Snow and Savannah (and Snow IN Savannah)

I’ve obviously been putting off this post for a while. I have no idea why. I create all of these posts in my head and they never seem to make it onto the blog. I think I need a small voice recorder with me in order to record my thoughts and I can just transcribe them later. Do they still make voice recorders?

But I digress… as usual. I was privileged to attend Stitching in the Garden of Thread ‘N Needle’s Springtime in Savannah event in February. Drama was apparently the special of the week.

Our heroine’s saga begins on Monday, February 8th. I went to work that Monday morning and had not been watching the weather forecast at all. As I began to talk about leaving on Wednesday morning for Savannah, some people started to laugh, which was quite disconcerting. That’s how I found out about the coming blizzard. So, after discussions with coworkers and Terry, we started thinking seriously about leaving on Tuesday instead and try to outrun the storm. We watched the radar projections carefully, talked to a friend in Virginia and figured out that, by the time we would be able to get going after dropping the girls off at doggie daycare Tuesday morning, we didn’t have a prayer of outrunning the storm. No matter how we sliced and diced it, we couldn’t manage to figure out how to get down past Virginia before the storm hit there. So, we gave up on the idea of leaving Tuesday and started looking at leaving Thursday instead.

Fortunately, I had built in some leeway into the travel schedule to begin with. I was planning on getting down there late Wednesday night, in time to crash into bed, then be there the next day for early check-in and the reception in the evening. Technically, classes didn’t start until early Friday morning, so I had some buffer. I hadn’t planned on needing that buffer, but there it was.

Wednesday, February 10th came and we were watching the forecast very closely, trying to figure out when the snow would finally end. Keep in mind that we had just dug out from the big storm that had hit over the weekend, so we had several feet of snow on the ground. The snow was still coming when we went to bed Wednesday night. So, we woke up early Thursday morning and waited for dawn to break so that we could go out and start to dig ourselves out. Problem was, after we dug ourselves out, Terry proceeding to dig out two neighbors as well. He’s such a nice guy. As a result, I don’t think we were able to get on the road until after noon. The roads in PA sucked. Totally covered with snow, tricky in some spots and drifted in others. Not the most pleasant drive. And then we reached the DE state line. The roads literally went from packed snow to just wet. Seriously, in a matter of inches. You could tell exactly where the state line was. Crazy. By the time we made it into Maryland, the roads were exactly dry in some areas. The rest of the drive down to Savannah was actually a breeze.

We made excellent time; getting into Savannah in less than 11 hours. Traffic was moving at a great click and the roads were beautiful. As soon as we checked into our hotel room, I called the suite that the retreat coordinators were in and went down to get my materials. They were all in their jammies and just the loveliest ladies. Granted, I knew all of them from the internet. The two event coordinators I had met years ago on the Yahoo! group called VSCyberstitchers, which is for graduates of Thea Dueck (The Victoria Sampler)’s cyberclasses. And the designer who brought the entire event together, Cindy Valentine, was also staying in the suite. I’ve done hardanger model stitching for her several times over the past few years, but never actually met her in person. She was welcoming and sweet, just a lovely lady. And both she and Bonnie (one of the coordinators) are blessedly TALL! Maybe even taller than I am. It was so refreshing!

Friday morning, I went down to breakfast and felt shy because everyone else had had the opportunity to meet and mingle the night before. When we went into the classroom, I took a seat in the back, right in front of where Linda and Bonnie (the coordinators) were sitting. It was a crutch for me to be able to sit back and chat with both ladies during the class and helped me warm up to the whole situation. We had another class Friday afternoon and then were on our own for the rest of the night. One of the coordinators found out about a needlework shop a few blocks away, so most of us filed into taxis and headed over there right after the afternoon class. It turned out that it was a needlepoint shop and she actually didn’t carry pearl cottons, so I wasn’t actually tempted, thank goodness. I bought three pieces of Dupioni silk that are just lovely. I hope to use them for finishing sometime, but really just bought them because they were pretty!

