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  • Started 12 years ago by Linda
  • Latest reply from Barbara Stone
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  1. Linda
    Member

    Just signed up, I am very interested in attending a weekend tuition on cross stitich. Does anyone have any advise as to the best ones available

    Posted 12 years ago #

  2. Christine Berrett
    Administrator

    Hi Linda, and welcome!

    Check out the Events and Classes on the CSG website for cross-stitch weekends - these are either residential in a hotel (the next one is at Bradford from 25-27 May), or single days at Jane's home.

    Christine

    Posted 12 years ago #

  3. Linda
    Member

    Thank you, I will have a look

    Posted 12 years ago #

  4. Barbara Stone
    Member

    Welcome to the forum Linda, and hope we can meet you sometime, hopefully at Pinks, or one of the hotels that Jane goes to.

    Posted 12 years ago #

  5. Linda
    Member

    I've booked to go to may weekend, anyone who has been before, could you let me know what to expect

    Posted 12 years ago #

  6. Christine Berrett
    Administrator

    Well, you can expect to meet a bunch of ladies who are all mad on cross-stitch and enjoy a good laugh. You can also expect a lovely, peaceful couple of days with nothing else to do but eat, sleep and stitch (not necessarily in that order!)

    Seriously, if you check out the Events and Classes tab and click on "Find out more about this event" then you will get the schedule for the weekend.

    Posted 12 years ago #

  7. Su Maddocks
    Member

    Hi Linda - hope you have a fab time in Bradford - lucky girl. ...and Mrs Berrett I think there should have been a full stop after the word mad...if Scotland was anything to go by lol :-) xx

    Posted 12 years ago #

  8. Andrea Thompson
    Moderator

    Hi Linda,

    If it is the Bradford weekend then, if you possibly can, it's an ideal location to go on the train. The hotel is a stones throw from the railway station.
    Of course that all depends where you are travelling from and the prices/times, etc.

    What tends to happen is when you arrive at the hotel - Friday afternoonish, there will almost certainly be a group of ladies either drinking coffees or with their stitching out in the bar or cafe areas of the hotel. At the Swindon weekend there was a coffee reception laid out ready for us in their reception area all afternoon! Which was impressive, although it was the first time I've seen the hotels do that for us.

    After going to the room, unpacking, eating the biscuit (compulsary to eat the biscuit the moment you arrive) people tend to migrate downstairs and generally gather in the reception area.

    People will start to disappear up to their rooms again as the afternoon moves on and then we all reappear at 7pm for a drinks reception before dinner.
    After dinner we go up to the stitching room (so it's worth bringing your stitching stuff down to dinner with you). Last time we went to Bradford the stitching room was on the top floor and I remember the lighting in there being quite good. But if you normally stitch with a magnifier or a lamp then it is always worth bringin it with you as you can't always guarantee good light... especially in your hotel room itself as they tend to go for mood lighting there! The stitchign room will be arranged in big round tables so just grab a chair and see who else is sitting with you. :-)

    Friday nights Jane will give us our kits and tell us how the weekend is going to pan out. Depending on how much you've drunk at dinner you might want to start stitching straight away or, if you had a couple of drinks you might want to start with sorting your threads or if you had a LOT of drink you might just want to browse around Jane's stock or Carole's stock which they bring with them and lay out for us to browse. Some people prefer to work on their own projects and Jane is very happy for us to do so. She is also happy to swap the material for a bigger count or from linen to aida (or vice versa).

    People drift off to bed then it all carries on, on the Saturday, after breakfast. No set time for breakfast, you just meander down when it suits you.

    Saturday will be spent stitching, chatting, browsing, coffee and tea breaks, lunch, more coffee and tea breaks until 5pm ish, then we get a couple of hours to ourselves. Bradford City Centre is just outside the hotel so worth a bit of a wander round. Or catching up with the news on the TV in the hotel room and, of course, eat the replacement biscuit. Saturday night, dinner again, then back to the stitching room for more stitching and sometimes a little extra demonstration, but that depends on what Jane and Carole decide to do.

    Sunday is the last day... well half day sort of. You usually need to have checked out of your hotel room by about 11 ish, so Jane recommends doing so at the coffee break. You can usually bring your bags to the stitching room. On Sundays we do a raffle (organised by us attendees) where we put everyones name in a hat, take some money (usually £2 each) then keep drawing peoples names out until all the raffle prizes have gone. The money raised goes to charity. So if you have anything you'd like to bring as a raffle prize please do bring it along. I usually bring a bottle of wine or box of chocolates, but lots of ladies bring some lovely stitching kits/books or other bits they just know they aren't going to get around to doing themselves. Anything really!

    We also have a Bring and Brag, where anything you've done that you're proud of or has a story behind it or just anything you like that you've made bring it with you. Jane goes through the bring and brag stuff on the Sunday before lunch and it's always a fascinating collection of work.

    After lunch it's hometime (unless you've paid for an extra night on the Sunday), so anything you decide to buy from Jane or Carole's stock you'll need to pay for on Sunday morning. It's always a very tempting array and depsite my intentions not to add to my stash, I nearly always do.

