Letters
A Lovely Yarn Shop, Then WUT?!
Dear Kay,
So there I was, watching a perfectly straightforward news feature about Fibre Space, the yarn shop in Alexandria, Virginia. It’s all very cool to see Danielle Rominette living out her dream of owning a yarn shop. Such a great space, beautiful yarns, all that. Would love to meet her.
And then.
With no explanation, right in the middle, 1:40 minutes in: YIKES! Those women! Kay and Ann, singing “Pardon Me (I Didn’t Knit That for You).”
It doesn’t take much to send me off into a tailspin of existential self-appraisal these days.
In Other News Involving Fancy Dresses
My self-examination about my never-ending fantasy of becoming a country singer led me to a certain gratitude at having new Christmas records to play while I decorated my Christmas tree. In particular, this brand-new-yet-also-vintage batch of Loretta Lynn, White Christmas Blue, got me through the traditionally gruesome hangin’ o’ the lights.
This is the first Christmas album she’s released since 1966. FIFTY YEARS AGO. Chew on that! For 49 years, Loretta has been all “One album is plenty of Christmas.” Then all of a sudden she’s: LET’S GET ON THIS CHRISTMAS THING AGAIN.
If you ever hear anybody talking about “the Nashville sound” of the 1950s and ’60s—less mountain, more swing—this is it. Owen Bradley produced so much of it, such a legend in Nashville.
ANYway. Holiday music is really on my mind right now. Would be happy to cook up a playlist if everybody would post suggestions over in The Lounge at “Holiday Music Playlist Suggestions.” The less familiar, the better. Any genre. Musical saw? Sure. Tabernacle choirs? Of course. But anybody who suggests “Frosty the Snowman” can just go listen to this.
Love,
Ann
Oh, the memories! And…..permissions and royalties sought?
Just purchased Pentatonix Christmas and Leslie Odom, Jr. Christmas (former Hamilton performer). Both are truly delightful.
I only listen to Pentatonix Christmas this year. Can’t stand to listen to anything else. They sound great.
When visiting DC I got to the shop. It *was*lovely but I didn’t see the dog.
Kay, did you take a barre class at a studio on the upper west side yesterday? My daughter did and she told me there was a woman who was talking about knitting and was double knitting a scarf (she must have told everyone that was what she was doing as I had to explain to my daughter what double knitting is). Thought it might be you.
Have you heard the Sirius Outlaw Country special with Loretta Lynn and her new album? It’s hosted by Elizabeth Cook. So many tidbits in there! A lot of it is just Loretta talking, and she also takes some questions from the audience (I guess it was recorded with her fans at her place in Hurricane Hills). One tidbit is that for her last Christmas album 50 years ago, she wrote 5 songs in one night. 5 songs. One night.
Why did you do that, she was asked.
Loretta answered, “Because I had to! We were recording the next day and I needed the songs. So I wrote ’em that night and the next day, we recorded them.”
Dayum.
Oh and for other new Christmas music with a Nashville connection, Brett Eldredge is getting a lot of praise for his new one, just out now. It’s called Glow and it’s more croony (like Frank Sinatra) than country. http://tasteofcountry.com/brett-eldredge-glow-track-listing/
Meanwhile nothing beats a rousing rendition of Vince Vance and the Valiants singing “All I want for Christmas Is You.”
OK Just one more and I swear I am done. Kacey Musgraves has a new Christmas album out now too, it’s a mix of classics and self-penned ditties including a duet she does with Willie Nelson which is really funny. I love hearing Willie say “Merry Christmas” at the end.
http://tasteofcountry.com/kacey-musgraves-a-very-kacey-christmas-track-listing/
Michael Bolton’s This is the Season The Christmas Album. Classics, carols… in his signature r&b style
If you want to hear some Christmas with an Australian flavour try Aussie jingle bells by Bucko and Champs.
I love that one! I’m an Aussie living in North Carolina and I play it every Christmas for my mates.
Christmas music
That is you and Kay up there in that knitting video isn’t it? Too funny – to be watching a news feature and suddenly there you are! No one else has commented on it so I did.
That must have been SURREAL! You celebrities, you!
Thank you for the postings. I’m so glad I got connected to your site again. I love it!
A Festival of Brass and Carols by the Philadelphia Brass Ensemble – simply the best ever. And NO hokey Christmas songs on it!
I love their store; her second location is even better than her first. I go every time I head to DC And how cool that you two were also featured!!!
I added this to The Lounge:
https://www.amazon.com/Ally-McBeal-Very-Christmas/dp/B000050HV4
Tune into Robert Downey Jr.!
Riders in the Sky, “Corn, water and Wood”.
Ok, that was hilarious, with absolutely no acknowledgement that the video was anything except genuine. I’m rolling!!!
I had no idea what had caught your eye on that video and then–boom! How wonderful!
You want to be a country singer?? And here we thought that chartreuse “Mrs. Slocombe” wig was just for Halloween…;-)!
I got sick to death of Christmas music BEFORE Thanksgiving, as stores were playing all 7,259 cover versions of “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree.” Just thinking about it makes me want to listen to ANYTHING but Christmas music! Does anybody have a copy of Johnny Rotten reciting the phone directory?
