So I guess 2026 has started. Wild. I actually stayed up until midnight to make sure the calendar moved. I'm not sure what 2026 has in store for me or any of us, but at least we've finished 2025. That's something.
This year, I plan to focus more of my time on what people are calling "analog" hobbies. The vast majority of my hobbies are analog, so this isn't a huge stretch for me, but it's interesting to see so many other people talking about doing this. Analog hobbies are non-digital hobbies; they don't require screens or the internet. The focus is on an object like a book or a piece of embroidery. I'm tired of all the screens. And I get the irony of me saying this in a blog post that will be viewed on screens. Having analog hobbies doesn't mean I won't use my screens; I just don't plan to use them as much as I have in the past. I'm pretty certain we're going to see more and more people moving away from social media, AI-driven anything, and binge watching/streaming various media over the next year or so. I'm not alone in being tired of screens.
Which brings me to this year's stitch journal. I struggled to figure out this year's focus and theme. Normally, I have an idea by the middle of the year or around October at the latest, but this year's theme eluded me. It wasn't until I started thinking about reducing my reliance on my phone and laptop that I figured out what to do. This year's stitch journal is called Liner Notes and will focus on musicians and albums that I love. Each month I'll pick a different musician, band, or album and use them as the inspiration for a fabric collage. While lyrics will be used, it's not meant to be a lyrics dump. I did so much lettering last year, so this year I want to focus less on letters and more on shapes and lines and more abstract concepts in thread and fabric. This isn't about music criticism or music scholarship. It's me creating art based on how music makes me feel or what it makes me think about. I'll definitely quote the artists and use their own words about their music as part of my inspiration, but my goal isn't to tell you why a person wrote a song or created a specific album. It's to interpret it through my own experiences with the music and the artist.
I selected Liner Notes as the title for the full piece since they're one of the more analog parts of experiencing music. Liner notes are included in physical copies of music like vinyl records, cassette tapes, and CDs. I assume 8-tracks came with liner notes too, but I've never owned an 8-track so I can't really say. I do have a collection of vinyl, cassettes, and CDs and they definitely have liner notes in various formats. I don't stream music anymore (I had an iTunes account years ago) so I rely on physical versions of music for my listening pleasure.
The basics of liner notes are track listings, credits, and production information. Liner notes may also feature the lyrics to songs, a thank you section, photographs, and other notes from the musician/band. In some cases, particularly with reissues of vinyl, there may be quotes or commentary on the album from the artist or a critic or some other expert. I grew up with records, cassettes, and CDs and liner notes were a big part of the experience of buying a new album. I remember reading the lyrics and other notes that were included. The photos were always super cool. Reading the liner notes while listening to the album was part of the experience.
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| This is a reissue of the Velvet Underground and Nico so not what was originally included but the basics and some quotes and photos. |
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| This version of the soundtrack to the movie That Thing You Do was released for the anniversary of the movie and is designed like a record with liner notes as it might have appeared in the early 1960s. Tom Hanks was very focused on creating a realistic experience of a band during this time so the album absolutely fits with that vibe. It's one of the few modern albums I have that includes really detailed liner notes. |
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| The soundtrack for the movie Singles. More track listings and photos for the liner notes. |
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| The Tori Amos albums I'll be using as inspiration for January. Her album liner notes always include lyrics and photos. |
I've selected 12 different artists or albums who are important to me. They're not the only music I listen to but they tend to be the music I listen to the most. Here's the list:
- January: Tori Amos
- February: Velvet Goldmine (soundtrack)
- March: Mitski
- April: Florence and the Machine
- May: Fleetwood Mac
- June: David Bowie
- July: Xanadu (soundtrack)
- August: The Foo Fighters
- September: Patti Smith
- October: Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds
- November: Lou Reed/The Velvet Underground
- December: Big Star
I may use song titles for post titles, like I'm doing with Tori Amos songs this month. Each month will be a little different depending on the artist. There are two soundtracks on the list; one is based on music by other people (Velvet Goldmine) and the other features music by two main artists, Olivia Newton-John and ELO. I may talk about the original bands/musicians in February and I may talk about the careers of the other two artists in July. We'll see.
I'm not giving myself time limits per day or keeping track of the time I spend on the journal this year. I'll post a photo of my progress every day on my Instagram account and share a recap post here every Saturday unless the last day of the month is on a different day. If that's the case, I'll share the last post of the month on the last day of the month and start the next month on the following Saturday.
