TOLEDO – The Needle Arts Guild of Toledo will hold its 36th Annual Needlework Show at the Sanger Branch
of the Toledo-Lucas County Public Library, 3030 W. Central Ave., this Friday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., and
Saturday, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.
The event is free and open to the public. It is expected to have over 100 needlework pieces on display
and guild members will be on hand to answer questions and explain the many types needlework.
The show features a variety of hand-held, threaded needlework and beading projects created by local and
regional needleworkers. These include needlepoint, counted cross stitch, and other embroidery and
beadwork techniques. Guild members will demonstrate various needlework techniques throughout the two
days.
The guild will be offering a class on Saturday. Beth Thompson, a dual member from Erie, Pa., will be
teaching Jane Ellen Balzuweit’s Casalguidi Altoid box. The class is $12 and will be from noon until 3
p.m. The class project can be viewed on the website. Contact the show chairman to sign up for this
class.
Entries can be made online by going to http://www.needle-arts-toledo.org/showinfo.htm.
Direct questions to show chairman Nancy Wright of Grand Rapids at (419) 832-3801 (home) or 419-266-7619
(cell) or email: [email protected] or to the registrar, Susan Pellitieri, at (419) 382-1329.
The Needle Arts Guild of Toledo is devoted to learning, to preserving and to educating others about all
forms of needlework that is done using a threaded needle. The organization is celebrating its 37th
anniversary this year.
Guild members meet on the second Wednesday of each month at 6:30 p.m. at the Maumee Senior Center, 2430
S. Detroit Ave. It is a chapter of the Embroiderers’ Guild of America, Inc.
The local chapter currently has more than 45 members who come from Tecumseh, Mich. in the north down to
Findlay in the south, and from Bellevue in the east to Defiance in the west. Their ages are as varied as
the addresses.
The guild’s Outreach Project for this year is making bookmarks for literacy programs.
There is more to the art of stitchery than counted cross stitch and embroidery. Members learn the
difference between drawn work and pulled work; blackwork and stumpwork; hardanger and cutwork; quilting
and beading. Group correspondence courses are undertaken. Master craftsman programs are done on an
individual basis.
Education is an important part of the guild, Wright notes. The EGA presents ‘The Gold Thread’ award for
excellence in education to a member of each of its 13 regions. For the last three out of four years, a
member of the Needle Arts Guild of Toledo has won that national award for the Great Lakes Region, which
is comprised of 60 guilds in five states.
