3 pm on Sunday.  Checked in to the hotel,

checked in at the faculty registration and also the class registration.

Made myself official and them it was up to the room to go through

all the paperwork.  Read what needed to be read and tossed the

Extraneous stuff.  The welcome banquet was good.  I did not find the NJNA

ladies So sat with Sue Reed and JONI Stevenson.  Rosie

did manage to find me after the banquet so I was able to make

a connection with them.

Today will be spent going through the exhibit, store and book store

with some local rug hooking friends coming in specifically for the day.

Promises to be a great day!