The Hat Junkie

Looking Backwards, Looking Forwards

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Yes, I knit this beautiful Skymning shawl by Sophia Kammeborn

And just like that, it’s over. I blinked and summer went away. I’m not sure that I swam enough or spent enough time in the garden, but I gave it my best shot.

The older I get, the more I am aware that sometimes you just gotta hang up the closed sign and go for coffee with your husband at the Point General Store in Blue rocks, because life doesn’t wait for anyone.

If you live remotely close or plan to visit then you really need to make Blue Rocks a destination. Tony and I even went on a kayak tour. Would you believe I had never been on a kayak? For shame! Paddling around Blue Rocks is a bit like paddling into prehistoric times. I highly recommend this mode of time travel.

The view from The Point General store in Blue Rocks, Nova Scotia
A picnic at The Annapolis Basin Conference Centre

Mostly we stuck around the Lunenburg area, but our son Dustin, who has been bit by the the theatre bug, spent two weeks at a musical theatre camp outside of Annapolis Royal. To be honest, two weeks without adolescent (and he’s actually an easy one) is on par with any tropical vacation. The most relaxing aspect of theses two weeks was how easy it was to keep the fridge stocked. Seriously, I can hardly remember a time when a freshly baked batch of granola lasted more than a few hours.

When it was time to retrieve our young and extremely tall food inhaler, our dear friend , the beyond talented, extremely generous and adorable Cynthia Myers asked if she could tag along to watch the closing show.

Cynthia is Dustin’s theatre teacher, a talented actor, musician and playwright. She’s every parent’s dream. That educator that truly cares about each kid as though they were her own. I can’t tell you how many times we say, “Thank Heavens for Cynthia”. If your child has the slightest interest in acting and you live on the south shore of Nova Scotia then sign ’em up quick! Click here

So, “tag along” she did and she just happened to bring along this little picnic. You know, the kind where you have a cooler and a beautiful picnic basket with enamel ware and then you pull out the homemade chicken and 3 kinds of salads and a homemade pie and a bottle of wine and a thermos of coffee…

Hand Felted Merino Wool Cloche

I’ll share some more backward glances at summer later, but I don’t want you to think that I am anything less than ecstatic at the prospect of autumn. I love autumn! Give me crisp, cool mornings, oranges, reds, brown and yellows with sparkly skies for 200 days of the year, please.

In hat land what I currently most love making are my hand felted hats. I know that in the name of feeding that tall child I need to also make my best seller hats, but these ones are my babies. My plan is to create a separate online shop for my one of a kind creations. I’ll, of course, keep you posted, but feel free to enquire if the hat is calling your name.

Hand Felted Merino wool dangling flower cloche

This is the sister hat. Wait, I have to show you the top…

Pretty cute, eh? I do love a classic hat, but I also love a slightly askew version of a classic hat. You know, like an elegant 1920s style cloche with a flower growing out of the top. Just a wee bit nutty.

hand woven cloche

I am also trying to make more of my Maisie hats. These are made from fabric that was woven for me by Marrie of Double Whale Handwoven, here in Lunenburg. She, unfortunately, won’t be weaving me any more fabric because she said it took too many beers for her to get through weaving so many metres of these tightly woven fabrics. I get it, I really do, but I am heartbroken. The fabrics are just so beautiful. I still have a good amount of several colours, but once they are gone they are gone.

This beautiful lady walked into my studio and walked away with this orange version. Actually, I own the same one. Orange lovers unite! (Dyslexics of the world untie!) Sorry, that just popped into my head.

Handwoven wool cloche

But if I could own another one (no, I can’t take them all) it would be this one. Aren’t those greens beautiful? And the sweater…Did you notice the sweater???

I designed this! Really, I did. How crazy is that? Next month will be my two year kniteversary. I’m sorry to brag, but I’m proud of myself. I have gone through my whole life believing that I am completely hopeless at math, but turns out that I just needed to put it all into the context of knitting. Who knew? Designing is really not rocket science. I could show you. It’s very basic math and just deciding what stitch patterns you want to put together. O.K. I’m simplifying it a little bit, but it’s just like anything else, it seems impossible until you take the first step. I won’t be writing out the pattern anytime soon because I learned that pattern writing is really time consuming, but I am working on writing out some other, simpler designs.

