Blog & News

The Guest list for our event is growing!  Thank you all for signing up.    We are about one half sold out!

We are so glad to announce the opening of reservations for our 30th Anniversary Luncheon.  

This past weekend and throughout this week, lace makers are putting on the final touches to their entries to Creative Arts - Big E.  

Hello again

You have to remember that one reason for lace making was so widows and single women could make a living and it was sisters who in many countries helped these widows find useful and profitable work.... hence much lace that was make was for liturgical use. Now maybe there are lots of other reasons for lace making but this reason will explain the next post. In a church, St Wallaburga ( a Saint I had never heard of ) tucked away again  in a residential academic sector of Brugge, there are at least 12 Marys which were  used in  religious processions over the last 500-600 years in Brugge. It is sort of like a big doll collection framing the side aisles of this beautiful white interior church. The dolls/Marys were called stick dolls as only the head and feet were sculpted. The stick inside was never seen as it  was dressed/covered with  brocades and embroidered fabrics and then of course the trim and the veils were all of handmade lace! I took many pictures of the Marys as each veil was an entirely different lace. I had to have closeups so you all could see the lace and then distance pictures so you could get the effect. I think the guide wondered who I ever was crouching and contorting to get the best angle and avoiding the sun glare from the clerestory windows! Maybe I made his day not too many tourists ventured to this hidden 'place' to  so closely examine the Marys.

Now I saw lace everywhere. In my own little church in the Beguinage there were three altar cloths, one main altar and two side altars. They each had a different Torchon lace trim... just like what Sr Clare is doing for Sacred Hearts! I have to tell her. Anyway I assumed that Sr Mary Anne the lace making sister had done these and I again contorted for pictures and then asked her at dinner. NO... these were done by the Beguines in the 1500s. She casually followed that statement up with 'Oh if you are careful the lace lasts a long time.' Well I would say so 500 years is a long time!

Last post I do hope to do a presentation for NELG with pictures. I think I have given you all at least a sneak preview of what I saw and experienced lace wise. If you have any particular questions feel free to email me or post and I will answer. I definitely am a novice in the lace making world but it was such fun! I loved it!

Sr Madeleine

Morning again

I guess I am on a roll. With the time change I am up at 4 and 5 am so the convent is quiet and the computers not being vied for! With my coffee to sustain me another adventure.I had wanted to visit the lace exhibition in a nearby village as it was of FLanders Lace the lace I was learning at Kantcentrum. For varying reasons I had not been able to get out there until the last two days. I had had a fall before I came so had a nasty gash on my leg that was healing and early in my month could not make a bike trip to this town plus the day I was planning to go 4 sisters in a nearby convent ate poisonous mushrooms and were near death, a serious concern when there are only 12 sisters in this convent! I felt my priority was prayer ( the work of nuns )and not lace at this moment.  So the last days my leg was healed and on a beautiful day I set off to rent a bicycle and ride the 5 KM to Damme. Now mind you bicyle riding is an art in Brugge maybe in all belgium and the Low countries I do not know. But NO helmets .... riding in high heels, and fancy dresses, in jeans and top or in full habit with veil flying with baguettes and books all trailing out of pouches on the rear.. all these were quite common sights. So when in Rome...... now dodging  the ubiquitous tourists and the speeding BMWs was another mountain to be scaled. There are bicyle lanes but at the intersection of the highways I couldn't tell which from which and just rode across and hoped for the best... Figuring hitting a nun is not a good idea and most people even unbelievers would abstain! So I trundled along by the canal watching the cows and horses as countryside comes quickly outside of Brugge. I loved it. THe quaint little village was quickly appeared and the exhibition was in the TOwn Hall. Now I have no pictures as they were prohibited as these were original designs. Tradition is you do NOT share your patterns although some lacemakers say this is beginning to change. THese were however original designs and commissions of Flanders Lace. Now only movie stars and baseball players could afford these I was told as they are originals to fit a certain desire of the purchaser! However they were quite stunning and the gal there didi give me a complete explanation of how it was done from the design to the tracing to the choice of stitches each piece being a one of  a kind original. They spin the thread themselves examples there and the little wheel etc. It was quite upper crust lace shall we say. I guess if you are Sandra Bullock and want lace for your yacht table you would know how to find such places and people. I felt sort of privileged to have even seen this kind of lace.
After a visit to tearoom for sustennce of pannekokken which  we call crepes with ice cream and caramel sauce ( many people gave me $$ for extra treats so kind ) I unlocked my bike from the bicycle parking lot and retraced my ride on the other side of the canal. THe return trip took me 20 minutes longer as I was bushed as I stopped on the benches a number of times but it was all worth it and bed looked good at the convent.