Dinner on Friday night saw a large group (but not all) of us at the Chart House. Fantastic place to eat. Expensive, but fantastic. Seriously. Good. Food. I had an 8 ounce filet mignon with fried shrimp. And for dessert, Terry and I shared a chocolate lava cake. Of course, I was the slowest eater there, but everyone graciously chatted around and with me while I finished. I sat across from and got better acquainted with Lou Ann, who was also a member of VSCyberstitchers. She was there with her husband, as well, which was nice to see. Actually, I think there were a total of 3 or 4 husbands there. And most of them were in IT or engineering. What a hoot! On the way out of the restaurant, we realized that it was snowing outside. Yes, it was snowing in Savannah. This was a BIG deal for the natives. Most, if not all, of us had come from areas that had been buried in snow, so none of us even blinked, but the waitstaff were whispering to each other and pointing out the windows at the snow. One girl walked out the door with us onto the deck and exclaimed about this being the first time she’s ever seen snow in Savannah. It was really amusing. We just couldn’t get away from the white stuff, I swear!

Saturday morning saw us in another class and then Saturday afternoon, the teachers (all 4 of which were also designers) setup in the classroom and held a little shopping market. The only one who had nothing to sell was Thea Dueck (of The Victoria Sampler) due to customs issues, I believe. The other teachers/designers were Cindy Valentine (of Cindy Valentine Designs), Patricia Bage (of Patricia Ann Designs) and Debbie Rowley (of DebBee’s Designs). I have to admit to liking Debbie’s class and design the best of the four. Mostly because it was the most challenging and it was basically canvaswork specialty stitches translated to linen. And anyone who knows me as a stitcher knows that I LOVE specialty stitches! So, it should come as no big surprise that I succumbed and bought two of Debbie’s designs. Yes, I am now getting into canvaswork. Which opens up a whole new realm of stash – doh! Too bad the needlework shop was closed so I couldn’t go kit up the designs right away. Instead, Bonnie is going to come up from Virginia sometime in the next month or so and we’re going to go to Fireside Stitchery so that we can both kit up some designs. Of course, the first design I’m doing, I’m going to change the entire color scheme.

So, the stash haul was as follows:
From DebBee’s Designs, I bought Aquamarine, from Debbie’s Glitz & Glamour line. This one I am going to change to a purple colorway. The other design I bought is Winter Fantasy. Debbie talked me into this one because it’s done on fabric, not canvas, plus it had some star-like motifs and a spot of hardanger in the upper right corner. It’s not symmetrical, which is unusual for me, but it should be fun.
From Patricia Ann Designs, I bought Moonlit Orchid, Silver Frost, and Twilight Star. Patricia sucked me in, selling me the accessory packs for the last two designs at a discount if I bought 2 or more designs. I think I had sucker written all over my face. She also gave us Le Jardin as a gift to everyone who was at the retreat, which was really kind and generous of her.
As far as Cindy’s designs go, I had just gorged myself on several of her designs a couple of months ago, so I was shopped out. She did have several packs of the white Dupioni silk used to finish the class project, so I snapped up one of those.

Saturday night, we were booked on a riverboat dinner cruise, which was quite lovely and lively. Obviously, we weren’t the only group there, so once the delicious food had been consumed, the DJ started up and some line dancing soon ensued. I’m not sure why, but I actually got up there and did the Cha-Cha Slide. Which was decently fun until they got to the “do the Charlie Brown” part. What the heck is the Charlie Brown? I couldn’t really tell from the people dancing around me, either. I’m just glad I was able to keep pace with the song and not look like an idiot. Okay, I hope I didn’t look like an idiot. 😉