I actually planned to quit trying to write out patterns because of time and because it’s hard to get a pattern seen. But I have since come to the conclusion that it’s good for my chaotic mind to go through the exercise of writing these things down even without financial gain. I’m not, by nature, a writer downer. By nature I am a keep everything stored in some remote crevice of my brain kind of person. If, in time, I figure out a way to sell some patterns, that will be a bonus.

Speaking of writing things down…I am currently reading Bird by Bird, by Anne Lamott. My friend Devorah came for a visit and gave me this book. Like everything that Anne Lamott writes, it’s wonderful. The timing of receiving this book was also pretty perfect.

One of my reasons for quitting social media was because I felt like every paragraph I wrote on Facebook took me one step further away from writing a book. Writing is just one more of those things that I enjoy doing, but don’t do enough of. ( It’s hanging out with my gardening, dancing, hiking, biking, swimming and cooking.)

Facebook, for me, was a quick and easy way to tell stories. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but I felt like the constant sharing of anecdotes was taking away my motivation to write my thoughts out in long form. Not sure I’ll get that book written, but this book is pretty inspirational.

She talks about how when her brother was a child he had a book report to write on birds. He had, before him, encyclopedias and library books on many different birds and he was freaking out at the enormity of the task before him. His father said, take it one bird at a time, son. One bird at a time. Seems like advice that can be applied to most things in life.

I will leave you with one last little tale and then a few more summer photos.

This is Brian Davis. He bought this hat from me. He is my neighbour and friend and I love him. Less than two years ago he could be seen running the streets of Lunenburg. Brian has ALS. Brian is dying. I know that’s not the most tactful way of putting it, but I think it’s the most appropriate.

You see, Brian is dying the same way he has lived, with passion and curiosity, intensity and openness. He wheels up to my door regularly and shares his excitement for having been approved as an organ donor and shares his excitement for his green burial and the wonders of his wheel chair and he tells me how much he loves every last little thing he is still able to do and how he is grateful for the wonderful life he has had. He’s not pretending that he’s not dying. He tried every treatment out there and he felt they helped, but he knows that he has to go. Death is his final adventure and he’s living every moment of it. Of course I want him to stay, but he is leaving me and anyone else who is close to him with the most incredible gift. He is sharing his courage with us.

I apologize if I choked you up there. Here are a few more summer customer photos. Thanks for spending some time with me.

nemesis socks by Ambrose Smithhttps://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/nemesis-socks-2

Hats for sunny days.

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My girl/boy next door hat can be purchased HERE.

I told myself I would write a new blog post when the Lupins were in bloom. Well, the Lupins are just on their way out, but better late than never. (Not to worry. I did get a pretty photo.)

Before we get to pretty flowers we need to talk about this hat. Currently, this is my favourite hat. You can be sure there will be another favourite in a couple of weeks, but this is it right now. I think of it as the girl/boy next door hat. It doesn’t flaunt its beauty. It’s easy to not notice it and instead turn your attention to the colourful bomb shell on the next hat rack over. But if you pay attention you might notice that it’s just a damn good hat. It has tons of sun protection. The ties keep it on your head in a breeze and wheat straw is so subtly beautiful that it really doesn’t need to be upstaged by flowers.

I actually made this hat for my brother-in-law, Chuck, who was visiting from Maine with my amazing sister-in-law, Amy.

He requested a hat for working outdoors that would really give him proper sun protection. Et Voilà! I was delighted to send him home with a hat, but also sad to not have the hat anymore. So, I made another one and then as soon as it was done I walked across the street to show my 84 year old neighbour, Margaret, and she bought it. I was delighted that she bought the hat, but also sad to not have it in my studio again. So, I made another one…and that’s where this story stays, for now.

Oh wait, I forgot I promised you Lupins.

