Kitting

Kitting, yes you read it right...not kitty (much as I love a warm kitty) but kitting. The thing we needlework teachers do to get ready for a class. It's a whole project in itself. Here you can read about a good example, my Beaded Strawberry Scissor Case class this week in Mount Holly, NJ. for the Holly Berries. a SAGA Chapter.

I gather all the supplies into a big tote and wander down to my dining room table where I cut various pieces of stuff. In this case green silk gingham, white silk, cotton batting and acid free cardboard. I stack them on a chest, along with other supplies, until I'm ready to package the kits.

 Beads, beads and more beads, all counted into little bags...5 colors in all.

Silk ribbons are cut for each kit and put into piles.

I can't forget the needle cards: printed on both sides, the back with the needle "key". Little pieces of wool felt are cut and stapled to the card. The 5 different needles are ready to go into the wool.

Completed needle cards are ready for insertion into the business card slot of the blue folders.

Then I start assembling the kits on the table, in this case, all 25 of them.

I put each completed kit in a ziplock plastic bag.

The plastic bag, needle card and instructions with patterns all go into a labeled blue folder, ready to be handed out to each person.

This kitting took two days to complete between cooking meals, laundry and business stuff. I'm looking forward to delivering these!

Getting Ready

The California Stitch-In is fast approaching and today is kit day for one of the classes I'm teaching: The Beaded Strawberry Scissor Case.

After assembling all of the parts and pieces on my dining room table I start the process: cut the silk fabric squares, cotton batting, acid-free board. Pretty mundane. The fun part starts when I cut the beautiful silk embroidery ribbons. Then I package the beads...LOVE the beads. They're so pretty and iridescent...the official term is Aurora Borealis. Shades of rainbows. These Japanese seed beads make the prettiest strawberries.

I arrange the kits in piles on my table before final packaging.

Then it's on to the final work: filling the blue folders with needle card, instructions and patterns. And they're ready!!

An Opportunity to Excel

I always look at mistakes, problems, supply frustrations or design challenges as "opportunities to excel".  Seems to make me feel better if I've made a blooper or can't figure my way out of a paper bag. It's particularly unnerving when I'm asked to teach a class, go to order the supplies and find something isn't available anymore.....
anywhere....
at any cost.....
never to be made again.
ARRGGGGGG....!

It happens more and more nowadays and forces me to either re-design something, or select different colors and make another sample. Such is the case with my Beaded Strawberry Scissor Case Class. Originally it was made with absolutely gorgeous pink and white 1/8" silk dupioni gingham. Just the right amount of pink to go with the Beaded Strawberry. But, alas, the darned pink gingham cannot be found anymore. It's not being made. And of course, I was asked to teach it as a class. I had a small amount of the pink gingham to make some of the kits but not all of them. No problem... just another opportunity to excel.

So the search commenced for another color of silk gingham. I found a beautiful green gingham from Silk Baron that fit the bill both in gingham size and color. Next I had to match cotton floss colors and found two DMC colors (#471 and #905) worked beautifully for the embroidery, cord and keyhole tassel.

I used a slightly yellow clear rainbow #11 glass bead for the tassel, too. Here's a photo of the result compared to the Original.

Pretty good opportunity to excel if I do say so myself. I think the ladies in the class will be pleased with their kit choices!