Yarn Bombing

There are certain activities associated with youth, like questioning authority, and then there are other activities associated with our golden years, like knitting. The lines between the two are now blurred, so hang up your shawl and grab your needles because baby, knitting ain't just for grandma anymore. Knitting has taken on cult status, and young and old alike are going guerrilla.

Behold these innocent balls of wool, unaware of their power to change the world, one knitting needle at at time

I started innocently, learning to knit when I was a mere child, all of eight years old. Well, technically I corked before I knit, using a knitting spool. This is a craft that has been around for a hundred years, which is odd given its limitations. Take a large wooden spool, hammer four nails in a square shape around the hole, then "knit" around in circles to create a tubular chain through the middle. That's corking in a nutshell.

This is about as practical and esthetically pleasing as tongue depressor sculpture. You always end up coiling it into a potholder, or in my case, many potholders. My grandmother - a master knitter who could watch TV, chat and knit a sweater at breakneck speed without looking down at her hands - was exasperated at the energy wasted on something that resembled knitted tapeworms. She taught me to knit properly and with purpose.  I never matched her skill, but I produced a decent scarf or two. I eventually abandoned this gentle pastime in exchange for more adventurous and age appropriate pursuits like disco hopping. Knitting didn't fit my image in the 80s, but maybe it would when I got to my 80s.
 

My 20-something artist daughter convinced me to pick up my needles again. She attends university on the east coast and she taught herself to knit. Forget grandma, Google is the new mentor. Cast on, knit, purl, "tink" (knit spelled and performed backwards in order to fix a mistake) - the basics and more are all on YouTube now. She quickly mastered the art and completed complicated hats, scarves, fingerless gloves, even socks for everyone on her Christmas list. I did not advance as quickly and made panicky Skype calls with my work-in-progress - usually a scarf (okay, always a scarf) - held up to the camera. 

Requests for more raw material meant I had to make regular pilgrimages to the yarn shop. One look around told me these are not the days of my Nana's knitting. Forget garish acrylics and scratchy wools. There is now a plethora of soft, vibrant fibres - bamboo, silk, organic cotton, soy and hand-spun and hand-dyed from a variety of sheep and goats whose pedigrees are lovingly listed on the label alongside their portraits and pet names. (I kid you not, no pun intended.) The colours are enough to knock your hand-knit socks off - luscious jewel tones, earthy shades from nature and screaming electrics from Japan.

And if you have any remaining doubts about knitting being a gentlewoman's craft, let me introduce you to the concept of Yarn Bombing.

The Before, Pre Yarn Bombing

Near where I live, and a place I pass by often when I walk The Budster. And just look at their innocent little statue faces, oblivious to the yarn carnage about to take place.

 

To the uninitiated, yarn bombing is where genteel meets renegade; its the art of knit graffiti or "textile street art." An international guerrilla movement, it inspires people to take up the knitting needles and along with stealth, a disguise and a dose of chutzpa, work for total cosmic yarn domination. Fighting for political change, when expressed with yarn, becomes a message delivered with a cuddle. All over the world, girls and boys yarn bomb; even grannies are leaving their wooly calling cards in random places. It grabs the notion of knitting as a gentle craft and knocks that theory on its fuzzy behind.

It's easy. You just target a post, bike stand, bench, anything that needs yarn beautification, and covertly cover it with a hand-knit item. It can be as simple as a tiny square on a chain link fence, or a garment covering a tree, statue, or even an entire bus. Unlike graffiti, it's not permanent and it makes people smile. It might be up for only a few minutes, or it may last for years. Sometimes tags accompany the item - like the Swedish yarn bombing group called Masquerade whose motto is Nemo Attexet Sobrius! (Nobody Knits Sober!) And sometimes the pieces remain anonymous.

So bearing all this in mind, Buddy and I stumbled upon this one morning. Someone came with stealth in the night and yarn bombed the crap out of these two. 

I prefer it this way, but clearly the art gallery owners did not, as the yarn was removed after only a few days. The piece is now back to its nudie-pants state. You can tell from the way Buddy is gazing longingly into the depths of their crocheted souls that he fancies the fuzzy.

The After, post Yarn Bombing

I wait patiently, and wonder where I can stake a claim as I nurture my inner yarnarchist.

To all my twisted knitter sistahs

You have to knit to really appreciate the silliness of this video. It uses dubbed computer voices to your text, which only adds to its quirky charm.

Dedicated to that particular member of the family (you know who you are) who knits something for practically everyone on her Christmas list.

"Blue."
"Yes, green."

