Thanks to everyone who came out last weekend to make cherry blossoms for the Historic Joy Kogawa House Yarn Bombing. We had a great turnout of enthusiastic crafty-types and Historic Joy Kogawa House has been receiving lovely pink blossoms in the mail. We can’t wait to sew them all together and onto the tree!

Here are a few photos last Sunday’s event:

A plethora of crocheted cherry blossoms from North Vancouver!

Mandy gives a knitting lesson.

I talked about the global movement of yarn bombing and showed some of my favorite photos of knit graffiti.

Everybody knitted with pink yarn!

Poet and novelist Joy Kogawa was present too,  if only in cut-out format.

After a day of knitting, we measure the beloved cherry tree in preparation for the yarn bombing on March 6th.

If you are local and couldn’t make it out last Sunday – please consider joining us in making cherry blossoms on Saturday, February 5th between 2-3:30. If you don’t live in the Vancouver area, you can still contribute by mailing in blossoms to Historic Kogawa House. We will take blossoms of any style and any type of yarn – as long as they are pink!

(A special thanks to photographer Jeff Christenson for capturing the afternoon.)

Knit Graffiti Round-up

My mailbox has been heavy with new yarn bombing feats – while we have much to post in the way of interviews and new yarn bombers trying their odds at sneakiness, here are a few noteworthy links of late:

You can now read Yarn Bombing: The Art of Crochet and Knit Graffiti in German! The book has been translated by Droemer Knaur.

We’ve been giddy about Olek’s winter yarn bombing of the great brass bull on Wall Street in NYC and we hope you are too. While the knitting only lasted one night, videos are forever. If you haven’t seen this video, it is a must watch.

Speaking of large mammels: a yarn-bombed Hippo in Berlin (via the industrious KnitHacker)

More cozy trees in Brooklyn.

Lovely video of Dot Vile yarnbombing in Philly.

Genny’s birthday is coming up, and rather than pub crawling, she is inviting her friends to yarn ‘crawl’ aka bomb. Nice!

80 year old woman may or may not know that she is yarn bombing. What do you think?

Also via KnitHacker, I am absolutely charmed by this variation of the Chelsea Gunn’s monster foot pattern from our Yarn Bombing book: http://knithacker.com/2011/01/24/dragon-foot-yarn-bomb-spotted-in-saarbrucken/. It is the cutest monstrosity that I have ever seen.

A crocheted tee-pee from Arlene, created by the StytchFace crew

I’ve given a lot of interviews in the past year about our book Yarn Bombing and the knit graffiti movement and there is one question that every reporter asks me:

“What is the future of yarn bombing?”

Each and every time this question stumps me. All I can say is that the future of yarn bombing is only limited by the imaginations of knitters, and crocheters, and those who work with yarn and that it constantly surprises me, and delights me…and just when I have it figured all out – it confounds me again. For example:

Jessie Hemmons in Philadelphia’s work has been getting a lot of attention: http://www.philly.com/inquirer/home_top_left_story/20100325_Philadelphia_s_anti-graffiti_knit_work.html?page=1&c=y

The Yarn Bombing Facebook group (no affiliation with Mandy or myself, except that I’m a member) has 300 members.

Here’s a nice little pattern for a heart-shaped tag via the Fibre Squad (Albuquerque, NM): http://fibesquad.wordpress.com/2010/02/07/a-heart-for-you/

Stellar pink camo bike, via the Cabinet Shop http://thecabinetshop.blogspot.com/2010/03/yarn-bombing.html

Knitters in Newcastle, UK get to work: http://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/north-east-news/todays-evening-chronicle/2010/03/15/guerilla-knittters-drape-work-round-newcastle-72703-26035067/

Yarn Bombing in Toronto and the photos are stealthy http://qknit.wordpress.com/

Those infamous Kitten Mitten Knitters in New Jersey who have been getting tons of attention on the interweb and who have been busy hitting up West Cape May might be asked to purchase a city permit for their tagging exploits. Say whaaaaat? Thank goodness for the city residents who have put up signs in their windows that encourage them to keep on knitting.

And, lastly because it is funny, obscene, and Canadian; the knitification of Vernon, BC: http://knitified.blogspot.com/. Trailer Park Boys intarsia!

So what is the future of yarn bombing? You tell me.

A delightful parade of  little cats and dogs encased in crocheted raindrops.

The handiwork seems to be by WooWork. Howie – you are a master of amigurumi and yarn bombing cuteness! In a city where it rains so hard, your work is a delight. It definitely made my day and that of many others.

