"I have a hat for you," my friend Bonnie said when I met up with her and the rest of the JewelTones to film our "Chattanooga Choo Choo" video. When I had purchased the gold lamé  coat, she had hinted that she had the perfect gold hat for it.

I admit I was a bit apprehensive. "Gold hat" could go wrong in a lot of ways--a quick Google search pops up cowboy hats, top hats, bowlers, and (yikes!) baseball caps.  Even vintage gold hats can be over-the-top, featuring swooping bows and lines of sequins. I vaguely pictured a late sixties turban hat that would be best worn with a flowing caftan and giant hoop earrings.

 Instead, nestled in the tiniest little hatbox (printed with little pink chicks) was this gold ring hat. It did indeed go perfectly with the coat--from just the same era. 

The veiling is original, and looks to have tarnished over time, but the hat has lost none of its charm. Bonnie has given me a lot of hats over the years, and this one is destined to be a favorite!

This year, I got a super fun Christmas gift: a cartoon version of me by artist Lauren Kurtz, otherwise known as Coppertop Ink. As her website says, she draws "vintage style cartoon cuties." I started following her on Instagram after seeing one of her drawings of a woman in a vintage hat.  Upon discovering that she does commissions, I thought it would be fun to have a picture to use as an avatar online.  

Both my husband and I have reached a point where we are difficult to shop for at Christmas.  We both get stumped as to what the other wants. To be honest, I got him four items with chocolate in them this year. Also, sweatpants. He asked me for gift ideas, and I finally sent him the link to the website and a picture to use. It was very close to Christmas, and on Christmas morning, when he didn't say anything, I assumed I'd given him the idea too late, especially as he'd gotten me several other lovely gifts. 

But then, while he was visiting his parents after Christmas, and we were talking on the phone, he sent me the image. It was beyond what I had expected. I love the way she captured the hat and picked up the hat flowers in the frame. Here's the photo I sent, so you can see how she transformed me into a come-hither beauty.

I've written before about how I gained confidence during the course of The Hat Project to wear even the wildest hats. I never would have gotten an artist to cartoon me before the project either. Getting the drawing was a fun-loving way to start the new year!

As I approach Christmas this year, I’m thinking with gratitude of all the generous people who have given me hats. I have had the good fortune to have many people give me family hats, hats they no longer wear, hats they saw in thrift stores or estate sales or garage sales and got for me. About 40% of all the hats featured in The Hat Project were gifts.
 
Giving gifts is a basic human impulse. It makes us feel happy to make someone else happy. I think it’s easy to remember the bad side of human nature—selfishness and anger and heedlessness—and ignore the generosity and kindness and love we also show. So many Christmas movies are about just that--remembering the good we can do for each other and trying to do it. 
 
Today’s hat was a recent gift from a friend from the pool, Mary. She sent me a picture of some hats she was looking to downsize from her collection and asked if I was interested. I said yes 😊.
 
We made a trunk-to-trunk transfer in the health club parking lot after water aerobics one day. (These parking lot transfers always make me feel like I'm participating in illegal deals). She handed me a bulging Hefty bag and also presented me with this cool retro wig /hatbox.

In the picture she emailed me, this red cartwheel hat appeared almost identical to one I already own, the Floppy Red Hat (another gift). Even the bands are the same.  However, when I put this hat on, I discovered that it was structurally much different, with a stiffer brim that gave it a completely different shape when worn. 

The Forties JewelTones Hat got another airing in a video my singing group The Fabulous JewelTones did. We recorded “Chattanooga Choo Choo” at home individually. After one of the members mixed the sound, we shot video at a few locations. I was only able to go to one location, the South Bay Historical Railroad Society museum, and it was amazing! They not only had a lot of cool railroad artifacts, they had an enormous room full of model railroad displays.
 
Growing up, my older brother had a model train and I loved watching him work on it—painting paper mâché hills and gluing artificial bushes and trees, and even shaving a pink crayon for little flowers. It’s delightful to watch the train chug through the little, perfect world. I did once draw upon the details of model railroads in a flash fiction, “Circle, Circle,” which was published in Monkeybicycle.
 
After The JewelTones shot the video outdoors and in the railroad society’s waiting room mock-up, one of our talented members, Deanne, assembled it.
 
