Ripley, WV - McGown Teacher Training 2019, Day 2

All the patterns today were from the Carolyn Stich Collection; whimsical and colourful.

I was in the class, taught by Pamela Landon, and the pattern was The Girls Doing Coffee.

She had hooked it mostly in a 6cut and had used a variety of embellishments.

Lots of colourful wools to choose from. Pam likes to get her colour planning inspiration from fabric samples which here she had mounted on canvases.

Most of us started with the chairs. They are closest to the viewer. Jennifer Curran hooked the chair in a 3 cut and then rewarded herself by starting on a dress.

A few started with the dresses or hats, wanting to dive right into the colour. One student spent the morning with colour pencils in hand, colour planning.

I hooked the chairs in pale green. They reminded me of ice cream parlor chairs. I also wanted to get all the straight lines hooked in straight before I started distorting the backing with those round ladies. I also added some wine bottles and a wine glass as, in my version, the Ladies are doing Wine and Coffee (for the designated driver). We decided that the lady in the middle (whose beverage you can't see) has a scotch in one hand and an espresso in the other.

The class next door was doing the Ladies going swimming. This is Claudia Lampley's.

The teacher from next door came over and described how she dyes wool using silk scarves that she has bought at thrift stores. She had some beautiful examples.

Although I wasn't, at first, interested in doing a Carolyn Stich, I have to admit that once you get into it they are great fun and quite a challenge with the amount of colour and opportunity to use different materials.

They lend themselves well to hooking and I love this one.