The Best Kind Of Summer Camp

When I was in the sixth or seventh grade, the one thing I really wanted to do was to go to Camp Lawrence. If I remember correctly, this was a week-long Catholic summer camp for elementary and middle school age kids. For some reason, going to camp was the big thing that year. Everyone was going. My friends and I started making lists of the things we needed to take. All of our enthusiasm didn't make any difference to my parents though, or to the parents of many of my friends. It was a no-go. So my equally deprived best friend and I spent camp week at home, making hippie love bead necklaces, riding our bikes, and being annoying.

Well, the good kind of karma struck when I found out about Camp Iwannastitch, which is held at my favorite cross stitch shop, The Dogwood Patch. The store itself is located in Hiawassee, GA, with mountains and Lake Chatuge in view. What a beautiful setting for a relaxing, stress-free weekend!

My sister, Sheila, and I booked our camp spots with the expectation that it would be as wonderful as last year's and we were not disappointed! Armed with our stitching and supplies, we made the trip through the winding roads of the North Georgia Mountains. We arrived on Friday afternoon to greetings from the store owner, Terrie, and our fellow campers. The store was stocked with fabulous charts, floss, fabric and supplies, plus chocolate in the form of candy and brownies. Terrie and her husband, Kenneth, are great hosts and always made sure we had everything we needed. Who could ask for anything more?

So from Friday afternoon until Sunday afternoon, we stitched, ate (the food was good too), shopped, played games, had some great conversation and then stitched some more. Some people might be confused as to how this could be fun. They wonder how we can derive pleasure from "just sitting around and stitching for that many days". One of the other campers summed it up best when she said that you would only understand if you were a stitcher.

I finally finished Leaping Cat and started Little Ballerinas by Country Cottage Needleworks while at Camp Iwannastitch. It was a good feeling finishing something because I haven't been stitching all that much lately. I think I got a stitching jump-start! Now I'm excited to keep going with my current project.

None of us left until we absolutely had to on Sunday. We finished up our shopping and said goodbye to Scooter, Terrie's newest kitten. We said our sad goodbyes to Terrie and our fellow campers, who we all consider to be new friends. There was also an agreement made to attend camp together next year! It will look a little different next time because Terrie is moving her store to Buford, GA. It's new name will be The Stitch Store. I will definitely be back!