It’s gratifying to see the video, but the best part was seeing in person the friends I had only collaborated with remotely for the last year and a half. Unfortunately, we were unable to sing together (right now most singing groups are only singing with masks and distanced), but it was fun even to lip-sync with my friends.
 
And the costumer, Bonnie, who has given me several hats in the past, gave me another one! So a new hat is coming to the blog soon!

Here's Chattanooga Choo Choo. Enjoy!

 
If you like the video, check out the JewelTones’ YouTube channel for other performances!

When I was a kid in the seventies, we had a set of Britannica encyclopedias bound in pebbly burgundy leather. As part of the set, my parents also ordered the Book of Year, which meant that every year, my parents received a volume summarizing the events and discoveries of the previous year.
 
I liked looking at the Book of the Year more than the regular volumes. The year books had lots of interesting pictures, and unlike random encyclopedia volume H-J, each of these books was a complete whole.

One day as I was looking them over, I took out the one covering 1968.
 
“Don’t look at that one,” my mother said. “Lots of bad things happened that year.”
 
It’s true when we think of 1968 in America, we think of the assassination of MLK, the demonstrations at the Democratic convention, the assassination of Robert Kennedy, the continuing Vietnam war.  The counterculture was raging, with hippies and drug use and psychedelic rock.
 
But “counterculture” must have something to run counter to, "square culture." And square culture was raging too in 1968. Richard Nixon was campaigning for President and would go on to win. Though “Hey Jude” was the Billboard top song for the year, orchestral instrumental “Love is Blue” was number two and “Honey” by Bobbie Goldsboro was number three.
 
When I saw this hat in the antique store, I pegged it right away as from the sixties: the material (plastic-coated straw), the shape (a modified turban). I have a weakness for light blue hats (see My Best Friend’s Wedding Hat, the Blue Straw Hat with Sequins). This one was very reasonably priced ($6.00!) and looked good on me. Plus, it was my birthday! I decided to buy it, even though I had no need for another light blue summer hat. 

What clinched the deal, though, was that in the group of hatboxes below the hats, I saw one that I believe must have belonged with this very hat. Branded Marty’s, Wooster Ohio, the hat box top also had, written in ballpoint pen: Blue Summer, 1968.

​Although I would have guessed this hat to be a couple of years older, more like 1965, I figured this had to be the blue hat’s box. And though the hat box, sold separately, cost almost as much as the hat itself, I HAD to get them both.
 
Later, I discovered that the box still contained the original receipt, marked paid, from June 1. No year given, but I assume the original owner marked up the box with the year.
 
And get this—I actually paid a dollar less for the hat than she did, though of course, she got the box for free. 

I often feel a  vintage hat is a time capsule. Fifty-three years ago, a woman in Ohio bought this hat. I don’t picture her as having gone to the Summer of Love, not with this hat. She was square culture, not counterculture. She probably went to church, or had a job where she had to look nice, and needed a stylish blue hat. She might have been black or white, old or young. She might have known someone fighting in Vietnam, a brother or son or boyfriend. If she voted, she might have voted for Nixon (who took 58% of the vote in that county) or Humphrey (37%). Hopefully, she didn’t vote for George Wallace, who got 7%.

I picture her in this hat during her summer outings: a party where she ate appetizers made on Ritz crackers, a philharmonic concert at the town bandstand, a church supper with jello salad and red punch that stained her lips. Maybe she wore it on a date to an Italian restaurant with checkered tablecloths, a candle stuck in a chianti bottle, and Dean Martin records playing in the background. 

Because even against a year of great social unrest, of societal upheaval and its backlash, people still went to work, attended church, dated, packed lunches for their kids. Bought blue summer hats and lived the best lives they could.  Living through another such time of upheaval, I feel as sense of kinship with the hat's original owner. As the news is full of pandemic outbreaks, voter suppression laws, refugees fleeing war and climate disaster, urgent marches for black lives and women's rights, I put on my blue hat (and my mask) and move forward.

When I saw this hat on Etsy, I thought, “That’s adorable!” There's something appealingly whimsical about this hat. I love the tiny daffodils, sunflowers, and daisies against green, like a summer meadow.  This hat makes me think of warm days, a hammock, lemonade. Flying a kite.

Over the last year and a half, we’ve all been living with extra stress—sometimes a low-grade, constant background hum, sometimes a loud cacophony. So a hat that brings an air of fun and relaxation appealed to me. I dropped a hint and my wonderful husband gave it to me for my birthday. The hat is even easy to wear—I pinned it in place and forgot I was wearing it.