Materials wise, I'm using a stitch journal I bought back in 2021 when I was starting my first stitch journal. I didn't use it that year, so it's been waiting for me to use it for five years now. The pages are small, 7x6 (7x5.25 if you don't count the border) so it'll be interesting to see what I can create in collage form in a small space. I'm trying my best to use fabric, trim, beads, and other notions I already have. If I do need to buy something for a specific month, my goal is to shop at Upcycle CRC, a thrift store, or swap a crafty friend for supplies.
Which brings me to the thread. I have so much thread in my house that I should never have to buy thread again. I have a large collection of my own, mostly DMC and Sublime Stitching thread. I bought the DMC chest a few years ago so I basically have at least one of every DMC color. Over the last few years, I've inherited thread collections from two women who passed away. For this year's journal, I'm using thread the of a woman I'll refer to as MLM. This is the more recent acquisition.
MLM was the friend of a friend of mine; they've been neighbors since the 1980s. MLM passed away in 2024 at 91 and was an avid cross stitcher, knitter, and quilter. My friend brought me part of MLM's thread collection earlier this year and I recently picked up the rest. She was a meticulous thread organizer, using small plastic thread storage bags and labeling everything. Her collection includes a large amount of DMC, Anchor, and Soie D'Alger threads and some samples from the Great Art collection. My goal is to only use thread from MLM's collection for this year's journal.
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| The Great Art - Black Crow is the color. |
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| Thread storage |
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I don't know that MLM would like what I'm making. Her work was very traditional in terms of cross stitch - lots of samplers, traditional floral and animal patterns, and holiday pieces. Her work was neat and orderly; I'm fairly certain that if I unframed any of the pieces they would be beautiful on the back too. She was the kind of person who had her pieces professionally framed.
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We are complete opposites when it comes to needlework. The end result of my work may be neat (for the most part), but it can be a messy process to get there. The back of my work is what it is - a lovely display of the chaos of embroidery. I'm not a person who believes the back should be neat.
I don't know how MLM learned to cross stitch, but my guess is she learned from someone in her family, most likely her mother, grandmother, or an aunt. That's more common with older stitchers, and usually means they're a little more traditional when it comes to things like the back of a piece. Women and girls of her era were taught to sew and cross stitch and do other things we might call "grandma hobbies" today as part of being a homemaker. While she may have developed her own techniques, she probably didn't stray much from what she was taught when it came to her cross stitch work. Her stitches were perfect and her organizational systems were very comprehensive. Her talent is obvious, and even if we would have been on the opposite sides of the creative spectrum, I love and appreciate what she created. It's not all my taste, but I can see her passion for what she made and I understand her need to organize and collect the things she did.
Would she like my 2026 stitch journal project? Probably not. She'd probably tell me I was being too weird or not respecting the tradition of needlework enough. That's fine. That's one of the things I love about being an embroiderer; we're all going to bring our unique perspective to what we create. I started out a lot more traditional and have grown my practice, particularly since 2020, to be more experimental and abstract. I try a lot of different techniques and what to learn from others. What I can learn from MLM is different from what I can learn from someone like Angie (the Savage Stitcher) or Shannon Downey or any of the countless other artists I admire. They're all part of my education as an artist. And I hope I can be that for someone else.
Art forms like needlework (in all its versions) and knitting and crochet and all the other things that might be categorized as "women's work" only persist if we keep making things. We can be traditional like MLM or use the art form to push boundaries and try new things. We can use it for protest. We can use it to make people smile and laugh. We can use it to help us slow down. While I'm very different from MLM in my style and format, we're not so different in wanting to create something to enjoy. I hope that she appreciates that her thread is continuing its life in stitch form. I hope she doesn't haunt me for having messy backs of projects. I didn't know her but I think I know a little bit about her from the art she created.
Here's the beginning of the Tori collage. The biggest challenge with collage is that it takes a little while for the piece to make sense. I'm currently in that phase and I suspect I'll be there for at least another few days.
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| January 1 |
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| January 2 |
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| January 3 - the lettering says "I believe in peace bitch." This is a lyric from the song The Waitress and is incredibly fun to scream out loud when you need to scream something. |
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