Stitching Retreat/Sleepover

WARNING: This is going to be a rather long post. I have uploaded 14 pictures. May take more than one time to get it all read.

As mentioned in a previous post my Monday Night Stitch Therapy group were planning an overnight stitch retreat. The long awaited event happened this past weekend. It was an overwhelming success and reservations have been made for the same group to do it again in October. However, we are going to stay for 2 nights instead of one. One night was definitely not long enough.

After much effort, we selected a B&B in a small unincorporated community of Dover, just a few miles outside Topeka, the 1878 Sage Inn. It is built of Kansas native limestone and is on the National Register of Historic Places and is situated on what originally was the Southwest Trail. The highway that runs through Dover was the first paved road in Kansas.

Some of our gang arrived as early as we were allowed and had already moved in by the time the last of us arrived after 4PM. "Moved in" is a good term for what we did. If anyone had seen us taking our things in would have thought we were staying for a least a month. Between the stitching lights, stitching bags and our treats, there was an occasional overnight bag. It took each of us more than one trip to get unloaded. Before we got to involved in our stitching we asked Joan, the owner to take a picture of the entire group. Here we are on the front porch. A couple of people are hiding on the back row. There were to be 10 of us, but one person got sick on Friday and was not able to recover in time to join us. Linda, we missed you.

Here is a snap of Joan taking pictures for us. Note all the cameras that she is holding. We are definitely in rural Kansas. You can see the farm implement dealer equipment in the background.

Here we find Jan, Marcia and Tammy in the living room that we converted to our stitching room. Converting meant we moved the couch around, took out 2 small side tables and a chair. In came 5 Ott-lites and 3 Ott-lite-like floor lamps. One with magnifier. It did not look much like a living room when we got done.
A stitcher does not live by stitching alone, so we had Papa Murphy Take and Bake Pizza for our evening meal. Although, we all brought treats and other things to eat, we thought we also needed pizza. We soon found out that we had toooooooo much food. There will be a revision in this policy for our next retreat. No Pizza, just junk food. Here is Pizza cook Marcia overseeing the cooking of the pizza. Note cooked pizza in the background.

Janet is assisting Reina with one of the projects she provided for us to do. More about the projects later. They are working in the dining room of the B&B.
Now here are a couple of views of the bedroom I stayed in for about 4 1/2 hours. I was the last one to hit the hay of the group. It was about 2:20AM. Most made it to about 1. The entire house was exquisitely furnished with antique furniture, dishes, glassware and other knick knacks. At the head of the stairs was a beautiful antique needlework sampler. Several of us were fighting over who was going to take it home with us.

The original builders of the house were stone masons. However, as they got older one of them could not carry the heavy stone anymore. So he began to work in concrete. The ceiling decorations in the stitching room and the bedroom I used had the original concrete work done around the light fixtures. Little to no work has been done to this work in over 100 years. The only work has been the painting done to them. Stitching room ceiling.

Bedroom ceiling

Anita,(The Sunflower Seed owner/designer) and Janet put together goodie bags for us complete with chocolate, notepads, Kleenexes (for drying our eyes from laughter) and glasses cleaner (for all the smudges after all the laughter). Yes, we did have to use the kleenexes several times. We are a crazy bunch and can really get going at times. It seems that one of us get started in one direction and we just play off each other until we are laughing so hard we almost wet ourselves. Janet was in charge of bringing the "depends". I think she forgot them, but luckily we did not need them. Janet provided us with a wool pin cushion and needle book project (more on this later) and Anita designed a project just for our retreat. Details later.

I borrowed from another camp I attended Stitcher's Bingo. The categories were designers, fabric, fiber, accessories and stitches instead of the BINGO. I made up lists of 15 items under each category and then everyone was given the list to make up their own cards. We played several wild rounds of bingo with everyone winning. No thanks to Jan for not knowing how the "S" was to be configured on her card. She could not figure out why we would play "S". After i explained that it stood for 'stitch', 'Sunflower Seed' (our LNS), or 'stupid'. We all forget that Jan is a blond. Then there was Janet that thought we were play "Liar Poker/Bingo". She would yell "bingo" after I would call only 2-3 items for the card. Oh, I almost forgot, Jan kept getting Waterlilies and Watercolours mixed up and every time I called those items we had to make sure she knew which item had been called. It must be tough being a blonde.

This group of stitches has become very close to each other and we have a great time together. It is difficult to put into words how much fun we had together for the less than 18 hours we were together. That is why we decided we had to do this again. The words that I have composed do not begin to relay the joy and friendship we shared during this time. I compiled a list of quotes from the time we were together, much to the horror of everyone. I will provide little to no explanation of the quotes and you can let you imagination run wild with what you think was going on at the time. Enjoy.

-- Oh, chocolate, I better eat this before it spoils.

-- Do me first!!!!

-- Oh look, I already christened mine with chocolate

-- Jammie Time, This bra has got to go. Heard from across the room "I left mine on because I didn't trust you guys." This is in reference to the fact there was some talk of putting all bras in the freezer.

--Where did this little hairy thing come from........Oh, it's lime green........I think I will cut it off........ If I can see it.

--If I am going to do it on a Futon, it better be a new one.

--SOB, I put it in the same wrong hole again.

--That was more than I needed.

--I have a needle and I know how to use it.

--3 snowflakes--Oh, we are snowed in. (We had snow flurries both Saturday and Sunday morning here in this part of Kansas)

--Holy, Holy, Holy--now we have been to church.

--Janet, which mistake (there are so many) are you leaving in. (Amish Tradition to have a mistake in a piece.)

--Crikey!!!!

As I stated before Janet made up projects for pin cushions and needlebooks out of some WDW wool. They are sooo cute. Here is the pincushion.

and here is the needlebook. Anita donated the WDW wool and the navy wool used in needlebook.

Anita, The Sunflower Seed, designed for us a project exclusively for our little retreat/sleepover. It is so wonderful. I cannot wait to stitch it. She was so creative in packaging the kit for it. She used old DMC floss boxes that I had unpacked one day when I was working. Such a neat way to recycle.

As of last night, Reina had completed all the projects from the weekend, Anita had done both wool projects and completed a stitching project that she started at the retreat. I spent all my stitching time working on QC.

Betsy, the shop dog did not get to go with us to the B&B, however, we were not without a dog. The owners have a rescue dog that was around to keep us company. He was starving when they rescued him, but not any more. Here is Jack, the big dog. Apparently does not miss a meal now.

Now, last but not least is a progress update on QC. This is between 7 and 8 yards of green silk used so far. I still love stitching on this. It is hard for me to put it down.

Well, it has taken me way too long to compose this, but I wanted to share with everyone a little of the fun that we had on our retreat/sleepover. Many of the gals were worried about what I would put in here. I have tried not to embarrass anyone and to keep it as clean as possible. Many of the things that happened do not translate well to a blank piece of paper. It goes back to the saying "you had to be there". The man owner came in and told us that "what happens in Dover, stays in Dover". So I tried to leave some of what happened just between us girls.

Everyone left before noon, already anticipating and planning our October retreat. I was worried that I had a home football game that weekend. Luck was on my side. They are out of town that weekend. Dover and the Sage Inn may never be the same. Thanks girls for a great overnight and we are getting geared up to do it all over again, but for 2 nights.

To all my readers, if you have made it this far, thanks for sticking through this all the way to the end. Your stopping by is always appreciated. Now I am off to stitch and run a few errands since I am hostess for my church ladies group tomorrow.

Happy Stitching.