Lupins on the Back Harbour Trail of Lunenburg, NS

Worth waiting for, don’t you think? We had a cold and wet spring/ early summer. I don’t generally do well in wet weather. It gets in my bones. But I developed Meteorological Stockholm syndrome. ( I made that up). It’s a phenomenon where you start to sympathise or even love your weather captor. The colours of rainy days are so complex and moody that I found myself mostly enjoying what everyone around me called miserable. I didn’t voice my feelings out loud because, is there anything more repulsive than a positive, cheery person when you are committed to gloom. But now that the sun has come out in spades I fee like it’s safe to confess that I really enjoyed that wet weather. Knitting helps, too.

Did someone say knitting?

I knit myself a dress. I kind of made it up as I went along. Here’s the back.

It took forever and a day, but I really enjoyed the process. As soon as it was done I headed down to The Mariner’s Daughter to show them. Faye kindly offered to take my photo, so that I can show you. The yarn is a Shetland yarn from Hawthorne Valley Farm in the Annapolis Valley. Tony took me to Gaspereau Valley Fibres on my birthday and that’s where I found it. The yarn is hard to come by because it’s from their flock of five Shetland sheep. These are the natural sheep shades. I also knit the sweater I’m holding in my hand, but I better get back to hats.

I finally got around to making this hat for Tiffany.

Tiffany’s wheat straw hat.

Isn’t she beautiful? Tiffany did some modelling for me a while back and I owed her a hat.

I have to tell you about the ribbon on this hat. I got an email from a lady who said that she had a whole pile of antique ribbon and she would be happy to give it to me if I could use it. I actually considered declining. ( I know, I know..) she had told me that it was over 100 years old and in my experience old textiles usually crumble. Luckily, Tony convinced me to take a look and it’s a good thing I’m married to that guy. There were spools and spools of the most beautiful ribbon that was perfectly preserved in acid free paper. All from France and Italy. It’s hard to actually use it, but I think it’s better to get it out there in the world than to spend the rest of its days on a shelf in my studio. My only criteria for using this ribbon is that the hat needs to be worthy of the ribbon. I make these straw braid hats on a straw braid sewing machine from the same era, so I consider them to be worthy.

My straw braid sewing machine is truly my prized possession. I see from scrolling back through my blog that I bought it 2 years ago. I am just now beginning to feel confident that I can form a hat without a complete melt down. This hat was the first two coloured straw hat that I made. Oh the possibilities! And did I mention that the pile of antique ribbon also came with vintage millinery flowers? That’s what you are looking at in the middle of the straw bows.

My Nellie Jane Hat is available HERE.

But as much as I love making my straw braid hats, I also love my hand blocked hats. In the case of the straw braid hats, I sew thin braided straw around and around and form the hat while I go. In the case of the straw above I start with a woven sack (It’s called a hood) and using steam and wooden hat blocks I shape the hat. It’s a simpler process and it allows me to have hats in different price ranges.

I was working on this one in my studio when a lovely lady came in, fell in love with it and commissioned me to make her this one…

Did I mention that I hand dye this fabric? It’s all organic cotton and hemp jersey. Although I am currently smitten with the simple hat at the top of this post, I concede that sometimes bling is the thing. Actually, on most days I walk around looking like a Christmas tree. I just love colour.

It’s been so long since I last wrote that I’m not done yet. Bear with me for one more photo.

Amanda’s hat

It was really rewarding to make this hat for Amanda. She has a very small head size. That’s not unusual, but people with small or large head sizes can rarely find hats to fit them. Amanda came by my studio and picked out the straw and the fabric. It’s extra special for me to make a hat for someone who has never had a properly fitting hat.

Well, that’s all for hat news right now. A quick word before I go about my absence from Facebook and Instagram. Although I miss many of the lovely interactions I had there, I feel I did the right thing. I needed to make my world a bit smaller. I am so happy to go back to slow communication. I spent much of my life writing letters to friends and when I began blogging it had that same slow communication feeling, just transferred to a key board. But when Facebook came along it slowly took away my need to write in full paragraphs. Updating my blog occasionally is better for me than small, frequent social media posts. But I do miss you guys and I really appreciate the comments. I don’t always make the comments public if they seem like they were meant to be private, but I read them all and they lift me up.