That was, um … a bizarre if pleasant nonsequiter, to say the least! In the forums I entered my vote for The Roches’ We Three Kings for an ancient classic and Annie Lennox for new(er). (I like my holiday music like I like my ladies: quirky, nasal and a little bit punk.)
😉
My daughter introduced me to Pentatonix….it’s all we play now as we roam from dance to orchestra to school
I’d seen the YouTube of “I Didn’t Knit That for You” some time ago. Yes, it’s pretty funny. But what I found apalling about the story was the editorial “surprise” that most knit shops are actually OWNED and OPERATED by — gasp! — WOMEN!!! ‘Scuse me? Where has Aljazeera been hiding that they don’t know women are perfectly capable of running their own businesses all by their little womb-owning selves.
I know, right?!
Refreshingly, though, the newscaster actually knew how to knit.
OMG. What a complete misunderstanding!!! But I love the idea that you were celebrities first and interesting in knitting second. This is going to make me laugh for days.
Last year, my mother bought me tickets to see Loretta Lynn at the Tarrytown Music Hall. It’s a pretty smallish venue but designed by the same folks who did a little joint called Carnegie Hall. It was fantastic!
I love that you’re in the story as famous people! Of course you ARE famous people…. and that video you guys did just NEVER gets old! Happpy Holidays!!!
Well of course you are celebrities! However, the uninitiated may be looking for you on Spotify right now! (Are you there? I’ll have to check )
Only Loretta could write lyrics like “your bulbs are burnt out and your tinsel don’t shine.” Just says it all right there.
My favorite couplet has always been, “Oh Loretta, I love you more than my Irish Setter.”
Oop, it’s “Hey Loretta,” which is also the name of the song. Guess I haven’t heard it in a decade or two 😉
Ann, you and Kay might be surprised at how much joy and laughter “Pardon Me, I Didn’t Knit that For You” has brought into my life. Whenever I need to laugh, I think of that video. Even my 23 year old son recognizes. So, when you self appraise, I hope that having had the nerve to don those outfits (and eye shadow), winds up in the “good thing” column.
Holy cow. What a weird world. You are now unironically singing celebrities to a global audience. You’re going to be recognized at the mall in Dubai.
I was saying “Wut?!” to the line of thought that said something like “Some people are still surprised that a woman can own a business alone,” and then there you and Kay were! Can I get a “Wut Wut?” I only wish that they had acknowledged you, not only for your musical skills, but that you are women making a business out of yarn and knitting!
Actually, I thought the focus was more on how something like knitting can support a business and that she switched from a good-paying job to running a business that may or may not run rather than on the fact that it was a woman – and they can actually run a business. Especially since it was a woman doing the reporting – and she is a knitter, too! (They showed her knitting)
Speaking about watching TV …. I was watching Al Jazeera (the only English news I can get here) and they had a focus piece on an LYS – and sorry, I cannot remember the name – which was born from someone’s teaching people to knit and they wanted her to open an LYS> ANYWAY, that is not the point. The point is, that the piece went on into knitting and how it is growing and supplying nice yarn is becoming big business (and showed the reporter knitting, a nice feather-and-fan piece) … THEN suddenly there was this blast from the past – Two ratted-hair ladies singing “I didn’t knit this for you”!!! They had YOU on Al Jazeera, on a piece about knitting!!! Whooooeeee!
I obviously didn’t read the rest of the comment before posting mine!! And I cannot click on the link here on my work computer (well, I can’t, but it takes me to a page that says FORBIDDEN) … I thought that was so cool! And they did put Modern Daily Knitting up in the top left corner of the video, by the way.
Oh my…..what would I do without this blog…how did I hang on until it was up and running….I love this posting!!!
Julie
I did a terrible thing this year. I gave all the lights to a charity store- the bags full of lights that didn’t all work or that played schmaltzy music ALL the time ( the mute switch was eaten by a rabbit) or that were too tangled to hang, and ALL of them stayed up till April because no one else would help take them down. Ever. I keep saying to the kids ” oh I think perhaps we put them in the shed, why don’t you look there? ” I doubt they will. So I think I’ll get away with this.
The Puppini Sisters are pretty awesome in the holiday album category. (They’re pretty awesome in general!)
Congrats on your moment of *international* television fame!
Funny stuff. That will teach you!
You’re celebrities not just in my world but in Al Jazeera’s world, too. Al Jazeera seems to have a different standard for determining one’s celeb status, but it works for me.
Fibre Space is my local. Great shop, great employees, great events, very tempting yarns. It’s pretty dangerous to have it within 5 miles of my house! I’m glad Danielle is young and (as far as I can tell) plans to own the shop for a good long while. We’ve lost two long-term LYSes this year to well-deserved owner retirements, and another is about to change hands (I hope it succeeds). The ones outside of the inner-DC suburbs are very nice but less likely for me just to drop in. We do have some really excellent festivals. I shouldn’t complain at all, because I know too many people have NO LYS near them.
The Fibre Space shop dog is Nemo, and he’s a cutie. There also are occasional sightings of the Fibre Space Tiny Human, aka Danielle’s toddler daughter, who also is a cutie.