Kills me.

from The Panopticon, a wonderful knitting blog

And in other news....

NoNoWriMo continues. I hated it this morning. Couldn't get going, didn't want to write. Wanted to stomp on its head. Had no ideas. Ideas that did surface sucked. Got discouraged, especially when I read a rant on another blog about how NaNoWriMo is a bad idea because it encourages crappy writing, makes you a slave to word count and therefore you end up with something that can't be fixed no matter how much time you put into editing the hell out of it. In other words, a complete waste of time.

Well, yes and no. I wanted to see if having a deadline would push me to write more. More words, more often, more consistently. I will think of a million excuses not to write. But what happens when I'm forced to write (in my case, I don't know about anyone else) is that in the act of writing, certain creative doors just pop open. I sit back and look inside and think, "well what do you know about that?" It's not enough to just sit around and think about ideas, or even to write an outline. It's the act of doing it that reveals all kinds of stuff.

Today a character popped up out of nowhere. It was supposed to be a creepy old man. It turned out to be a tattooed, pierced, charming young woman. And having this girl there suddenly created a new and welcome twist in the plot. Hm. Not sure I would have thought of her had I just outlined, or stared at the clouds.

I'm exercising my creative muscles. I don't know if I'll end up with something usable or not. But when I lift weights, I'm not aiming for the Olympics. I just know I'll be in better shape than when I started. That's all I want out it. Maybe I'm just being too Canadian.

The last point in this other blog was that writing is supposed to be enjoyable, not done "with a gun to your head." Well, some of us need more motivation than others. If not a gun to the head, maybe a kick in the butt. NaNoWriMo is my kick in the butt.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have a tattooed lady to attend to.

Beverage Alert

I love this quirky knitting blog called The Panopticon.

Today his post made me laugh out loud.

Oh, and Beverage Alert.

It's HERE.

Knitting Humour

For all you knitters and Twihard fans... proof that no matter how bad life gets sometimes, a little knitting will always make things better.

Go check out The Panopticon for a sweet little yarn that had me chuckling. But then, wool does that to me.

Knitting up a frenzy

Oh yes, it's a yarnapalooza around here. All kinds of knitting projects going down.

Not me. My daughter. She puts me to shame.

Since I have nothing to show you (nothing, people since the Cat Barf Incident) she gave me permission to share some of her recent projects.

To recap (no pun intended) here is the hat she made me for Christmas.

It fits me perfectly and I love, love, love the rich jewel tone colours.

Then I was browsing in our local consignment shop, and I found not one but TWO wooden hat forms that are both my size. One is mounted on a pole (above) and the other sits on its stump, neckless, like a victim of the French Revolution after someone rifled through the wicker basket under the guillotine. They keep my hats blocked and ready to wear and I was right chuffed to find them.

However, I have heard the rumblings of discontent from the peasants who dwell within my house. They complain about how it must look to outsiders who must walk past the dining room window in order to get to the front door, and how startling it must be for them to see a pair of heads on the table. I think they look perfectly fine, especially seeing as I also have a row of wooden foot forms along the sill.

But I digress.

Here is the other hat Youngest made for herself. It's in cashmere and silk. It looks a lot better on her than it does on this wooden form, but you'll have to take my word for it when I tell you that handling this hat is like running your hands through warm butter.
And the scarf underneath is an infinity scarf, all joined together in one long oval that you twist and put over your head. It comes out looking a bit grey in the above shot, but it's actually more like this shade of green:

Being an artist, she has a good eye for colour. I love green and rose colours together. You see it a lot in nature.
I guess Mother Nature knew what she was doing. Even if she does get a bit pissy every now and then and sends us SNOW in May.

Not content to sit back on her heels and rest, Youngest out-done-did herself and made socks. Handknit socks! Self taught! Seriously, she inherited some mighty powerful craft mojo from someone and coupled with an artist's eye, she is a force to be reckoned with.


Then the piece de resistance, as far as the rest of us were concerned. These little gloveless beauties made from something called cashmerino, a heady blend of merino wool, cashmere and some other fibre not worth mentioning in the same breath. Oh, baby. These are soft, and the colour of new grass in the spring. Youngest offered them up to me. Eldest then made a play for them, stating that her new office was freezing and it would make her so much more comfortable if she could wear them at work.

As the provider of All Things Edible, I made an impassioned pitch as to why I should get the gloves. My writer's fingers need the warmth to avoid the dreaded affliction which strikes down many a writer in his or her prime - Finger Cramp (stifled sob.) It would keep my finger muscles in top shape and thus, provide more victuals for the family. Why, I would be able to write and then say, knead some bread dough for some sweet cinnamon rolls, your decision, no pressure, take your time, you decide, I'm just saying, as a fer instance, no pressure, no guilt. Don't let the fact that I gave you life influence you one teensy bit.