    The kit for the weekend comes with the price of the weekend, and our meals are also included (as are tea and coffee at break times during Saturday and Sunday). The only things you need to pay for yourself are any extras you get from Jane and Carole or any drinks you buy from the hotel. The hotel bar isn't the cheapest alas, despite me always putting on my feedback form to them that if their prices were cheaper I'd spend more :-). If you drove then sometimes the hotels charge for the car park, but sometimes they don't. Jane will usually let us know the score at that hotel by Sunday.

    Then people start to go home. Which is always sad. Especially if Monday morning means work...pah! But a very good way to spend the weekend and one that I'm really looking forward to.

    Of course.... if it isn't the Bradford weekend you've booked onto then please ignore everything I've just said! :-)

    Posted 12 years ago #

  9. Andrea Thompson
    Moderator

    Oh and Scissors.

    When you are in the stitching room there will always be someone there who has got scissors with them, (or you can buy some from Jane) but when you are back in your hotel room if you carry on stiching you'll miss them if they aren't there. So it's worth bringing your scissors with you. I think scissors caught me out the first time I went on a weekend. Now I just bring my whole work-in-progress stitching bag with me which has my scissors in it. :-)

    Posted 12 years ago #

  10. Christine Berrett
    Administrator

    Linda

    From Andrea's comprehensive explanation I think you will be able to see that what I said describes the weekend perfectly - "a lovely, peaceful couple of days with nothing else to do but eat, sleep and stitch".

    I might have known that Mrs Maddocks would pick me up on the use of the word "mad". But I maintain that stitchers are the SANE ones - it's the rest of the world that's mad!

    Looking forward to seeing everyone at Bradford - only 16 sleeps to go....

    Christine

    Posted 12 years ago #

  11. brenda midgley
    Member

    Just loved your description of the weekend Andrea - it took me through every minute of the time we spend in whichever of the hotels we are inhabiting.

    Contrary to Christine's saying that we eat, sleep and stitch but not necessarily in that order; I have to put my hand up and say she got the eating bit right (for me) and if she says she doesn't eat much - she's telling fibs; so her list only needs a slight alteration - eat, stitch and sleep. She also forgot 'drink' and 'laugh'.

    Looking forward to you joining us there. As Andrea says once we've checked in and hung up whatever it is we are wearing at dinner that night (just to allow the creases to drop out from the packing - we get an iron in our room but there ain't no way I'm using it!) we then meet up in reception and just have a catch-up chinwag. No need to be shy.

    Posted 12 years ago #

  12. Linda
    Member

    Thank you all for your comments, looking forward to the weekend, I was looking for a distraction, and being a keen stitcher for most of my life I thought it would be perfect. I was a little apprehensive, but was encouraged to book by my daughter and my mom said she had always wanted to attend one of the meetings. So look forward to meeting you all at Bradford, and thanks for all the information. Very usefull.

    Posted 12 years ago #

  13. Helen Hawkins-Ainsley
    Member

    I'll be at Bradford
    For those who know us Mick is coming for Sunday dinner (if he doesn't have his kids).
    If he gets there early enough he'll join us for Bring & Brag
    See you all soon
    Helen

    Posted 12 years ago #

  14. Christine Berrett
    Administrator

    Only 12 sleeps to Bradford!

    Posted 12 years ago #

  15. Doris
    Member

    Linda, welcome to this group of mad crazies. You'll never regret it. And, they are distractive, lol. To add to Andrea's description... or if you've had a WHOLE lotttt to drink, you can just crawl around on the floor and look for needles that have fallen. Wish I lived closer to enjoy some of those week-ends. (Jane would probably send me back to the States.)

    Doris

    Posted 12 years ago #

  16. brenda midgley
    Member

    Oh Doris, we wish you lived closer too. I didn't get to Norway this year so I wasn't able to see you, but I hope you had a lovely time. Did you stay at the same place for your London overnight as you did the year before? I seem to recall you saying you couldn't find the way out or something. Mind you, was it you who stayed in the Nunnery? - they probably wouldn't have had you back again anyway (are you laughing) No, actually I think it was the Australian lady who said she'd stayed with some Nuns - wonder if they were all called 'Sheila' - (God I shall never get to Heaven - maybe Christine should ban me from this site.)

    Posted 12 years ago #

  17. Christine Berrett
    Administrator

    ... don't tempt me, Brenda! ...

    Posted 12 years ago #

  18. Doris
    Member

    LOL Brenda. Yes, I did foist myself on the group that went to Norway this year. Awesome trip. No, I got wiser over the year and found a closer hotel. The Thistle Westminster, right across the street from the pick-up point. I couldn't find my way out of the hotel last year. The Nunnery? Me?? LOL No, it was Jan, from Australia. Stick with me, Brenda, you'll get to Heaven. If we had been on Noah's ark, we'd would of had the poop detail.

    Posted 12 years ago #

  19. Helen Hawkins-Ainsley
    Member

    Brenda, you're not allowed to be banned from the forum - who would make me laugh if you were?
    Look forward to seeing you next week at Bradford.

    Doris I think you've just come up with the best excuse for crawling round the floor drunk I've ever heard

    Helen

    Posted 12 years ago #

  20. Christine Berrett
    Administrator

    Only 6 sleeps to Bradford now, folks - this time next week we'll be well into whatever delightful project Jane has dreamed up for us!

    Can't wait!!!!!!

    Posted 12 years ago #

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