April meeting -- Schwalm whitework embroidery

Carol P. led us in a session of learning Schwalm whitework embroidery, using a traditional design of linked hearts, and we soon understood why she had set up two meetings for this stitching form. It's slow and painstaking and has several stages of work, fine small stitching, cutting, drawing out thread, all of which need time.

Jane S. was a great help, too, as an experienced teacher who gave a generous assist to Carol, since this work needed a lot of observing and correction by the teacher, and there was a sizeable group enrolled.  Jane is seen here demonstrating how to start the thread skein correctly.

 Along with the kit, you see flyers of German women creating this kind of whitework, and scenes of the historic region it comes from.

This bottom picture is Carol's own work, on a different project. This is what we aspire to. She started us off on a simpler design, but still challenging enough for beginners.

 Nice afternoon for all of us. So in May we continue with the Schwalm adventure. 


In other news, our chapter has officially moved from the MidAtlantic Region of the Embroiderers' Guild of America to the Metropolitan Region.  Geographically we are right in the Metro area, so this is a good logistical move, enabling our reps. to get to regional meetings much more easily.


However, before we left, MAR invited us to take part in stitching the MAR banner, which is marked off in small squares, for members to design within as they choose, as long as they observe the colors.  The banner comes complete with a bag of threads of all kinds to choose from, and a roster so that participants can indicate which square she completed, her name and the date, for this historic document in stitching.

Your blog admin took on the first square for our chapter, and is struggling a bit, with the fineness of the mesh, and the stiff competition from previous stitchers, whose work is world class, as you see in the detail picture! 

But it seemed like a good thing for a president to do, as a friendly gesture as we leave. Other members of this chapter with superior stitching skills to mine will do squares, too, before the June deadline by which MAR needs to have it sent to the next chapter in the roster.