Dear Kay,
Straight up, I am not comfortable writing on your day. It just feels wrong. I don’t have a dog photo. I don’t know any good British teledramas (except Broadchurch, which has only two seasons to watch, not 30 like Eastenders). I don’t have a four-acre garter stitch blanket on the go. Despite the fact that people regularly call me Kay and you Ann, I have to face into the fact that we are separate people, for pity’s sake. I can’t channel your thing, whatever it is. (Your thing does involve a lot of parenthetical comments.) (And double spaces after a sentence ends.) (And #hashtags.)
After all these years, I really don’t know what you’re going to write next. There are times when it is deeply surprising, to the point that WHAM, out of the blue you’re rattling on about some Missoni fashion show somewhere.
There are, however, Kay topics that recur like the return of the goddang bird outside my window here in Monteagle that does this grace-note song at 4:49 am every goddang morning. (He waits ten months for me to open that window so he can sock it to me on the first morning I’m here. Fweeoo. Fweeoo. Fweeoo fweeoofweeoofweeoo. I just want to pinch that little beak shut.)
As predictable as the fweeoo bird, a classic evergreen Kay topic is Natalie Chanin and her appliqué empire, Alabama Chanin. In honor of your absence, I hereby present an Alabama Chanin reverie.
I’m back on the cotton jersey bandwagon, this time with a swing skirt that features a stencil called June’s Spring.
When I glimpsed a swatch of this pattern at a Craft South trunk show last fall, I was a goner.
It was encrusted with beads and appliqué and embroidery. Madness. I ordered a swing skirt kit, stowed it away for the right moment, and cracked it open to celebrate the arrival of summer (and yet another long-haul project). (Which I’ll argue I really need.)
My strategy is to do this thing in layers. Get the bubbles stitched and cut on all four panels, make it a skirt, then add more to it as time allows. In years to come, I’ll get on a phone call, pick up the hem of my skirt, and add more junk to it. It’ll keep growing excrescences over time. Like barnacles.
YES! That’s what these bubbles remind me of: barnacles.
I still don’t know why this is so addicting. It just is.
(Hurry back.) #needahashtag
Love,
Ann
Valiant, lionhearted, mettlesome, and doughty! Can’t wait (but understand I will wait) to see that skirt swing! xoc
Your stitches are so even. I’m so impressed by that. So, let me get this straight. Are you starting with two layers of fabric that you are stitching together as you go?
Barnacles- perfect word.
Barnacles?? On a skirt??!? Have the arbiters of good taste — the cats — approved this??
(P.S.: Great party! Got any more bean dip?)
When I sew on what I’m wearing, it is usually a button, hem or those little metal jobbers that that provide extra hold on the waistband. I did get to see some Alabama Chanin in progress in person at TNNA. Very cool.
From one reader’s perspective, it’s not so bad to read “Ann” on a “Kay” day. Back in the day, the random style of posting was pleasing and exciting on several levels. Your Alabama Chanin is so nice. I remember some of your projects from not so long ago. I wouldn’t mind seeing those pics again (or updated ones, if possible). Your work is so beautiful, such neat and even stitches.
Ann, hope you’re having fun with your barnacle bubbles.
FweeooFweeooDiane
I, too, am a firm believer in the parenthetical and the “retro” use of two spaces after a period. Lovely skirt, wish Imakes me want to pick up this craft! #notoldfshionedbecauseproperspacingisalwaysinfashion
Alabama Chanin sewing is soooo addicting! I love what you are doing. Did you cut your own stencil, brave lady?
Never heard of this – wow! Thanks for a new thing to explore.
I never noticed that Thursday is a “Kay Day.” ™ I just look forward to, and read every morning.
And lovely to discover that there are others that out two spaces after a period. That skirt will always be beautiful, at whatever stage of its creative life it is
that “type out” – sometime I hate hate hate auto correct. I should also never type without a real keyboard.
Two spaces after a period is what I was taught in “Personal Typing” class when I was in high school. Apparently. In. The. Dark. Ages. ‘Nuf said. 🙂
#beadedbarnaclesforever
I’ve come back three times to see your project. I’m completely enamored of the pattern, the bubble/barnacles and beads. Your idea of a skirt as a living piece of art is genius!
