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2025 Fall Retreat Classes

Stitching Girls Society   founding group held the first ever Fall Sewing Retreat with classes at Camp Burton on Vashon Island in 1985.  Our unique, personalized, hands-on classes have been a hallmark of our organization's purpose ever since.  Over the years our experienced teachers have been both locally and nationally known sewing experts as well as friends-teaching-friends, all of whom are passionate about sharing their knowledge and love of sewing.

We are offering three One Day Classes at the 2025 Fall Retreat for an additional $20 fee each.
Featherweight Machine Maintenance
Mini Mosaic Quilt
French Braid Quilted Sweatshirt Jacket

See Also About - Our Founder, Lorraine Kimmel
and her daughter, our former  Executive Director and President, Penny Kimmel  who succeeded her.
Since their passing, our Retreats and Programs are planned and implemented by Member volunteers.

Featherweight Machine Maintenance


Featherweight Sewing Machine
Featherweight Maintenance


Featherweight Machine Maintenance
One Day Class

Because so many people at previous retreats asked Kristina for help with their machines, especially Featherweights, often saying they were about to send them in for service, Kristina would say: “Ohh why??? Its so easy to maintain yourself.” So, she offered to teach a one day class and this is your lucky Retreat. Sign up now. She will send you a Supply List closer to the retreat.

Kristina Leslie
Kristina Leslie

by Kristina Leslie

Kristina has been sewing since she was little. She is a graduate of the Seattle Community College Apparel Design program and an experienced seamstress from the Cicada Custom Bridal Shop in Seattle. She first came to a Stitching Girls retreat in 2008 and has been coming ever since. She loves sewing everything and also loves the mechanics of machines. She repairs most of her own and will share her many secrets with you.

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Mini Mosaic Quilt

Mini Mosaic Quilts
Mini Mosaic Quilts

Mini Mosaic Quilt
One Day Class

Kit Fee $12

If you love to create while on the road or are looking for a small quilting project, this fun to create Mini Mosaic Quilt is for you. This project has two parts to complete. Part One is handwork, small enough to fit into a travel bag. Part Two is finishing your quilt on the sewing machine. Think of it like a jigsaw puzzle with fabric. Laurie will help you prepare your tiny 3/8” square pieces. Don’t be intimidated - she will give you lots of pointers.

A $12 kit purchased in class from Laurie includes your chosen pattern and materials not found in a sewing room. Laurie asks that each person bring batik fabric scraps from their stash for all to share. She will bring a bunch of her own scraps and send you a supply list prior to class.  Choose your pattern from her list. Those pictured here are only two of the possibilities.

Kaurie Wilkey
Laurie Wilkey

by Laurie Wilkey

Laurie Wilkey went to design school in Florida after high school in Connecticut and pursued a short career in fashion before joining the Navy, getting married, having an information systems career with her local school district, and raising 4 children. While becoming a retired grandmother of 8 she decided it was time to update her sewing skills. She joined the American Sewing Guild and Kitsap-Olympic Peninsula Clothing and Textile Advisors, volunteers with Project Linus and the Poulsbo Historical Society, and has been a Stitching Girls member since 2018. A self-learner, she will try any type of sewing but gravitates toward improv quilting and quilting projects off the beaten path. She likes to quilt by hand and always has a project in the hoop.

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French Braid Quilted Sweatshirt Jacket


French Braid Quilted Sweatshirt Jackets
French Braid Quilted Sweatshirt Jackets


French Braid Quilted Sweatshirt Jacket
One Day Class

This very comfortable simple jacket is made by cutting an overlarge sweatshirt into jacket pieces, then quilting on your own premade French "braids" before reassembling the jacket and binding the raw edges.

Penny will provide directions for constructing the braids prior to class from 2" strips of coordinating fabrics. Jelly rolls work great or you can choose your own assortment of fabrics. The class will concentrate on positioning your braids on the sweatshirt pieces. Penny will send you a supply list and instructions for taking measurements from a jacket that fits for sizing your sweatshirt pieces. You will refine your Sweatshirt Jacket fit during class. Penny has lots of tips for choosing and finishing your favorite neckline. Jackets can be left open or you can choose from a multiple of closure techniques. This is likely to become a project you’ll want to make again and again.

