My First Sample Panel Has Begun!

Alot has been worked on this past week. In my efforts to make sure I had as many as the victim's names as possible, I consulted 3 different lists. CNN was the most complete, so I started laying them out for placement on the panels.

I spoke to one of the curators at the National September 11 Memorial & Museum last week. She is familiar with the work I am doing and she saw An Americana Flag four years ago when she worked at the New-York Historical Society. Apparently, they don't have the most complete list, either. But she was sure to tell me that after speaking to many of the families, she knows that they want the most complete version of their names that is possible - middle names, maiden & married names, etc. I can certainly understand how they feel. I know I no longer feel "completely dressed" without my middle name included, as simple as it is.

It was a very original feeling when I worked on my list. After I made my spreadsheet, I went to other lists to find as many as I can. Rather than just being names of the people who died, they became more real as adding to them seemed to add to their personalities. For example, Mike Bocchino became Michael Leopoldo Bocchino and Ingeborg Lariby became Ingeborg Astrid Desiree Lariby.

Sometimes, I came upon a name that I was not sure was male or female. So I would click the link CNN has for each name and begin to read about them. As personal as I have always felt this project to be, it could not help but become even more so..

And as for the first sample panel, I completed all of the basting stitches for the placement of the stars, names and words across the top. This will be the first time I get to see if the layout and size really work as I had planned. I think I am going to have to think about a backing for each panel so that they will remain stable over time..

I know I will end up going to my friend Wendy's house to work on her dining room table within the next 2 weeks. She has been very generous in helping me whenever possible with this project..

The article in The Wave has come out and Wendy brought me a copy. It is the only article so far with all 3 important parts - my name is spelled correctly, it has the project name in it and my website is listed..

As always, if you know anyone with a website that might like to include a link to my story to promote donations, I would be so grateful. If anyone out there has a connection to the American Legion or VFW (Veterans of Foreigh Wars), I would love to speak to them about including my story in their newsletter..

Next time, I promise to write about my wonderful stitchers! And if you want to see An Americana Flag, scroll to the bottom of this blog!

See you later! Thanks for reading!