The Gathering House in Odessa, Washington

Our quilt community is all but complete, here in Odessa, now, with the addition of "The Gathering House" quilt retreat.  Located at 4 West 5th Avenue, it is designed for small group retreats, quilt show weekends, quilters, scrap bookers, beaders, crafters, knitters and others who want to gather and spend time together. 

 The house is completely furnished with plenty of work space to accommodate up to 10 people. 

Utility area includes a cutting, ironing area and a washer and dryer.  All the amenities of home.

 The house includes four bedrooms, two upstairs and two in the basement.
This room is called "In the Garden"

This room is called "For the Birds"

This room is called "By the Sea"

This room is called "Cabin in the Woods"

The family kitchen is fully equipped with seating for 10.  

Work tables, irons and ironing boards are provided.  You need bring only your sewing machines and materials for your projects.

For rates, details and pricing, please contact Jan Hinton

The Gathering House Retreats

4 West 5th Ave.

PO Box 383

Odessa, WA  99159

425-879-5631

tghretreats@hotmail.com

You may already know that we have a very active quilt community here, especially for such a small town as ours (950 people give or take a few).  We have had a full-spectrum quilt shop, The Quilt Crossing, for many years; a full-functioning quilt guild, Fronen Steppdecker, or the Odessa Quilt Club. 

 Each April we hang at least 250 quilts in our annual show repleat with classes, vendors, a "Quilt Walk" and wonderful prizes.  Each March, we "Quilt Til You Wilt", a full, 24 hours of quilting( if you like), in one of our huge local churches, Heritage.  Additional quilt shops are located in nearby communities such as Ritzville, Ephrata, Moses Lake and Reardan (The Buggy Barn is just 45 minutes away).  

Some Quilts from the 2012 Odessa Quilt Show

Odessa is a great community with full services (airport, hospital, police, fire, museum, restaurants, motel, RV facilities, golf, grocery, pharmacy, swimming pool, micro brewery, tennis, sausage factory, motorcycle events,  etc.)   

Odessa features a spectacular landscape, trails and natural wonders, situated on the longest year-round creek in North America, Crab Creek.  

Our special museum tells the story and displays the relics of this historic area.  

We are located, as we say, 35 miles from everywhere, literally.  Between I-90, to the south, and Highway 2, to the north, and where State Highways 21 and 28 intersect, it's a great place to retreat to, on any occasion!

Dry Falls, about 45 miles northwest of Odessa where the waters once flowed washing out a basalt canyon which opens to the south at Soap Lake.

 Dry Falls, looking straight east from the viewpoint on State Highway 17 just north of Sun Lakes State Park.

 Dry Falls, looking southeast from the view point.

Dry Falls, looking northeast; Coulee City on the horizon.

The Odessa area is nearly always sunny with little humidity and good weather almost all the time in any season.  

Our annual fun time is Deutschesfest, the third weekend of September each year.  This is when we roll out the community.  

The high school ball fields become a giant RV park, as well as almost all other free space in the town, including camping in the city park. 

 Deutschesfest features food booths (kraut ranza, reubens, German sausages, cabbage rolls, apple struedel) and lots of activities including German music, a beer garden, parade, bed races, carnival, museum tours, The Sausage Bowl (football), antique quilt show, yard sales, etc.

A Couple of Quilts from the 2012 Antique Quilts Show

(Details to come in the next little bit)

"Working the Stem Stitch in Embroidery"

It’s important, when using this stitch on appliqué, that you try to stitch through all layers, not just the top layer.  If you are stitching through just two layers, it’s easy.  More than that, will be harder, but try to go as deep as you can.  The stem stitch is great for, um, making stems….on plants and flowers….and little vines.  It’s also great for outlining almost anything, especially appliqué piece edges.  It’s great for “drawing” with thread to describe details of a piece such as how you see it in these pictures of the “Wilkommen”, from our pattern of the same name.   

 

   

It makes a nice twisted thread line on the surface of the piece.  Here’s how it’s done.

When I teach a class, I make up little samplers for the participants out of some simple materials.  I make each student an embroidery “hoop” out of tag board; two circles, basically, about 6” in diameter.  I staple these to opposites sides of a piece of white cotton cloth and draw some lines on it for them to follow.

Most any needle will do, but if you plan to continue to embroider with your appliqué, you will use a couple of different needles quite a lot.  The needle on the left is an embroidery needle.  The one on the right, is an appliqué needle. 

