Behind the scenes at HGA-Reno

Behind the scenes at HGA-Reno

Written by Suzanne Woodhead

Photos courtesy of the Participants

We did it! With our support and promotion, Reno 2018 Convergence was a resounding success with registration numbers HGA hasn’t seen in 10 years!

Following up Bill Jackson’s delightful letter home from “Camp Convergence” that you all read in CNCHnet’s August edition, this story also goes back to Convergence in Reno. This story is about the how and the why Project Goody Bags was a success as it’s never too late to say thank you to our many volunteers and contributors.

Going back to, October 2017, Ringleader of Project Goody Bags, Rae Stuart of The Reno Fiber Guild and the CNCH Advisory Board asked membership guilds to donate memorable items that were either handmade or purchased. At the onset of this endeavor, HGA told us to plan for 500-700 bags. But once registration opened, those numbers continued to increase. By June, Rae was told we needed to fill 1,000 Goody Bags! This was both exciting and daunting news. Exciting that WE were doing a fantastic job of making Reno 2018 Convergence a memorable event, on “home turf”, but daunting as that was practically doubling the original numbers.

To envision and appreciate the massive turn this project took when the projections went from 500 to 1,000, I’m going to paint the story with words and photos as none of us who were associated with this project and helping Rae anticipated the volume of boxes that would arrive from vendors, advertisers, and donations from corporate sponsors and guilds.

Rae’s home on Alexander Court became the most memorable and frequent delivery destination in her the neighborhood! In multiple instances, although a box incorrectly addressed, the carrier knew its destiny was Rae’s home. Thank goodness Rae’s family (Jim – husband and Maggie, family dog) were such good sports as boxes arrived daily, until the middle of June.

With so many deliveries, BOXES were the principal occupants of Rae’s home. To accommodate the growing need for more floor space, furniture was moved, boxes were stacked up to 5’ high along the hall, kitchen, and living room. While boxes were stacked wherever space allowed, there was ONE exception to this invasion. Yes, we must all have our limits. In Rae’s case, it was her weaving room! At that door, this invasion stopped! Rae’s weaving room was sovereign ground!

During the box invasion, it was necessary Rae and her two helpers, Mary Nagel and Lorene Sullivan to maintain an accounting and sort over 6,000 items for an attempt to achieve an equal distribution. With so many items of varied nature, some items were counted as one, while others were bundled to equal one! In addition to the donation inventory, all arriving literature destined to the Goody Bags required counting and collating.

June 20th, Distribution Day! Ten volunteers arrived this day to setup, build boxes, fill “temporary plastic bags”, and schlep about 80 filled boxes back into Rae’s home! Because Rae’s team had already sorted and collated, our job was to weave around 4 lines of tables in the garage for 6 hours, filling the 1,000 these “temporary plastic bags”, while admiring the creativity of all the handcrafted donations! Amazing! Amazing! Amazing!

Having to fill “temporary plastic bags” was yet another unexpected turn. Temporary plastic bags, because the official conference bags was destined directly to the Peppermill, within a day or two before conference; too late for our availability. Yet, another opportunity for us to shuttle items from the “temporary” bags into the 1,000 conference bags on the morning of July 5th. GRRR… these things happen. Back to June 20th, when reality smacks us in the face.

Oh my gosh! The reality of the quantity and the bulk of these boxes that had to be transported to the Peppermill gave us pause. A VERY BIG PAUSE! Forget the plan with a few SUV’s, we needed several pickups, or at best U-Haul truck!

Yep; that’s exactly what we did. While elated we’d finished filling and stacking boxes back into Rae’s home, we were exhausted, and our goal was to get these boxes delivered in one fell swoop! And so, it was, July 5th, 7AM, Jim Stuart picked up the reserved U-Haul truck! With the help of a few husbands, we loaded the truck loaded, tied in the boxes, and we’re on our way to pick-up looms and equipment our guild was lending to HGA workshops, arriving at the Peppermill loading docks as scheduled!

Now that the earlier invasion is just a memory, Rae and her family are thrilled to be the sole occupants of their home, to walk freely around furniture as it was intended, to have the use of electric outlets, and to visit with the family photos that adorned walls!

On behalf of my guild and the many members in the CNCH Guilds that supported and donated to the Goody Bag Project, an immense THANK YOU to Rae and Jim Stuart for their time, their space, and their dedication to this ever-expanding project!

And then, thank you CNCH membership guilds for your unbounded creativity and generous donations! Filling the bags on the 20th was a marveling experience! I wish we could have photographed each item as all handmade donations were fabulous, so varied and so unique!

