Monday, June 5, 2017

EAC Seminar 2017 - Rock, Needle, Scissors - Part 4


Saturday was our third day into our Hedebo class. We all came in very early as usual to catch up on homework.


For this class we concentrated on the needle lace portion of the piece. I don't normally use doodle clothes, but I used one this time to practice as I'm not a 100% sold on having it at the center of Hedebo Enchantment. I'm thinking I want to leave the center area blank and do the needle lace petals on a smaller doily. We'll see. All in all I'm glad I did use a doodle clothe anyways because my buttonholes didn't look that great. They were very loose, I will have to practice some more.


That night we had our banquet. They always hold it on the Saturday as many people end up leaving on Sunday to return home. I missed last year's as I was flying off to Paris, but it was really great to attend. Since we were all dressed up, I took the opportunity to take pictures with my teacher Jette.

with Jette Roy Finlay Heath
Since Alison Cole was also there and she was my teacher this year (although online), I made sure to take one with her as well.

with Alison Cole
During the banquet, the committee for next year's seminar always has a presentation to show off what is planned for the following year. In 2018, Seminar will be hosted by my guild Virtual Threads in Prince Edwards Island. Really excited to go! As favors, we received a parting gift from the hosting guild. It's an adorable puffin (click the link to see the puffin army). He's weighted down so I can use him as a paper weight or even a frame weight. From next year's host we received a needle threader and a booklet containing the list of classes for the coming seminar.


After the banquet, we returned back to the residence to find that there were many stitchers staying up later to finish homework. I was completely out of it and there was no way I was going to do any stitching but I did go around to see what they were all working on and spotted this lovely bargello scissor case and fob. I just loved the colors. 


The morning of day 4 found us in class again catching up on homework. We were supposed to finish cutting and weaving the ends on this square the day before but there was no way we were going to do that after the banquet. It would be stitching suicide! It was very hard to do as well as we were anchoring two fabric threads (that have slugs!!) under a four sided stitch that is tiny. Normally four sided stitches are done over four threads but in this case they're stitched over two.


After this we moved on to some needle weaving demonstrations in the border. I spent most of the rest of the class just watching the demonstrations Jette was giving and stitching easy stuff (we were all very tired). Check out this awesome teaching tool Jette has.


This year's class was really large despite the fact that it was a really big piece. If you'll remember, my class last year was almost cancelled because the amount of pre-work scared people away. This didn't deter the group this year. There was actually a large number of students from Ontario that are part of a whitework group. The reason why they didn't take Fandango last year even though it was so close to home? They were the teacher's, Barbara Kershaw, test students. It does explain a lot doesn't it :)


My certificate with my piece in progress. It has since progressed much more than this as I've been working on it steadily. I will post an updated picture soon.


Our little group from Montreal. There was quite a few of us this year. I hope we will have an even bigger group next year in Prince Edwards Island.


6 comments:

  1. I think you were wise. Stitching after the banquet would have been a spectacularly bad idea, especially with something so detailed. A combination of fatigue and over-excitement doesn't make for good stitching...!

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  2. Thanks so much for sharing all about the seminar! It sounds exhausting, but so enthralling and exciting too. I think you were wise to take it easy on the last day. I'm with Rachel - tiredness doesn't necessarily make for good stitching!

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  3. Your classes, classmates, facilities, etc. all looked and sounded wonderful. Thanks for blogging about it all. PS You look wonderful in the pictures.

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  4. Beautiful work! What a great seminar.

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  5. it looks like you had a great time, the stitching looks gorgeous to me! And you are so much younger than I thought, for some reason I thought you were my age! I'd love to attend seminar, but I guess you have to be a member of a north-american stitching guild?

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  6. You do look lovely in your best frock! I love the puffin army, and each one is individual too, what fun.
    Love Jette's giant piece of "linen" too, what a great way to demonstrate.
    Looking forward to seeing you finish this piece at home now. No pressure!

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