I also really appreciate people sharing my blog with friends. It helps me enormously.

I wish you all warm breezes, plenty of gardening time, lots of knitting and swimming in lakes. That’s my idea of perfection anyways.

Hope to see you soon.

Anna

A Hat Making Demonstration and Lots of Chatter

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Hello again, Thanks for tuning in. Last I left you, I was off to visit family in Toronto. Nothing like being air lifted out of your everyday reality to help one contemplate life. One little trip, so many conclusions. More on that later, but first I have a video for you. I thought you might like to join me in my studio for a hatting demonstration. I also threw in some lovely Lunenburg interludes. This town can make anyone feel like a professional photographer/ videographer. It’s just so darn colourful here.

This Thumbnail makes me look a psychopathic hat killer.

Hope you enjoyed that. If you’re still with me I’ll share some of my life altering revelations from my trip to Toronto. (I’m prone to exaggeration.)

View from the Art Gallery of Ontario

It was a real treat to have a few days of walking around the city by myself. I visited some friends, saw family and even took myself to the Art Gallery of Ontario. I grew up in Toronto, but I don’t think I have been to the AGO since I was a child. To be honest, I have never thought of myself as a real museum person. I have trouble taking anything in on demand or in large quantities. I love to sit in Cafés and stare at one picture for an hour.

But I heard so much about the renovations that were done and I’m older now, so I decided to give the museum thing another shot. So glad I did. There was an exhibition about the impressionist painters of Paris during the Industrial revolution. I was truly blown away. Looking at these paintings was like a religious experience. I’m not even going to try to explain it. It’s just amazing to witness such beauty.

One thing I did, being alone, was I took my time and only walked around around the one exhibit. When I got tired, I sat in the café and rested.

And then I went back to the same exhibit and took it all in again. This really worked for me.

Ack, I can’t find the name of the artist. Please fill me in.

When a long time customer, who is a plein air painter, asked me to make her a hat that she wouldn’t mind getting paint on, I figured the best solution was to pre splatter the hat for her. (Tony suggested that this could become a theme, where I make chef hats with food stains, mechanic hats with oil stains…)

Anyways, the colours in the above painting inspired the colours in this hat.

A pre splatted painting hat for Plein Air painters

Here’s another photo of Toronto for you, taken from my brother’s office.

Toronto from Above.

I think the above photo is what a lot of people think of when they think Toronto, but once you get down into the neighbourhoods it’s actually a very colourful city.

China Town, Toronto

O.K, Now for those Toronto induced life revelations. I’m a bit of a tangential person, so you need patience to hear the end of a sentence.

I visited a couple of fellow artisan friends. One was, Karyn of Lilliput hats. Karyn is an amazing milliner, but she’s also an inspiring business woman. It was humbling to see how hard she works, running a store, overseeing her assistants and also travelling across North America to do high end craft shows.

And then I visited my friend, Andrea, of Pomp and Ceremony. Andrea makes beautiful mens’ accessories from Liberty of London Fabric. I was also blown away by how hard she is working, doing the show circuit and making all those ties and pocket squares by herself.

Andrea gave me a bag of Liberty of London fabric scraps and they are slowly being turned into fascinators.

Both of these visits made me realize that I was a tad spoiled. I have been a bit whiny lately because my head is always full of new ideas and it’s hard to make myself go into production mode where I make best seller hats that I have been making for years. Creatively, I just want to go to the next thing, but financially I need to also make what people want.

You are probably not grieving for my little problem and you shouldn’t. My hardest days still entail working in my beautiful studio, taking breaks to go for walks and not needing to travel anywhere further than my local Post Office to sell my work. In short, I am blessed. I have a pretty sweet deal.

I also was keenly aware of how privileged I am to live in Nova Scotia. Not that we don’t have our problems here, but my day to day life is pretty amazing. I am surrounded by quiet, fresh air, space and beauty. A family doctor would be nice, but at least it’s easier to stay healthy here.

Lynda in her new hand felted plaid hat

I have beautiful customers, like Lynda, who come right to my studio to buy hats.