Another lace adventure or two to tell about.. I hope I am not boring you all.
Sr Madeleine

One of the NELG members emailed me about looking for some old thread i.e. out of production. I read the email at the local fast food joint one day and thought 'I don't know what she is talking about in English' letting alone finding a shop or explaining in French what I am looking for "Fat chance of this I thought"....... Nevertheless a challenge is always good so off I trekked armed with the notes from the email. As luck/ God would have it, the first shop a big one on Wollenstraat for those of you who know Brugge sort of an old factory type shop wooden floors and pictures of lacemakers from the last centuries in the window was the one I tried. It looked promising as it was big. I faithfully cornered a saleslady about my age and repeated as close a translation as I could get. She said 'ah yes' in French of course rushed to a hidden drawer underneath a big display of lace and presented a drawer full of little bags  filled  with skeins of thread. Hmmm I thought now what??? which little bag????
She asked me some technical questions like how thick? what was I going to use it for? all of course which I had no idea of not being the eventual user of this item! SO then she said she really had no idea either it was her daughter who knew about all of this and we peered together at an equally Greek like chart with numbers and presumably sizes on. So we agreed we knew nothing and I would write back describing what I saw in the little bags to the lacemaker searching for this item and she would ask her daughter and I would return the next day. THe whole interchange was quite comical!
     In a few days I returned with the decision, the finest and the whitest now that was reasonably simple or so I thought, the finest was not available as some other lacemaker a few months  ago had bought every skein of the finest they had had! You have to remember that this thread is no longer made so it is not exactly like a reorder is possible! Then of course white is relative ( it all looked off white to me... ) But what they had they had and this was it so I bought the whitest and the finest of what they had. Now mind you this is not the cheapest stuff so how much to spend when you are spending someone else's money.... even as a nun one does want to be responsible but again it is not like I can come back next week and get my friend the lacemaker more. So I decided on two skeins oh yes she had said skeins so again the mother and I mused over what exactly constituted a skein since this thread comes in packages and is sort of tied together with little read threads. and again the decision amounts  to spending $3.00 or $33.00 dollars depending on one's  definition of skein. So the mother and I had quite a time analyzing this problem and at last I decided on what seemed to us at least a reasonable amount not knowing what she was making or how much she wanted to spend!
  Suffice it to say the skeins were safely tucked into my suitcase ( thread is light Thank God ) and  are actually sitting beside me ready for mail. I must admit I have a desire to see these threads in the finished lace product! I think I will ask..

More adventures tomorrow
SrMadeleine

Hello All

I am home but for whatever reason  my Kindle would not allow me to post even here so I am now at my trusty convent computer and there is so much more to tell about my trip to Brugge and Laceland! God Bless Patty for her yeoman's duty in posting as much as I could send her. All my posts and emailing were from the trusty 'Fast Food Joint' run by a busy, energetic and I might add quite gorgeous Scandanavian. Nuns had not been  in her scope but she came to be quite friendly and fascinatedas I frequented her cafe.
So on to Kantcentrum..... I have pictures snuggled in a residential sector of Brugge beside a Crusades era church it held two classes each morning and then demonstrations meaning anyone nearby could come and work on their lace and there was a monitor who would help you. I think you had to pay for this but I do not know. Tourists then or at least a few who wandered far enough from the center of Brugge to visit the Lace Museum attached  to Kancentrum could then see the real thing happening Hee Hee we were the real thing! I loved it! There were 15 in my class 6 Belgians, 2 Dutch, 2 French, 1 Chinese from Hong Kong and 1 Japanese who lived in Germany and 1 American nun.The reference was always 'oh you are from America' no separation of Canada Mexico or Brazil! So as you can see I was the only native English speaker. Chantal the teacher spoke several languages which buzzed around me no chance to learn by listening to others.... I could not understand anything!
I was almost in tears the second day as I had the least experience of  the group with 4 years in at lacemaking.But I persevered valiantly trying to figure out what she was talking about with the word junction. Sometimes the words she used I did not even get in English! Oh well miraculously after 2 or 3 nights of carting my pillow home to my cell at the convent guesthouse and working diligently I had a basic Flanders and felt again a part of the group which was much like us at Sacred Hearts laughing, struggling eating lunch together and at last day pictures and ice cream crepes at the local cafe by the canal and a nostalgic good bye until next year as of course one does not really learn enough in one year! Hmmm we shall see.

The museum with old laces was exquisite there are no other words and a little shop around the alleyway that claimed you could purchase old laces and receive a certificate of authenticity needless to say I did not go in but... it looked interesting. There was also a Folk museum nearby which I did go to having a display of the lace making diorama like from the 17th and 18th century. These were fairly common in different place as Lace making was such a part of the women's and sisters' history of this area.

Another post tomorrow. Happy Labor Day
Sr Madeleine

As in all organizations, we have change.  Today, our last day of the fiscal year, it is also the changing of the guard in your officers.  We are all intertwined and we make the fabric of NELG.

I'm finishing making my arrangements to be in England to attend the National Christmas Lacemaker's Fair  this December 1st.  I have heard of it, saw some pictures from the past event that piqued my interest. So across the pond I shall go. 

I'll have the opportunity to visit with our very own Jill - she and her husband, Bob are getting settled in to their new digs.

At this event, there will be an exhibition presented by The National Needlework Archive called 'Archives and ArteFacts'.  It should prove to be interesting as they cover all types of fiber arts.  

If you are going to be in England - let me know and we can have a spot of tea!

I thought I would post along some amazing links that I just saw in the Lace Digest I got from Arachne.  All links are current,  so much lace to see.  Most of the sites linked below are in French or Dutch.  Be wild and click on the links, great surprises exist all over these sites.  You may have the translate widget installed on your browser so these sites do translate to English quite well.  If not, the picutres are really fun, great ideas, inspiring,  viva la lace!  ......... so here they are.

World Congress of Lace - 2-13 July 2012 - Caen France

World Congress of Lace - continues

Passion-dentelle.over-blog.com

Les Dentelles de Sophie

Lace-attidude.over-blog.com

The Passions of Josidentelle

Lace and Cats  .... les chats

Kantklossen