As I was sitting on the bench for these photos, a cat visited. Though I was petting the cat, he seemed more interested in my shoe.  

Maybe that's because the magician on the shoe is changing the playing cards to fish!

Perhaps cats, like people, also enjoy a bit of whimsical fun. 

(Note: the painting depicted on the shoe is by surrealist painter Michael Cheval. To see the full painting, click here).

​“What was the milliner thinking?” I sometimes wonder when I look at vintage hats. Some are in unattractive styles that were unaccountably popular, and some are just weird, as I discussed in my last blog post.
 
When I tried on this hat, I wanted it immediately. I had very few hats with artificial flowers, and this hat fit me so comfortably. I liked its intricate woven raffia pattern. Plus, with its red, white, and blue color scheme I reasoned it would be perfect for Fourth of July.
 
But then I looked closer and noticed that the net hatband was…yellow? Where did yellow fit in with the combination of artificial poppies, daisies, gentians, and gardenias? Also, the flowers were not arranged symmetrically. Was that on purpose, to make it look more like a garden?

 I often wonder what stories hats could tell if they could tell me their history. Were they worn once or twice and then kept in a box, or were they a favorite outfit topper?  Were they designed for a specific occasion or outfit, like these bridesmaid dress hats? ​

(I got this image off a Bored Panda page on vintage bridesmaid dresses. It is TOTALLY worth looking at.)

What is this hat’s story? I will never know.
 
Despite the yellow netting, my plan was to wear this hat on the Fourth of July. However, the holiday fell on a Sunday, and a parade would be passing right by the front of the church I attend. I intended to walk around town before the parade and hopefully stay after the service a bit and watch, so I needed a hat with a brim for sun protection. I ended up wearing The White on White Hat with a red shirt and denim skirt.
 
Even though I wasn’t planning to wear the hat on the Fourth, I expected I would wear it with my red or my blue dress. I walked into the closet with the hat to see what it would look good with. Then I had a brain wave. I’d recently bought a yellow sundress that had red, white, and blue flowers on it. I had been so fixated on the Fourth, I hadn’t even considered the sundress.
 
So what was the milliner thinking? Maybe she made the hat for a dress like this!

Sometimes I see a supremely odd hat and think, “That’s so weird. I should buy it!” A hat that looks like it’s sprouting tentacles or is shaped like a giant seashell. For example, a while back, a hat came up for sale on the Goodwill site that looked like it had a dead bird on it. 

I seriously thought about buying it, just because it was so weird. Then, remembering my resolution to wear every hat, I refrained. I have so many hats I love, why buy a hat that I don’t want to wear? 
​
A couple of months ago, I was in a local antique store and came upon a wool hat that looked like half an egg. It was similar to this picture I found on Pinterest. 

When I put it on, I looked like I was planning to dress as a hatching chick for Easter.
 
Once again, its oddity tempted me before I remembered that I would have to wear it.  Back it went on the display rack.
 
Besides, I reminded myself, I already had this white organza hat.
 
I would not have set out to buy this hat. However, it was in an auction lot of Goodwill hats that contained two I was really intrigued by, the Pink Turban Toque and the Lilac Pixie Hat, and one that I was less excited by, but still happy to own, the Brown Tweed Pillbox. This white hat (and another I hope to restore) came with the group.
 
I see hats of this shape advertised under many different names: casque hat,  half hat, Juliette cap, close hat, calot. But my favorite (though less common) name is the eggshell hat, because, well, that’s what it looks like.

It mystifies me that these type of hats were so popular.  A spin through Etsy will show you several very similar to this one, in an array of colors. Maybe they were the headwear equivalent of the ugly bridesmaid’s dress. They are mostly in decent condition, perhaps because they were seldom worn—no one wanted to look like an Easter hatchling.
 
I didn’t either. But I figured if I was going to wear an eggshell on my head, I might as well wear the pie dress too.  Though I feared I would feel ridiculous, I didn’t, once the whole outfit was together. It was fun.
 
Still, I draw the line at a dead bird hat.

Back at the beginning of the pandemic, I had eight more hats to go and nowhere to wear them. How would I complete the Hat Project? What was the point of wearing all my hats, if I only did so virtually? And with no church, where could I wear a fancy fascinator? 