I’m knitting the Kidalton Cardigan by Kate Davies

At lunch I get to sit in my yard and knit.

Meerschaum socks in Felicia Knock’s yak sock yarn

And knit…….

Also Meerschaum socks in Mondim sock yarn.

And when I need a change of scenery I just walk down the street to The Mariner’s Daughter to inhale the colours and textures of all that beautiful yarn. I have a beautiful life.

So, thanks for joining me. I really appreciated the comments on my last blog. Sorry, I’m horrid at responding. I did respond in my mind, but it may not have reached you. Take Care and hope to see you soon. Anna

All Your Beautiful Faces

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Beautiful Mandy in a handdyed wheat straw braid hat.

Hello Everyone, I have missed you. As you may know, I took the radical step of deleting my social media accounts. Was it a month ago…two months ago? At first it felt very awkward. With twitching fingers, I kept picking up my phone, trying to find an app to open. There are only so many times you can check your email. It took about a week, but my fingers did eventually stop twitching and I even found myself forgetting to carry my phone from one room to the next.

I have gone back to listening to podcasts, audio books and the radio. Slowly, slowly, I am recovering my attention span. Knitting is still a major work distraction, but I’m not giving up my knitting needles. In fact, let it be known that I would like to be buried with knitting needles in my hands. I also won’t report that without social media I am all calm, cool and collected. I wasn’t calm, cool, and collected before social media was invented, so it wouldn’t stand to reason that I would be now. But I am happier and I am enjoying existing in only one reality.

With the absence of social media, I have finally found the time and the will to work on my website. I can’t tell you how many years I have been thinking about creating a page of customer photos. Well, I did it! I finally did it! You can find this page by clicking on “Collections” and then scrolling to “Hat Junkies” . Or just click HERE. It makes me so happy to look at all your beautiful faces. Over the years I have connected with so many women and even a few men who have purchased hats from me. I have been tipped with many a hug, both physical and virtual. Meeting my customers is the best part of my work. If you don’t find your face on this page please email me a photo. I promise to include you.

I have been very busy in the hat studio filling a Spring order for Beauchapeau Hat Shop in Niagara on the Lake, Ontario. One of these days I will get to this beautiful store in person.

I have also been playing with my antique straw braid sewing machine. You can see one of my latest creations on Mandy in the top photo. Mandy actually bought a different hat, but I was quite impressed with how beautiful she looked in this hat. I also made this pretty one…

Wheat straw braid hat with organic cotton and hemp band

I ordered a couple of yards of the striped organic cotton and hemp fabric, which makes up the band, just to see if I liked it. I do! There will be more. this particular hat is a large size (23.5 or 24″”) So, if she is calling to you and the hat fits, let me know.

And then, of course, there is my knitting. One of the things I do while hand sewing flowers is watch knitting videos. I am a huge fan of Bluprint (formerly Craftsy) It’s a paid subscription, but so worth it. It is full of online courses in knitting, crochet, sewing, cooking, calligraphy. Basically, anything that matters. Well, I was watching this course in shawl design and I learned that you don’t need to be a rocket scientist to design a shawl. Shawls are basically a template and then you fill in the template with the stitches that you want. I seriously thought that you needed to have an advanced Mathematics degree to understand pattern design. But this truly mathematically challenged human has designed a shawl. Here it is! Wrinkles and all…

I made this using Mungo by Rosa Pomar, purchased at The Mariner’s Daughter in Lunenburg.
In other news, I am very temporarily leaving this beautiful place…
My beautiful Lunenburg, NS

And heading to Toronto to visit my family. I had to make myself a new “city hat”.

My new hat. Fabric woven in Lunenburg by Double Whale Handwoven Designs


I explained to Tony that I needed to make a new hat because I wanted to look like a tough city chick while in Toronto. I didn’t want to look like a country girl frolicking through the daisies. He laughed and assured me that I still look like a country girl frolicking through the daisies. Oh well, I should probably just own it.

