I heard about The Jingle Ball last year but also very confused on how you roll out a whole stitching retreat online. But people raved how fun it was so I decided to take the plunge. This year the Jingle Ball was December 5th thru the 7th. The beauty of Covid is that it created new ways to meet people that was never an option before. So this is a new exciting way people can gather, stitch and learn. The cost to join the Jingle Ball was only $15 but if you signed up for a class it costs more and of course if you bought items at the shopping booth it costs even more. Bet your bottom dollar I spent a small fortune on patterns.

I decided to take one class with the kit. I went with Primrose Gardens stitching mesh bag.

I figured this would be a good introduction to the whole online retreat process. I am a huge fan of Primrose Gardens and their designs. Easy and so darn cute. The class/kit was expensive but it never hurts to have a good stitching project bag in my stash. All the ladies from Primrose cottage came to the retreat. It was their first jingle ball too. When you take a class you have 30 days to watch the classroom video. It is helpful if you want to rewatch a part of the lesson.

Yes I started the project bag, no I did not finish (yet). Stitching inside a bag is a bit more awkward than I thought. Sometimes my hands don’t work that good (arthritis) and it was not going well. I will finish, but not today.

Besides the classes there are stitching rooms you can join, entertainment videos to watch, speed dating, classes, meet and greets, and shopping. I was a little apprehensive about how you do speed dating but it was very easy.

The ladies I chatted with were very friendly and it was fun. I sure we would have been friends if we met in person. The furthest away was a lady from Australia. Most were in the States. The nice thing about the Jingle Ball is that it was open internationally and was 24 hours a day.

I did a lot of the meet and greets, tried the speed dating and watched most of the videos. I did enter a stitching room but it was not my cup of tea. It works great if you go with a friend so you can chat and share.

It was from Friday to Sunday with lots to do. I mostly watched and stitched during the meet and greets. So I got a lot of stitching done. One of my favorite sessions was a man who collected vintage LPs from the 1940-1950’s. His Christmas music was great. I asked him for the playlist so I can create a Spotify list. Love those old Christmas songs.

I excelled at shopping. Most of the booths had freebie patterns only available at the Jingle Ball. A nice gift from the teachers. Speaking of the teachers, there were 12 teachers from the different companies. As I mentioned I took a class from Primrose Cottage.

Steph from Lindy’s Stitches is the creator/hostess of the Jingle Ball. So many great companies like Primrose Garden, Hands on Design, Tiny Modernist, Teresa Kogut participated. I love these designers.

Every year they do an ornament book and the patterns are exclusive for a year. I was thrilled that the book was a PDF since I don’t need another book in my house. They also had last years book. Yes I added it to my cart.

There are many cute designs. The 2024 Santa from Teresa Kogut was just released and I have seen a lot of people do his jolly face. Each of the designers had a shop with exclusive jingle ball releases. I have seen a lot of people on Facebook asking where to get the patterns. Sorry you need to wait a year since you did not go to the ball.

Here are the patterns I got from Primrose Garden. I am hoping to start Winter Rules next.

The Winter Forest Ornaments was a 5 part mystery series that was exclusive to Jingle Ball. I finally got all 5 patterns (one a week). Tiny Modernist rolls out a lot of mystery multi part stitches. I never seem to know about it on time, so I was thrilled to grab this exclusive one from her shop.

Of course I bought from other designers.

Some I already have kitted up and ready to stitch others I am holding onto and will kit later.

Overall I really enjoyed the Jingle Ball and will probably do it again. They do have a harvest one and a spring one but I think the Christmas one is the big event. Maybe next year I can talk my sister into to joining.

Thanks for checking out my blog.

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