Wednesday, September 06, 2006


In Which Our Heroine Gets In Touch with Her Crafty Side

I had to attend a wedding on Saturday. Wait, that sounds a bit harsh. I wanted to attend my friend Susannah's wedding, very much. And Susannah wanted me to attend as well. Specifically, she asked me to attend "wearing a great big hat." Now I love Susie, and was happy to accomodate this request, but of course the issue was finding the hat.

In what seems to be universally regarded as "a really Anne thing to do" and also "super cool!", I signed up for hat making class. That's millinery to those of us in the know.

I didn't know I had it in me. Despite having my knitting pattern published in Stitch and Bitch Nation, also for a hat, this seemed pretty different. That was just simple knitting. This was things with blocks. And also, as it turned out, steamers, ropes, feathers, my whisk handle (which I ususally use for spinning sugar for decorating cakes and croquembouche things, etc) hand stitching, and the like. Frankly, I thought that it would be a pretty simple affair, since it was my first hat. What I wound up with, however, is a completely different story.

It wasn't bad. In fact, I sat around staring at it for two days before unilaterally declaring it the best hat in the history of hatting. I'm still trying to get the photos uploaded - the best one was taken on my phone and doesn't seem to want to be saved as a JPEG for some reason. The only other photo is this one, which was taken well under the influence of champagne.

I was voted best dressed guest. That's got to be a first. The last I heard about my mode of dress was that my family thinks I dress like a prostitute. They have yet to comment on the hat, it must be said. But everyone else loved it. The groom greeted me with "That isn't the hat you made. It can't be. It is incredible." I suppose if you think about that it is a bit insulting, but I knew what he meant and I also know that Bruce is one of the nicer people on this earth. But it was definitely a hit!

Love,
Anne