I made do. My husband took pictures of me on our porch or at the beach or in a city park. But it wasn't the same as wearing a hat in a social setting. My church spent the pandemic producing audio church, which I ended up loving to listen to lying in bed on Sunday night. 

However, this February, our church started meeting outdoors. Ash Wednesday was our first service on the church lawn, but soon we were having weekly outdoor, masked, socially distanced church, and it was wonderful to see people and feel the community. 

As far as hats went, though, I was restricted to wearing my sun hats because shade was limited. I wore all my favorite wide-brimmed hats. I even took a couple out of the Donate box, including the blue sequined hat. 

Finally, the pandemic restrictions lifted to let us attend masked, distanced church inside our building.  What a wonderful moment to be back in the sanctuary again! On the first week I attended knowing I would sit indoors, I wore this flowery orchid hat. 

To me, this flowery hat symbolizes spring and renewal. I feel like the country is waking to new life after a long winter of pandemic hibernation.  So I felt it was an appropriate "first hat" for this new phase.

Back when I "ended" the Hat Project, I told myself that I would only buy hats if I felt they were something special, or if they filled a hole in my collection. I received my first orange hat for Christmas. My husband also gave me a gift card to a local antique store. I spent part of it on a couple of hats, including this one, which is my first all-over flowery hat.  It's completely covered with purple-and-pink-tinged silk orchids. It's so spring-like, I chose to wear it in my church's virtual video of "Easter Song." I would have worn the flowered lilac pixie that was my Easter hat this year, but for the Christmas video, the top of my Christmas tree fascinator got cut off, so I knew I needed a flatter hat!

When I was a kid, I loved going to my great aunt Doris’ house. She had a lovely hillside garden with steps leading down from my grandparent’s house to hers. A rope swing with a round wooden seat hung from a leafy tree, ready for a spin. But the real wonders were inside. As soon as I walked in the kitchen (family and friends always used back doors in this town) I’d start spying her collection: cows. Every room had shelves full of cow figurines. Cream pitchers, their spouts bovine mouths. A cow cookie jar. I think she even had a cow clock. An overwhelming display of black-spotted white, with hints of pink udders. I was never invited to touch any of them, so I’d stand in front of them, marveling.
 
Her husband, my uncle Dunk, drove a milk truck, a shiny tanker with the slogan “Every Body Needs Milk” on the side. And because of his profession, collecting cows became Aunt Doris' hobby. I’m not sure how it started. But by the time I knew her, if someone wanted to get Aunt Doris a gift, they’d get her a cow. Cows were her thing.

 I wonder now whether she grew tired of all the cows, but family and friends had given her so many she had to keep displaying them.
 
With the cautionary example of Aunt Doris in mind, I’ve always tried to keep hat swag to a minimum. Especially as much of it is so frou-frou: big flowery hats on brooches or figurines or silk scarfs. The Red Hat society has engendered a flood of red-hat-themed merch, none of which appeals to me.  Neither am I interested in top hats, baseball caps, or cowboy hats (though I did buy some of those shapes of cookie cutters for my planned post-pandemic hat party).
 
I love hats, not hat tchotchkes. 

Right now, aside from the cookie cutters, I have very few hat mementos, though it could be that I've forgotten a few.
 
I have a hat Christmas ornament I bought long ago on a holiday trip to Mendocino:

I sometimes wear a knitted hat brooch I bought as a souvenir in Uruguay.  You can see it in the photo for  The Black Hat with Pearls.  It's not very large:

And finally, there’s the lady’s head hat vase at the top of this post. I saw one of these vases on Instagram and instantly wanted one. When I searched on Etsy, I found a bunch. Apparently, they were quite popular in the fifties and early sixties in floral shops. Unfortunately, most were of pink-hatted Gibson Girl types that Angela Lansbury might have posed for. Some reminded me of Marie Antoinette.  But when I spotted this lady, I knew she was perfect. She looked like  a sophisticated woman about town, maybe sporting a postwar New Look suit. I was coming to the “end” of the Hat Project and bought the vase as a commemoration.
 
The other day in a vintage clothing store, I came across a cute dress. Mind you, I have a lot of dresses, and don't wear them as often as I should. But I was tempted. I liked the pattern, of stylish ladies. One of them was wearing a hat! I held the dress up to me, dithering.

Then I thought of Aunt Doris, and her rows of cows, and put the dress back. Don't want to overdo the hat swag.