Just look at these puppies and you tell me what you wouldn't do to own a pair:

That's what I'm saying. However, Youngest is a kind and generous soul and has decided to make another pair. That is, after she finishes the white cashmere hat she started yesterday.

Cool Ways to Use Wool

I can't remember who recommended this video to me, but thank you!

My mind is like one of those....those...you know, those thingies you use to rinse pasta, you know, the big round pot thingies full of holes, what do you call that damn thing, those whatchamacallits...oh, never mind. Do you SEE what I'm dealing with? COLANDER. That's it.

If you'd like to bop me upside the head in the comments section whoever you are, please feel free. I apologize for my lack of available brain cells. I believe the problem is hormonal, i.e., all my available energy is being diverted to my numerous Tropical Moments (enough to be considered a contributor to Global Warming) and it would appear there is nothing left for short term memory.



My unfinished knitting projects are all sitting in a big basket right now. I lost my mojo when Boris sabotaged my efforts with his projectile Vomitus Felinus (sounds so much better in Latin, doesn't it?) and my other favourite project (the gorgeous orange red silk blend) had to be unraveled and begun again after I couldn't ignore the skipped stitches and my botched efforts to fix them. I've been staring at the basket like a haunted woman.

I want to get back up on the horse, but that horse is a biter, man. That horse is mean. Like, glue factory mean. Perhaps if I feed it a sugar cube and let it run free for a while I can approach it again and go for another ride.

Also, I have a slightly compulsive nature when it comes to doing things exactly right, a trait a lot of knitters appear to share. While friends said they couldn't even see the missed stitches, I would know every time I wore that scarf and it would drive me berserk eventually.

I thought knitting was supposed to be relaxing, calming, soothing...?

Youngest will be back home again, and she will encourage me to take up the needles again. Stay tuned. More projects to follow. In the meantime, I shall post a photo of her most excellent socks and slouchy hat. They're both awesome. As is Youngest.

Knitting the Light Fantastic

I'm midway through this project, feeling pretty chuffed about it as the colours put me in mind of Easter which is my target date for finishing the thing. And this yarn is special. I scooped the last three handspun, hand-dyed skeins on eBay. So it's special stuff. I can't just run down to the wool shop and get more. It's a limited edition, one might say.

Are you picking up on the subtle foreshadowing here?

I set it aside on the dining room table to "keep it safe" between sessions. And it should have been safe because my cats know they are not allowed on the table. Never, ever. In theory.

Along came This:
And This, well, This Boris just doesn't believe in rules. Rules are for other cats, oh, and the dog who is too stupid to live, and perhaps small humans.

Unfortunately Boris is also a consummate glutton saddled with the constitution of a weak old woman, a crotchety binge-eater who can't make the connection between his behavior and natural consequences. If one eats a partly rotted mouse, it will reappear on the front hall carpet. If one insists on eating an entire bird - feathers, beak and feet included - it will end up as a sort of sparrow tartar mounded on the front step like some grotesque art piece. But the dots are never connected in his tiny cat brain.

Because Boris also refuses to abide by any of the rules of the house, he not only gorged himself on a new food, a particularly pungent mixture which contains a lot of fish and fish oils designed to give him the shiny coat of a kitten, but he then climbed on the dining room table in order to digest it from a better vantage point. Unfortunately, he made himself comfortable on my unfinished scarf, and moments later, gacked up his entire fishy breakfast all over it. In the process, which involves simultaneous spewing and backing up as though the vomiting is something he can escape from, he managed to hit not only the scarf in progress, but also the giant ball of yarn, soaking both with fishy chunks and gooey strings of saliva. Ever tried cleaning a fat, fuzzy ball of yarn?

The question remains, do I wipe it off as best I can and keep on knitting then give it a thorough wash after I'm finished, or do I strangle the cat and call it a day?

Happy thoughts, happy thoughts. Spring is coming. Happy thoughts.

Pringle of Scotland

A brilliantly funny animated short by David Shrigley and narrated with understated elegance by Glaswegian Bridget McCann, this little gem celebrates the 195 year history of the Pringle of Scotland company. It was created for Milan Fashion Week and shows some of the behind-the-scenes stuff that goes into making Pringle jumpers and cardigans.

Does anyone else own a Pringle jumper besides me?

Beverage alert. The dancing goat killed me, and the ending sent me into hysterics.