It’s been a pleasure chatting with you. I love your comments, so send them along. Love, Anna

My State of the Art Marketing Technology

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Snowy Lunenburg

Last night I wrote this very long winded post explaining why I deleted my social media accounts. When I reached the end I looked at it and thought, this might be the most boring thing I have ever written. There are so many interesting things happening in Canadian news right now and somehow, The Hat Junkie Deletes Her Social Media Accounts just doesn’t compare. So, I deleted it and with the rising of this morning’s sun I am writing a new post.

As I explained in the previous paragraph, focusing this blog post on what lead me to make this decision would just put you all to sleep, but I will lead you (at this end of this post) to the interview on CBC that started it all. The interview lead me to the book and after that there was no turning back.

What I will talk about though, is my new Facebook/ Instagram free marketing strategy. It’s really quite revolutionary. I got the idea from walking into The Mariner’s Daughter, our local yarn shop here in Lunenburg. My excuse for going there was that I needed a skein of yarn to complete my latest sweater, but really it’s because I sometimes just need to stare at all the colours on the shelves and I really like the owners.

After inhaling all the yarn I noticed this strange looking device on their counter. It’s called a clip board.

There was a piece of paper attached to it that said, Mailing List. Hannah explained to me how this innovation works. Apparently, customers pick up a pen (no batteries required) and if they would like to be notified of shop updates they simply write their email addresses on the piece of paper.

Slack jawed, I considered this new technology for a few minutes. So, let me get this straight, I said. Are you telling me that I can actually communicate directly with my customers? You mean that Facebook does not have to be a go between? Holy Macaroli! Wait, wait….and if I communicate directly with my customers do I have to collect copious amounts of data and use their data to manipulate them and then go sell their data to other companies to make an even larger profit? No???? But, how many people who sign up for my mailing list will actually receive my emails? All of them? This is staggering, I thought to myself. Will wonders never cease.

So, that’s what I did. I made a mailing list. And you guys signed up for it. (well, I admit, I took the liberty of adding some of you myself.) And if you ever you get tired of hearing from me, all you have to do is scroll to the bottom of that email and click “unsubscribe” and I promise I will still like you.

Now that I have you here, let me show you some of the pretty hats I have been working on.

Christiane’s hat

This is my latest straw braid hat. There is actually a video of how I make it in the previous post. I don’t so much recommend watching it. I geared the video for other milliners because I had a request for help. Plus, I look horrible in the video. It’s so hard to find any information on how to sew these kinds of hats on antique straw braid sewing machines.

I have also been working on making a whole bunch of my hand dyed organic cotton and hemp jersey hats for Beauchapeau hat shop in Niagara on the Lake. This is Charlotte and one Eloise. You can scroll to see all the photos. Amazing how different she looks in different colours. Now that I’m not on Facebook, I might even have time to put these pretties into my online shop.

Organic Charlotte Royal Blue

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Hand dyed, organic cotton and hemp jersey

More snowy Lunenburg

And lastly, I leave you with another photo of my town that I love so much. It’s one of the rare places left on earth where people know their neighbours. It’s not that we are are one big happy family where everyone gets along. It’s a true community filled with all kinds of personalities. Just like Facebook, except with nuance, context, tone and facial expressions. These little things help us navigate our differences. On the streets of Lunenburg we are more than the latest opinion we just posted to social media.

Thanks so much for joining me here. If you know anyone else that would like to join my mailing list, just let them know the box to fill in their email is on my home page and I certainly won’t hold it against you if you’d like to share my blog. See you all soon,

Anna

Click here for the interview that started it all.

How To Make a Straw Braid Hat

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John Anderson, The knottiest man in Lunenburg, sporting a Hat Junkie hat

The following video is a tutorial for other milliners. I am in no way an expert in making straw braid hats, but I had a request from another milliner for some help understanding their antique straw braid machine. The video is long and kinda boring, but it serves a purpose. I’d love to hear from other milliners with their tips for sewing straw braid.

A Hat For Women Who Have Something to Say (and the woman who inspired it)

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I did it!  I wrote a knitting pattern.  I don’t so much consider the designing of the hat to be a terribly big deal because I’m comfortable creating with my hands,  On the other hand, writing out directions in a way that is understandable to someone not living in my brain is way out of my comfort zone.  I have never done any graphic design, so that aspect of pattern writing was also a challenge, but I like to live on the edge, and with the help of an incredible tech editor, I do believe that I have written a knitting pattern that I can be proud of.

