Weekend Sewing with Heather Ross

Denyse, Heather, and Leisl (photo taken by Rachel)

In my last post I made a brief mention about how I was able to obtain a signed book for my swap partner, Lisa, and that I would elaborate on it in my next post. Months ago I saw someone’s post on flickr about going to a weekend sewing workshop with Heather Ross. I immediately looked this up, and emailed Heather, who got right back to me, with the great news that there were still spots available!! (I literally squealed.) Hubby, being as amazing as he is, totally supported me going, and with that my spot was secured!

As we get closer to the date, Heather emails us all fairly regularly to check in, and then just casually mentions that Denyse Schmidt will be attending too. Oh yea, and Leisl Gibson will be there too. OMG. OMG. OMG. Seriously? Then I see in our list of email recipients that the beautiful Rae will be attending. THEN, as if it can’t get any better, Ashley shows up. SERIOUSLY?!

Photo of entire group, taken with Rae’s camera

I was supposed to share a ride from the airport with Rachel, but her flight was delayed due to mechanical issues so I hopped in the car with Emily and Rae. It was a fun car ride to the inn, we just chatted and enjoyed the scenery, and even stopped at a couple places to take pictures. When we arrived at the inn, Heather, Denyse, and Leisl were having wine and cheese with everyone that had already arrived. We were one of the last few to arrive. We were showed to our rooms and then we all sat down to an amazing dinner! Fresh made pesto on fresh pasta was just the first course! *swoon*

After dinner we headed over to the sewing lab where we picked our tables and machines. Rae and I ended up sharing a table, and what a fun table it was! She was a great table-mate! Most of us stayed up til midnight sewing. We were told that breakfast would be at 8:30, so I didn’t want to stay up too late, especially after a long day of travel.

The grounds were stunning! The inn we stayed at was built almost 200 years ago, and was so sweet and quaint! Seeing it in the morning light made it all the more magnificent. After breakfast we headed to the sewing lab, where we busily sewed until lunch. We had yummy sandwiches by the lake and watched the inn’s dog play in the water. After lunch, we headed back to our sewing projects, with the plan of doing our “own thing” for a while in the afternoon. I had woken up with a headache that progressed to migraine over the course of the morning, and so I took a much needed 3 hour nap during our free time. I think it was the combination of travel, dehydration, and sleep deprivation that did me in. I woke up feeling refreshed, and found everyone out by the teepee with yet more wine and cheese! While I was napping, the rest of the crew entertained themselves with either more sewing, or a guided walk around the grounds, or a visit to the local magistrate’s vintage clothing and costume collection.

I’m sure you’re wondering what projects we worked on with these amazing women. We were told to just bring along whatever we wanted – just to pack the patterns and fabric that we wanted to work with. I of course waited til the night before to pack and figure out what I was going to work on. I had a TON of stuff that I was going to bring. Then I had a brief moment of sanity where I realized I would only have like 12 hours of actual sewing time, and there was no way I was going to change reality and get 20 sewing projects done in that time. I decided it would be a good time to try my hand at repurposing, and brought twi garments if mine that I thought would make cute girls clothes. I also thought it would be smart to just bring a little extra fabric in case something struck me that I wanted to make. In the end, I ended up making two dresses for my niece (almost finished with the second one), and a Mendocino sun dress (with the help of Heather) for Darcy’s daughter’s first birthday. I’ll post pictures of all the dresses soon!

Rae took this photo – this is the very tree on the cover of Heather’s book, Weekend Sewing!

Rachel’s amazing photo, showing back of Inn and lake.

The weekend was over in a flash. Before I knew it, we were heading back to the Burlington airport, already missing my new friends. I can only hope that Heather will put this on again next year – I will sign up in an instant! If you have the opportunity to go, I highly recommend it! It was the perfect setting of great company, great sewing, and great wine, all set on a great landscape.