I was fortunate enough to be sitting beside Thea Dueck for the dinner cruise. She was quite a skilled conversationalist, keeping it flowing quite smoothly and involving as many people as she could. She even left at one point and went to sit at the end of the tables to talk to a few people that I suspect she felt were getting less attention. I really enjoyed talking with her and getting to know her a little bit more. As part of the dinner cruise, there was the ritualistic kissing of the frog. Each teacher nominated a student who, in her class, seemed to struggle the most with the dreaded frog. That student was given a nice little gift and was granted a chance to kiss the stuffed frog. Thea actually (purposefully, I think) misconstrued the point of the nomination and chose to nominate who she felt was the most talented student in her class. Take a wild guess at who she chose? Little old me. Seriously. I was so tickled! And when my turn came to kiss the frog, I tried to give him a big MWAH in a very dramatic fashion. Terry took a picture, but missed the actual kiss part and only got the WAH part. The resulting photo showcases me with my mouth wide open, looking like I’m either trying to compete with the frog in fly-catching or more like I’m going to attend to swallow the frog whole. Not a very flattering image, to say the least. So no, it will not be posted here, or anywhere for that matter. I’d like to pretend that it never existed.

By this time, I was really warming up to everyone and that little tiny extrovert that is buried deep within me had decided to make an appearance. I was really “on” that night. Sure, part of it was likely the caffeine from the Excedrin Migraine that I had taken before dinner (I react very strongly to caffeine; it gives me diarrhea of the mouth and raises my energy to a near-uncomfortable level), but part of it was me finally loosening up. I haven’t felt that good in a long, long time. It was a vaguely familiar feeling, so I know I’ve managed to get to this level of extroversion before, but it doesn’t happen very often nowadays. Did I mention that it felt good? I guess I really need to start doing some sort of presenting to large groups of people again, because that’s the last time I remember feeling that way. It’s usually accompanied by a crash because I am mostly an introvert by nature, but the short-term payoff is worth the expenditure of energy.

Sunday morning was our last class, with Cindy Valentine. Her panel design has a little bit more of a freeform feel to it, with specialty stitches all over the place (my favorite!). Cindy is a great teacher and actually was kind enough to sit down with me Saturday evening, before the dinner cruise, and assess what I’ve been doing wrong with my buttonhole stitch for years. I thought I had been doing it backwards from everyone else, but that wasn’t the problem. I only really noticed an issue with my inside corners being way too bulky and not crisp enough. Cindy was able to quickly and easily see what I was doing wrong and help me to correct it. Now I know how to do them correctly – woohoo! Anyway, she actually passed around samples of a few other ways to do the flowers on her panel, so I made sure to take good photos of each of them. I’ll decide which way I want to attempt to do it when I get there, but I think I’m going to do the silk ribbon approach that she came up with later and not exactly how she has it charted.

Sunday afternoon was just free time in the stitching room. Most of the stitchers were flying out around that time, so there were only a handful of us left, including Cindy, Debbie, Lou Ann, Bonnie, Linda and me. I spent two hours trying to sequence a second band of overdyed silk thread on Patricia’s piece. Yes, you read that right – two hours. I’m not that slow, trust me. The trick was in trying to get lengths from two different cuts of the thread to sequence as closely as possible to each other. Do you have any idea how difficult that is? If it had been a 12-stranded silk, I wouldn’t have had this problem, because I could have just pulled another four threads from the same cut and they would have matched perfectly. But no, it couldn’t possibly be that simple. I stitched and ripped, stitched and ripped, then stitched and ripped and then, finally, at some point, I got a clue and stitched, then cut to another section of thread and stitched some more, ripped and stitched again, etc., until I got it right. Now the two bands are similar, though not exactly alike. Close enough to satisfy me, mostly because it was as close as I was going to get!