The image on the hat is based on a block print called, Gossips, by Virginia Lee Burton.  Virginia departed from earth the same year I entered it (1968).  Pity, because I would love to have met her. I have had to settle, instead, for reading the many stories she left behind, with day dreaming myself into her heart filled images and with tales of her life.  I wish I could have been her friend, but I’m happy to simply be one of the many women she inspired.

The little piece below is included in my knitting pattern.  I strongly encourage you to click on some of the links.  Virginia Lee Burton is somebody we should all know about. You can buy the pattern HERE or HERE and the soft, squishy and very Canadian, Custom Woolen Mills Yarn is available at The Mariner’s Daughter, in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia.

Virginia lived between 1909-1968. She is best know for her many children’s books, like Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel, and The Little House, but she is less known for one of her most impressive accomplishments, The Folly Cove Designers.
Virginia and her husband, George Demetrios, settled in Folly Cove, a neighbourhood in Cape Ann, Massachusetts, in 1932. The Folly Cove Designers began in 1938 with a barter between Virginia and her neighbour, Aino Clarke. Aino would give violin lessons to Virginia’s son and Virginia would teach design to Aino.
This simple neighbourly exchange led to more neighbours wanting art lessons and eventually blossomed into a very successful community design guild. Virginia believed that everyone was inherently creative and encouraged her students to draw from their daily lives. Most of the Folly Cove designers were women.
There’s so much to say about the Folly Cove Designers, but the part that touches my heart most is that one woman, with an incredible talent, lifted up so many other women in her community. Her belief that everyone is inherently artistic and her willingness to share her own talent with her community, made it possible for many women in a small, tucked away community to both discover their own artistic abilities and to earn a living.
I first came across the work of the Folly Cove Designers while working as a dancer in Cape Ann. Gossips is the piece that whispered to me. It smiles at our sometimes good and sometimes not so good human nature.
I don’t know for certain what the women in my hat are saying, but I think that, like Virginia herself, they are encouraging each other and finding ways to make their lives better. I’m pretty sure it’s Good Gossip. 

Links

The Block Print, Gossips.  If you are in Gloucester, MA, be sure to stop in to the Cape Ann Museum to see some of the work of the Folly Cove Designers.

An Interesting article about the Folly Cove Designers

This book by Barbara Elleman is beautiful.

There’s also a film called, A sense of Place.  I haven’t seen it yet.
 

The Answer Is In the Box.

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So, here I was desperately trying to think out of the box for the solution to my sustainable fashion problem and all along the answer was right there in the box…well, in the boxes, the many boxes, and shelves and drawers and the attic…

I have been struggling with the question of how to shift my business to align with the values I care about: sustainabilitly, cleaning up plastics in the ocean, and not shipping the waste we produce to our friends in far off, and less well off, countries to deal with. It may surprise you to learn that the fashion industry is the second largest polluting industry in the world.  Oil is number one.

Anyways, back to solutions.  My mind has been doing somersaults trying to find a replacement for polar fleece that does not contribute to the plastics that are filling our oceans.  Simultaneously, I have been looking around my studio at 25 years worth of textile accumulation and feeling the need to lighten my load.
Not sure why it took me so long to connect the dots, but the chocolate finally fell into the peanut butter (apologies if you are too young to remember that commercial) and the answer hit me like a ton of vintage hankies.

I have been trying to find the answer using the same business model that I have been using for many years.  It’s the same business model that is used by fashion lines large and small. 1- Create a line of hats (dresses, scarves, pants, neck ties…)  2- source fabric and make sure that the fabric can be reordered. 3- Create samples and take orders on the sample photographs.  4- Yearly, or every so often shake things up and add new fabrics, colours and designs. 

This model has worked well for me, except for one little thing.  There is always a lot of leftover fabric and trimmings.  Sometimes it’s because a colour was discontinued or because a colour was not popular or because I moved on to something else, but the end result has been boxes, shelves, and drawers of supplies.