Love the Alabama Chanin skirt. I wish I could sew well. You and Kay got me very excited about the Alabama Chanin line. I kept trying to get to her studio while on travel in Huntsville but the only opportunity kept falling on Sundays when she is closed. Next time…
Fweeoo. Fweeoo. Fweeoo: Pheobe? My husband is more colorful about what he wants to do to the one that wakes us up every morning before dawn …
or maybe a less srident relative of the Phoebe, the Eastern Wood Peewee?
I love the colors you have picked for your skirt. And the idea of a work in progress while you wear it is wonderful. You can say it is finished and wear (such a good feeling) but still have the fun of adding on. You may have inspired me to dust off all those AC books I bought and start stitching. I guess as long as the layers are stitched together close enough to keep things from shifting, it should work.
GORGEOUS!! I always think of my Alabama Chanin/hand-sewn projects and works-in-progress. I stitched it up, I can un-stitch it, re-work it, add/subtract whenever I want! They’re fluid… like me.
Two spaces = typewriter. One single space = typesetting. Before personal computers, when a typesetter got typewritten manuscript and re-input (or ingested) it into an electronic typesetting system, the extra spaces were auto-deleted. BECAUSE the fonts were calibrated to account for that and it looked normal when it appeared in final form (like a newspaper or magazine or book). Then came “desktop publishing” and the two things got all mixed up. Ask me how I know.
Yes! It’s all about the calibration. It’s the typographic equivalent of a dropped stitch. Also, please tell us how you know, I’m listening. (gets popcorn)
I almost forgot to say: I love the idea of Ongoing Embellishment!
The skirt is exquisite. Would love more details about how it was initially and what you have done so far. You are doing fine without Kay! Of course we miss her but know that we are all here patting your shoulder and saying, “Great job, keep up the good work!”
Such a funny, lovely post. And that skirt! So fabulous!!! I really want to make an AC project. Sigh….it is on my ever longer list.
Your Kay Day post is just fine Ann. In fact it has me thinking that I should do something with that Alabama chanin yardage that I bought for a project I never did three years or so ago. I have that stencil. I have the books. I am so in love with that swatch of beads and reverse applique. Love sick I tell you. Mooning.
But first I am finishing a birthday sweater. One sleeve and some button bands by Saturday. It could happen.
We have cardinals at five am. They scream for each other in the early hours and also at dusk. I wonder what they are saying. Mating calls? Here I am? Can you pick up some nuts on your way home?
I am inspired to work “excrescences” into conversation today. 😉 LOVE the skirt, too.
Did no one else google “excrescences”? Is that just a word that floats in most vocabularies? Because I love it. And I too cannot wait to work it into a conversation.
Totally had to Google it. Glad I wasn’t the only one!
#barnacles #barnaclelove
Is this your birdie?
https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Red-eyed_Vireo/id
Maybe take a recording and post it, we can figure it out for you!
Ann, you get an A+ on your parenthesis, hashtags, skirt stitching and vocabulary, all very top notch! I’m still with Kay on the two spaces after a period, I just think it looks better.
Be sure to leave plenty of time for cleanup after the party and have fun while Kay is away!!
I blame y’all for my Alabama Chanin addiction. I took a class with Natalie and Anna Maria Horner and it was almost too much awesomeness to bear. Beautiful skirt, and I absolutely love that stencil.
So Cheryl, or Ann (or whomever is familiar with AC projects), it seems you need one of the books, as well as a kit, is that correct? And if so, which one of the books do you recommend?
Kay also sent me down the rabbit hole. I’m still working on the t-shirt. AVFKW set me up with all the necessities, including the best book: Alabama Studio Sewing + Design. The other books are nice, too, but that one goes over the basics in quite a bit of detail. Remember: love your thread!!
Many thanks for the recommendation!
Excellent stitching. Excellent posting in the odd day void. Excellent use of parentheses (I mean, really, excellent).