Penny Specht
Penny Specht

by Penny Specht

Penny Specht has have been sewing since her early teens, primarily garments through her student years, then children’s clothes after she had two. She got into quilting and long arming later in life and that became her passion for the past 30 or so years. She retired from full-time to part-time Registered Nurse work to have more sewing time but still support attending her many retreats. A Stitching Girls Society member since 2009, she has attended all but a couple of our retreats and has always treasured the friendships and sewing tips & tricks she picks up from them. She is also a member of Gig Harbor Quilters Guild where she has taught this class, a couple on Freezer Paper Piecing and one on Designing Your Own Kaleidoscope quilt using Ricky Tim's techniques. Her students describe her as fun, efficient and calm! She can meet your needs no matter what your level of sewing.

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Founder, Lorraine Kimmel

Lorraine Kimmel
(1920 to 2008)

Lorraine started the Vashon Island Sewing Retreat. Having a passion for sewing all her life and having owned the Plaza Fabrics store on Vashon Island, she became a founding board member of the Seattle Chapter of the American Sewing Guild. She talked the Sewing Guild into sponsoring a sewing retreat on Vashon Island, but before the first retreat in 1985, a change in the Guild's national policy caused the Seattle Chapter to disband. Lorraine kept the retreat alive by personally taking over the Retreat project. Shortly there after, Lorraine brought Camp Burton in as a co-sponsor. Over the years since then, many retreat instructors and attendees have pitched in to make the retreat the cooperative effort it is today.

Lorraine had a loving and friendly but firm way of managing this group of creative and independant individuals, so we soon came to affectionaly call her "Mother Superior." Gradually Lorraine handed the directorship duties over to her daughter Penny. Lorraine will be greatly missed, but never forgotten!

Lorraine had a flare for colors and styles, sewing her own clothes from an early age. Later, she concentrated on crafts, dolls and quilt projects, combining flashy new fabrics with the colorful stash left over from the closing of her fabric store, which she owned with her sister-in-law Sally. She was an active member of both the doll and quilting clubs on Vashon, plus part of a small group of island sewers who made hundreds of lap quilts for Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center patients. Her later years were filled with quilting projects for American Hero Quilts. She will always be known for her unusual soft sculptures which she sold on consignment and her colorful, individual sweatshirt jackets, that she wore everywhere.

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Former Exec. Dir. & Pres. Penny Kimmel

Penny Kimmel
(1950 to 2022)

Penny Kimmel was the Director of the Vashon Island Sewing Retreat, taking over from its founder, Lorraine Kimmel, her mother.  She had also been the first ever President and Executive Director of our sponsoring non-profit Stitching Girls Society which she helped found in 2009.

Penny attended the Sewing Retreats since 1988.  With her Apparel Design Program training from Seattle Central Community College, she had also been a well qualified instructor when needed.  She has taught sweatshirt appliqué, purses and bags, adaptable aprons, and then for several years she became the Retreat's polar fleece guru, known for the mounds of Polar Fleece scraps she always brought to classes.

Before attending the Apparel Design Program, Penny worked full time in television production.  She combined her 2 loves on a number of sewing videos for Jinni's Personal Patterns, Kathy Ruddy Live Guide Series, Unique Measuring video, Clotilde, and Creative Feet.  Her professional video abilities also made her the important Pen_y part of Pengy Productions with Peggy Grber, the Pe_gy part of Pengy.  Together they created this web site as well as the 20 year Retreat History DVD/Video and the 30 Years of Retreat History Video on YouTube.

In spring of 2021, Penny had to step down from all of those happy activities to focus on her personal health issues.  She put up a valiant fight for her life, but lost the final battle on April 20, 2022.  We miss them both terribly, but their memories live on every time the Stitching Girls get together.  See Remembering Penny Kimmel where we have shared many memories of our years of sewing and retreating under her leadership.

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