As I looked through fabric websites, I kept thinking to myself, I don’t want to order 10 yards of anything. Do I really have to do this?  I finally decided that the answer is no.  I don’t need to order the latest eco friendly, certified groovy fabric and create a new line of hats.  It’s way more eco friendly to use up a non organic fabric that I already have in my studio than to buy more fabric. And just like that, my new direction took shape. I’m simply going to make hats from what I have.  Doesn’t sound revolutionary, does it?

Ironically, it’s exactly how I began making hats at the age of 26.  With no money to my name, (that part hasn’t changed much) I used remnants from a local upholsterer, cut up thrifted clothing and frequented vintage shops for vintage fabrics.  Back then, the words sustainability, zero waste and eco fashion had not yet been invented, but I was doing it.  The same way that our foremothers did it. It’s simply what you do when throwing things out is not an option. 

Looks like I have come full circle.  I’m not promising to not buy anything, but I am going to make using what I have a priority.  So simple.  All this time, the answer was in the box.

The photo above is a batch of flowers that I had in a drawer.  I just put pinbacks on them and will bring them with me to the Lunenburg Farmers Market.

Here are a couple of hats that I just made from an old coat.  (I’m having a blast.)

Dear Abby, Should I cut the sweater or stretch the husband?

by

Dear Abby,

I have just finished knitting the main body of the sweater for my husband.  He is 6’1″ and kind of enormous. There are a lot of stitches in this sweater.  By nature, I’m a selfish knitter. I so admire all the women who want to express their love for their family and friends through knit wear, but, I confess, I  just want to make myself beautiful clothes.

Since learning to knit a year ago, I have found myself dedicating most of my time to knitting while ignoring some of the more mundane tasks of life, like washing dishes, cooking, paying bills or talking.  I thought I might be able to justify my neglect by knitting a sweater for my husband.  (Really, Honey, I’m doing this for you.)

And so, for the past two months, I have spent my evenings knitting my husband a cardigan.  I can’t say that I haven’t enjoyed the process, but knitting for the man is slightly challenging.  You see, he’s quite finicky about his clothing.  Some might even call him a pain in the ass, but I call him discerning.  Knowing how difficult  thoughtful he is regarding what he wears, I included him in on the process.  I let him choose the pattern and choose the wool.  I knit one sleeve first and when he felt it was a bit too snug I ripped it out and knit it again.  I also distinctly recall asking him about the length of the sweater.  I knew it was a long sweater,  and I remember him answering, “it’s fine, it’s fine, whatever”  In fairness, he may not have been entirely awake when I asked him that question, but he did answer me.

Last night, after binding off, I had him try on the sweater.  It fit perfectly. It is a long sweater, but it’s SUPPOSED TO BE A LONG SWEATER.  He said he loved it.

Well, this morning, before I had my first sip of coffee, he casually asked, “Hey, could you make the sweater shorter”  No!!! I can’t make the sweater shorter!   Why not?  Because it’s knit from the bottom up and I’d have to cut the damn thing and knit down and that’s terrifying and that Bloody tubular cast on took me two days and almost killed me and it’s in moss stitch and I can’t, I can’t, I can’t!!!  He did feel badly for asking, but now the wheels have been set in motion.

I have started watching Youtube videos on cutting your knitting with vague thoughts of divorce wafting through the back of my mind. I had heard about the legend of the boyfriend sweater.  Don’t knit your boyfriend a sweater because that will be the beginning of the end. But after 16 years of marriage I thought I’d risk it.

My question, Dear Abby, is, do I put this sweater that still needs button bands and a collar into a bin and never finish it?  Do I finish the sweater as is and resent my husband for the rest of eternity for not wearing it?  Do I leave my husband for a 6’4″ man or for another 6’1″ man who likes long sweaters?  Or do I get over my fears, learn how to cut my knitting, and try to  be one of those people who don’t make their husbands feel eternally guilty for asking me to do something really scary before I have had a cup of coffee.

O.K., I think I have answered my own question.  Youtube to the sweater/marriage rescue.  Thanks for listening.

Signed,

His first and last sweater in Lunenburg