You're Not Helping

I know these shoes aren't meant for me. But I'm positive they aren't going to make cross stitch cooler.

They will be available here, someday. Of course, you'll probably find them at a DSW near you in two years.

Young People Reviving Old School Crafts

I love the media. Those people are so funny and so...clueless. Here's what they say about cross-stitch now.

"The age-old hobby using a needle and thread is having a shock revival as hundreds of young people flock to bars to take part in 'urban' cross stitch.

"Shock" revival. I love that. Because it's only happening if you see it happen. No one does it at home behind closed doors or anything...and never in the rural areas. What happens in cities is what's important. (Actually it is to us.*) And, only when the youngsters have a go.

But I am perplexed about the bars thing. Are they drinking and stitching? Because that doesn't usually go well.

* Over 80% of Americans live in urban areas and 90% of economic output happens there.

La Plus que Change

Jenny Hart of Sublime Stitching has a guest column at get crafty about the state of needlework industry.

How tired am I of people classifying the needlework industry as country? It's the strawman. It's just such a stereotype. How cool I am to be working in this goose infested industry? Tiresome. Nevertheless, she makes some good points: if an industry wants to attract new blood, it has to be willing to make some concessions, to welcome newcomers, to look for the new new thing rather than sit and wait for the customers who are seeking the new thing to change into customers who are seeking what they've already got.

The good news for Hart is that when I first started going to cross-stitch things, there was a lone woman teaching punch needle. I never bothered to visit her thinking I didn't have time or resources or even interest in it. Now look at it. Taken off...and there I am searching the craft room for the punch needle. Someday, everyone else will catch up with Jenny...

Interestingly, one commenter points out that Piecework--whose editor Hart champions as someone looking to change things--bemoaned the lack of new blood last year. Specifically focusing not on changing the needlework industry, but rather getting the kids involved. We've discussed that.

How come the needlework shop owners get together and wring their hands about this stuff? Have none of them heard of market research? Come on! We're out here--interview us!

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Also, in my efforts to spread the word about Sew Simple I want to let you know that I saw it in both Joanns and AC Moore recently. It's out there people.

Murders and Executions

Shay Pendray's Needle Arts Studio has been acquired by Interweave Press the company that brings you PieceWork and Interweave Knits. Ms. Pendray will continue as host through 2007, and will be involved with the show until 2011 on and off the air.

So, um, wake me in 2012?

I think I've seen the show once, and it was on needlepoint. I seem to remember it was like watching paint dry which is unfortunate for both PBS and needlework.

In other news, last Saturday at the hairdresser, I sat stitching as usual while I waited for the dye to take. The salon owner, Nicholas Sebastian, who is not as gay as that sounds--in fact, he's not gay trust me--comes over to me and says, "Needlepoint is getting hugely popular. You're not the only one I see doing it in here anymore." Since I've only been going there for just a shade less than a year, this "anymore" takes on a new dimension. At least he's used it with the negative--using anymore with a positive spin is one of the most perplexing regionalisms in the English language. Lots of people do it. And it still confuses me.

We're Popular. We're Really Popular.

Check it out! The Independent News, an alternative paper in Pensacola, FL that has an "audience that is more educated, affluent and active than the norm" puts cross stitch at #5 in their "Hot List."

5. 'SUBVERSIVE CROSS STITCH' Kate Hudson and her knitting needles are so last year. The next cool thing to come out of the uncool world of arts and crafts is cross stitching—only this time it's thanks to a book, not a celebrity endorser. But be warned: Julie Jackson's "Subversive Cross Stitch" ain't your grandmother's style.

In laptop bag news, I finished knitting the top and started to sew it on. When I started sewing on the second side, I realized the top was twisted. It is really hard to take back stitch out of knitting, especially since I can't tell the knitting from the sewing...

Stitch 'n' bitch

So for fun, I googled "Stitch Bitch." And what do I come up with but a bajillion sites about the Stitch and Bitch knitting clubs. Apparently, I am old and out of the loop. These groups are for knitters under 40 to get together and "stitch" in public. I've never really thought of knitting as stitching. It doesn't even look like sewing.

I was on page 17 before I even had a reference to cross-stitching (more on the porn sites later, or not).

There's also a vaguely interesting article about a female Frankenstein called Stitch Bitch: The Patchwork Girl. But I couldn't read that much of it. When I put that life behind me, I put it behind me for good.

So, why don't stitchers stitch publicly and in groups? Ages and ages ago, well probably some time around 1995, I had met some Angeleno stitchers online and had them over to my house. There were about 7-10 people who came and went, and we'd either gather to stitch or would go on shopping excursions together. What happened to all that? Oh, the sacrifices we make while pursuing letters to string after our names. . .

Part of the problem I suppose, for me anyway, was that I had to stop reading rctn. Too many off-topic posts. Too damn many posts period. Oh, for the days before AOL, when people read and followed netiquette rules. There were about 50 messages a week, and they were all on-topic and interesting, too. Now there are too many stitchers out there who spend their time talking about everything but stitching. It's too difficult for me to have what I consider a normal conversation with a regular person let alone a fundamentalist woman who homeschools and has no sense of irony, even if we have cross-stitch in common. Maybe this stuff is going on out there; maybe I'm too "in here."

I'd go to an EGA meeting, if I didn't have to go it alone--maybe. But which of three vaguely-local ones to attend: Pasadena? Long Beach? El Segundo? Women stitch at the LNS, but they're all about a hundred and have bad taste as far as I can tell from the projects they've chosen. The other LNSes are too far to go to to stitch for a couple of hours so I can be with people.

So for now, I will sit at home and work on battlestargalactica (not going too well) while I watch professional sports on tv. Oh, and plan another trip to Tulsa, OK.

Next up: a collection of cross-stitching trips you can take, and some brief reviews of the ones I've taken.