PS. Didn’t know Broadchurch has a 2nd season. I hope it’s on Netflix!
“It’ll keep growing excrescences over time. Like barnacles.” Thanks for the laugh!
They are filming season three of Broadchurch right now. Yay! But it is the last one. Boo! (Also from a parenthetical, two spaces after the period, kinda gal. No hashtags yet though.)
You’re doing a great job, Kay-Ann, or whatever your name is! ; ) I LOVE the barnacle skirt, both as a concept and a slow-growing project. (Oh, and it’s a great design!) I think it’s great that you’ve embraced the fanciness of “beads, applique and embroidery,” but in subdued, Ann-like colors. I look forward to periodic updates on it.
My mom is 85, and she belongs to several clubs for senior citizens. At one of them, they did discharge dyeing on dark colored t-shirts with sponge stamps and the gel you use in the dishwasher that has bleach in it. We played around with it at home, but I can’t remember the whole process. Seeing all of this Alabama Chanin is making me want to at least try a few zipper pouches—your skirt is gorgeous.
Whaaaat??? This sounds like loads of fun! Your mom hangs with the cool kids, doesn’t she?
I didn’t know that two spaces after a period was no longer standard. Where have I been?
Sorry – replied to wrong msg …
Veery? A different thrush – not as watery as a wood thrush, but has the double tone descending thing.
https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Veery/id
Great to see a before/after type picture of one of these kits…I’ve wondered what the “before” looks like. And I think you’ve got a fine idea for barnacles, too. Sure beats scraping them off a hull, I betcha!
This is a funny coincidence (I think): this morning I happened to notice the moment when the first birds began calling to each other, and (very appropriately) tweeted it: 4:40AM. Obviously not the Fweeoo Bird, unless they have that Yankee Work Ethic that makes them start earlier than the Fweeoo Birds of the Less Northern Regions.
I admire your ability to phonetically reproduce a bird call, I really do. My best attempt is always something like, “That one that sounds like a little waterfall running over a rock, you know, fluid-sounding, but in two descending tones. Simultaneously.”
So far, no one has ever identified a bird from one of my descriptions. I’ll bet your blog-readers will have ID’d the Fweeoo Bird by nightfall!
Veery? A different thrush – not as watery as a wood thrush, but has the double tone descending thing.
https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Veery/id
Fluid descending waterfall – sounds like a wood thrush or hermit thrush, I can never remember which. They are both so beautiful, especially in the evenings.
So interesting that you mention barnacles today. I’ve been reading The Highest Tide, a YA novel by Jim Lynch. It’s about this genius kid who lives by Puget Sound and is obsessed with sea life. Apparently barnacles mate in a really unusual way, which I hesitate to describe here. At any rate, I’ve been thinking about barnacles and other under-appreciated sea life today. I like it when things align.
Your skirt to be is epic!
Wonderful skirt, also excellent use of ###, ((())), and . This ̶p̶a̶r̶t̶y̶ not-party is fun…I’m gonna go make some guacamole to go with the margaritas. Sorry about the couch.
If you two ever end up in the same rest home, please let us know so I can sign up for the same one.
I love the idea of you working on this bit by bit, over years. And I can SO see this idea evolving into an amazing quilt. With denim. And bubbles and beads….oh my. Is the bird perhaps a phoebe? We used to have a whippoorwill that sat under the cottage window and “sang”. All night. We threw flip flips out the window, but all that it did was move slightly further back, and continue it’s call. As Randy Travis said, “longer than the call of the whippoorwill” (that spelling looks off, but my auto correct says it isn’t).
I’m just wondering why Thursday was Kay’s day. Did I miss something?
The photos of the skirt stirred a memory of a craft I’ve been wanting to try: Sashiko. Have you hear of Sashiko? It is a traditional Japanese embroidery technique first developed to repair clothing. It is traditionally done with white/cream thread on indigo dyed cotton. I think it would right up the mason dixon ladies alley! Purl Soho sells supplies. I’m off to order by first square.
I’ve just requesting 7 books on Sashiko from the Cincinnati Library-who knew a library could have so many?
That is so fantastic. Let us know how it goes!