 Notice the size of the eye.  The embroidery needle has a large eye, which makes it good for using varying amounts and sizes of thread.  I usually use two strands, but for work that needs more bulk, up to six strands can be managed. 

By contrast, the appliqué needle is thin with a tiny eye, making it useful for working a single strand of strong thread in tiny stitches needed for the blind stitch used by most stitchers to anchor appliqué pieces.  It goes through several layers of fabric without too much trouble.  It’s also a little flexible, which is useful for maneuvering.  More on appliqué, itself, in another session.

"Oh, What a Tangled Web..."

To begin, one of the most frustrating problems for beginners is that of getting one or two strands of floss out of a skein without tangling up the whole thing. Here's how to overcome that little problem.

Pull about 18” of six-strand floss out from the skein and snip it off.  You don’t want to sew with a longer length  than this because it will wear out and break before you ever get down to the end of it.  Beside that, it tangles horribly.

So once the six-strand length is cut, hold the thread in your left hand, near the end you will thread through your needle, and pull one strand straight up and away from the bunch, holding back the strands that gather as the strand is pulled, with your other hand.  Lay the strand aside and smooth the remaining strands out straight again.  Then, pull another strand out the same way.  We will be using two for this project so that is all you will need here.  But, even if there are only two strands left of the hank, you still must separate them in this same way so they come untwisted from one another.

Moisten, trim and thread the two strands through the eye of the needle.  Always thread the end that came out of the skein or off the spool, first, through your needle.  Thread has a slight “nap” to it, according to how it is twisted during spinning.  Using the right end will prevent additional tangling and help your thread to be your friend and not your enemy.

For this exercise, you can make a knot in the end of the strands, if you like.  Later on, I’ll show you how to weave your thread ends into the back of your embroidery so that the back is smooth and almost as pretty as the front.  For appliquéd quilting, though, the back is never seen in the final product so knots are okay.

Bring the thread and needle to the front on the line of travel.

Insert the needle about 1/8” to 1/16” from the start point and bring it back up in the same hole made by bringing the thread to the front.

Tug the stitch firm and hold the working thread down below the line of travel.

Make your next stitch as before.

Continue on until you have finished the line or run out of thread.  Before you run out of thread, always be sure you have enough to take to the back of the work and weave through or make a knot.

Here is the back of the piece we just stitched.  This is how the back of the stem stitch looks.

Weave your remaining thread under the stitches on the back of the piece 6 or 7 times….enough to hold it and keep is from undoing itself.  Or just make a couple of half-hitch knots through the first stitch, if the back is not to be seen.

This is how the finished woven fix looks when done.  Snip off your thread close to the work….closer than I’m showing here, so the ends don’t show in the front as a shadow on the white background.

"Using the Stem Stitch on Curves"

The stem stitch works well on curves but I like it to have the same look on an inside curve as it does on an outside curve.  Draw an “S” on your sample fabric about 2” tall.  When you look at it, the first curve I am stitching on this “S” is an outside curve.  Holding the thread to the outside of the curve makes it lie down very nicely and it holds the line of travel very nicely.  But when you go around the other curve, at the top of the “S”, the stitch doesn’t look quite as good and doesn’t describe the line of travel quite as well.  I call the upper curve of the “S”, the inside curve, just for the sake of this demonstration.

To stitch the  inside curve (below), move your thread above the line of travel just before you begin the curve and continue as before, all the way to the end of the curve.  The transition is nearly invisible in the line of the stitch, and the inside curve looks as smooth as the outside curve.

The finished “S” with both curves lying quite smooth and sweet.  End of lesson.  Now, you can stem stitch to your heart’s content!!!

By the way, I will be giving away a copy of

 the "Eight Great Potholders" pattern this 

week to someone whose name we draw 

from our readers who leave a comment on 

this post by Midnight, PST, Monday, 

March 12th, 2012.

Here is a sampling of each potholder figure.....four are Sunbonnet Sue and four are Sunhat Sam.  These patterns can be used as quilt blocks as well as potholders.

To leave a post, just click on "COMMENTS", below.  Be sure and leave your name, so I can find your email address in my contacts list.  If you are not in my contacts list, you can email me your information by going to Prairie Cottage Corner using the link at the top right of this page.

Happy Stitching!!!