Participating Guilds – Anne’s Web, Bay Area Basket Makers, Black Sheep Handweavers, Carmel Crafts, Central Coast Weavers, Country Weavers, Del Oro Spinners & Weavers, Diablo Weavers, Fresno Weavers & Spinners, Glenna Harris Weavers, Golden Gate Weavers, Golden Valley Weavers & Spinners, Foothill Fibers, Hangtown Fiber, Humboldt Handweavers & Spinners, Motherlode Weavers & Spinners, Mt. Lassen Fiber, Sacramento Weavers & Spinners, Santa Cruz Handweavers, Spindles & Flyers, Treadles to Threads, and The Reno Fiber Guild.

Items donated – Atlantis & Peppermill decks of playing cards, snack packs of – Blue Diamond almonds, Sun Maid raisins, Kimmie Candy, pens, rulers, cloth bags (zippers and drawstring), chapstick, darning needles, assorted spinning wheel threaders (made with a combination of wood, glass, wire, and threading floss), assorted magnets (covered with handwoven fabric or basketry material), assorted tiny bags, knitted or crochet, felted acorns, hand-painted silk scarves, many assorted hand-made greeting cards (blank inside with envelope), assorted woven basketry items, laminated sett/weaving tips cards, assorted handmade tassels, lavender sachets with hand-wovens, individually designed silk pouch/rice paperweights, hand-painted top

spindles, assorted woven bookmarks (inkle, basketry, metallic, and paper), assorted small notebooks (covered with hand-wovens or Convergence 2018 softcover, weaving drafts with yarn samples, measuring tapes, assorted lanyards, assorted pins made with handwoven and embellishments, woven potholders and mug rugs, handmade soaps, felted soaps kits, assorted fiber packets. As you can see, it was truly an amazing collection of items! My apologies if I’ve forgotten to list any items. A few photos showing a sampling of items.                                                                                                                       One of many batches of filled boxes

ready to go back into the house until

moving day, the morning of July 5th.

Now that I’ve reported on the resounding success of Project Goody Bags, I also want to report on the nail-biting CNCH Sheep to Shawl Competition! That, too, was a big success; and, an event that was enjoyed by many on Saturday, between the hours of 12:00 to 4:00.

On the day of the competition there were 5 (8-member) teams competing. At 11:30 AM, team captains of Black Sheep Fiber Guild, Carson Sierra Spinners and Weavers, Hangtown Fiber Guild, Silverado Spinsters, and Spindles and Flyers met with our Sheep to Shawl Captain, Pam Crause and Judge, Susie Liles of Eugene Textiles for a review the rules. Starting at 12 noon, and with only 4 hours to complete shawls, this was an extremely tight competition. Circling back around close to the finishing time, my watch showed 3:38 PM; and, there is only one finished shawl on the tables! If I bit my nails, my nails would have been bitten to their quicks over the next 22 minutes watching these teams throwing the last few pics of their shuttles, cutting their shawls from the loom, whipping out handfuls of fringe twisters or cutters for members to work both ends at the same time, until the loud speaker announcement, “TIME’S UP! Drop your shuttles and fringe twisters and take your shawls to judging tables.” Although this was the Market Place, aside from the whispering of the teams, you could have heard a pin drop in the silence that pursued. In fact, I’m not sure if any of us were breathing at this point, waiting, and watching, staring at the 4 empty tables. What seemed like an eternity, but in reality, was only about 30-40 seconds, the DAH-DAAAAA moment! Miraculously, 3 more shawls floated onto the tables. From what I witnessed in those last 22 minutes, these were and are well oiled teams! Hats off to these teams; they knew their stuff down to the last nanosecond. After Susie Liles completed the judging, our top three winners were –

Silverado Spinsters winning shawl

Third place winners Blacksheep Handweavers

The Hangtown Team and shawl won second place

Cash prices $200, $150, $100 were awarded by HGA via Clemes and Clemes of San Pablo generous donation of $450. The Rosette Ribbons were personalized for competition by Sharlet Elms of the Sacramento Weavings and Spinners Guild. Thanks Sharlet!

HGA was so pleased with this Sheep to Shawl Competition, they’ve asked Knoxville for the event in 2020!

Thank you all for your part in making Reno 2018 Convergence a memorable event, in many ways and for many people. I had a great time, and I hope you did too. Now, time to catch our breaths from all the Convergence excitement, and then get back to our annual regional conference, CNCH 2019 – Fiber Therapy, Sonoma State. See you all then, if not before.

Suzanne Woodhead is CNCH Area 4 Advisor