Sunday evening, Bonnie, Linda, Debbie, Terry and I went out to dinner on River Street. It was Valentine’s Day and I think we were the only ones from the retreat left. We went to the Shrimp Factory and had a nice meal. The service was incredibly slow, though. I don’t think I’ve ever experienced service that slow in a restaurant before. It was so bad that Terry started to feel unwell and I told him to go ahead and go back to the hotel without us. I just knew that there was no way that we were getting out of that restaurant before he was going to need a bathroom. The waiter had not even come to collect our credit cards yet. So, we sat and waited and waited and waited and then the girls and I all looked at each other and started digging for cash in our wallets. None of us were willing to sit there any longer, so we just left cash (including very small tips) and went on our merry way. From there, we went to a candy store to buy bear claws, which Linda and Bonnie were raving about. They are clusters of pecans held together with chocolate and caramel. Of course, Debbie, being a proper Southerner and all, politely corrected us on our pronunciations of pralines and pecans. 🙂 Actually, I just went out and found the website for the candy store, so here’s a link to the page with the bear claws. I actually got mine with almonds instead of pecans, so they probably aren’t true bear claws. I also picked up a one-pound bag of peanut brittle, because it was on sale for $3.95 with a purchase. Who could pass on that? Unless, of course, you’re allergic to peanuts…

We then made our way back to the hotel (just a few blocks away) and said our goodbyes. Back in the room, Terry and I started packing up so that we could leave the next morning. We had originally planned to stay an extra day and do some sight-seeing, but the weather was forecasted to be iffy, cold and potentially wet, same as it had been for our entire visit. Late that night, I started feeling really nauseous. As time progressed into the wee hours of the morning, the nausea got worse and worse. I was finding it hard to sleep, but I was determined to ride it out and keep the food down. Until I started to think about it more and realized that, even if I managed to get the food past my stomach, I still had to process it all through both sets of intestines. Yeah, I didn’t think that would be a good idea. So, up it all came and I was finally able to get a little bit of rest, albeit with alternating fever and chills. We left a few hours later, with me hunched over and barely able to move and a barf bag handy for the long car ride ahead. Of course, when we left the hotel, the weather was gorgeous; warm and sunny. Figures. The ride home sucked. Hard core. There’s nothing worse than being confined to an SUV where the ride isn’t as smooth as it would be in a car, feeling nauseous, unable to eat and with all of my joints aching. It was pretty miserable. Add to that the fact that the stupid Nuvo GPS decided to take us through D.C. instead of around it, adding unnecessary time to the trip, and I was so relieved to get home, I can’t even begin to express to you.

Instead of being food poisoning (which I suspected might have been the culprit; I still can’t think about deviled crab without getting nauseous), I apparently was plagued with some sort of awful stomach virus, which held onto me like a vise grip, for the entire week. I wasn’t able to even attempt to eat normal food until Saturday and, even then, I couldn’t eat much before I reverted to softer foods. But, that’s all in the past, thankfully!

Getting back to the retreat details, photos of the main class project can be seen here. I put stitches into each of the four panels during class, except for Thea’s, for which I just doodled some of the specialty stitches, especially the bullion roses. I do not enjoy those, but I got some valuable tips from Thea (she’s quite patient) and mine are slowly getting better as I continue to practice them. Never attempt to do them with cotton floss. Silk floss is the key. Cotton just doesn’t slide of the needle very easily and you’ll quickly get frustrated. Now that I’m home, I’ve picked up the green panel (with the Savannah wording) this week and started working on it again. I had gotten the furthest with this one, so it made sense to start there. I am putting off Debbie’s blue panel for last because I want to do it so badly! 😆 Each teacher also designed a small to go into the reticule. Debbie designed a little needlebook, Thea designed a biscornu (of course), Patricia designed a scissor keep and Cindy designed a pin keep. Oh, and speaking of scissor keeps, why the heck are they not called scissorS keeps? After all, they keep your scissors. The word is spelled s-c-i-s-s-o-r-s, people! It’s not a pluralization (as far as I’m aware), so there is no such thing as a scissor. Sheesh.

And finally, I will leave you with a couple of photos. Sorry I don’t have more, but I was too busy stitching to take pictures, even though I brought my camera into the classroom with me every day.

Thea Dueck and me (with Cindy Valentine in the background) –

Me and Cindy Valentine –

Bonnie, Cindy, Linda and me (yes, that’s a stitch diagram being projected onto my belly) –