Be sure to check out the following via WooWork.com:

The edible cat

The shark fin soup

and, the crocheted spy wear.

“Um, this guy is kind of awesome,” said Jeff.  Yep, I agree. Howie, we can’t wait to see what you get up to during the Olympics!

In the meantime, we leave you with some random y-bomb links to round out 2009:

Yarn bombing puzzles and charms Christmas shoppers in Ecucha

Art Yarn‘s Yarn Forward project grows and grows.

The BYOB crew (Bombing Yarn Over Bend) offers instructions via Cyclocross magazine on how to cozy up your bike.

Tasmanian Renegade Craftivism

New crochet yarn bombing blog: Crochet the Day

Memory through knitting: the Elegant Spider remembers the victims of the Commemorates Victims of the École Polytechnique shootings in Montreal through yarn bombing. Watch the video here.

You have got to love husbands who leap from the car to take photos of yarn bombing! Via Twitchy Fingers.

Macleans Magazine pronounces Yarn Bombing part of the lingo that made 2009. We like to be topical.

We are looking forward to 2010 and lots of new knitting and crochet madness! Happy holidays dear yarn-bombers, stormers, and wool enthusiasts…here is wishing you a warm and wooly season, and fresh new things to cast on in the New Year.

Danielle of DeeDee’s Devotions, has been adorning trees with little creatures. She says:

I decided to do crocheted butterflies so I dug around online and found a simple pattern. I swear all I do is make butterflies these days. I think by the time I finish yarnbombing butterflies I’ll have made about 110. I put up about 50 today.

Props to Danielle’s dad who also has helped her install the butterflies. This picture makes me smile:

Dad and I also went to Central Community Park and pinned up a bunch of butteflies there. Dad was surprised by a lady who shouted “Is that Yarn graffiti?!” ha ha! He said it was so she hopped over the fence and grabbed one of the butteflies. Apparently she heard about yarn bombing on the CBC and by the way she jumped and waved at me (Dad told her I was the one who crocheted them all), she was pretty darned excited about it!

In other news,

KnittaPlease has posted a submission call for knit graffiti photographs for a new book that will be coming out next year (found via the Subversive Yarn Network)

There will be a Yarn Bombing Stitch and Bitch event at the Davie Street Book Warehouse this thursday evening. Come one, come all!

On twitter? Don’t forget to use #yarnbombing so that we can find your knit graffiti posts!

She will be giving a talk about her work, and the work of three other artists: Elaine Reichek, Janet Morton and Barb Hunt, at Lion Brand Studio (34 West 15th Street in Manhattan) this Thursday, May 7th. Doors open at 5:30 p.m. and seats are first come, first served. The talk begins at 6 p.m.

If you wish to attend, RSVP at studio@lionbrandyarn.com, as space is limited

Here is Robyn in action:

The Ladies Fancywork Society on CNN.

They were also featured in an article by the Colorado 9 News last month, which has some great quotes from the group.

Images courtesy of Sara Noble

Sara says: I walked out my flat last week trying to think where and what I could yarn bomb – and there it was, all down my road there are about five zebra crossings! All looking really slick with their black and white stripped lines and yellow flashing lights. My work is normally really brightly coloured, and this gave me a fresh approach. I stripped up plastic bags to make the yarn for the crochet because I thought wool would go all soggy in our current British rainy climate, also the plastic fits in with the shiny look of lamp post, making it more invisible. Watch out around East London – as more of these crop up!

Sara’s also been busy decorating the banks of the Thames:

I had been planning to do knitted graffiti as a way of getting my work back out into a bigger, site specific space, and was a amazed when a friend forwarded me the yarn bombing website, hence creating a sense of urgency to make something!

Thanks for sharing this with us Sara! We can’t wait to see what is next. To learn more about Sara, check out her website.

There has been lots of excitement in London lately – yarn bombing hero Magda Sayeg recently went tagging with a bunch of folks. Deadly Knitshade of Pearl Interrupted has a great story on her blog about bombing with Magda.

And, speaking of black and white, check out this awesome tutorial for spinning yarn out of newspaper. I’m really enthused about this – hence the groan-worthy title of this post. I’d love to know if anyone tries to y-bomb with this. It would probably work best in warm, dry places – not the Canadian rainforest that I reside in.

Wow – I’ve just looked at the work that has been created by contributors to
Grrl+Dog’s Global Guerilla Knit Up. The work is amazing! Over the past few months I’ve been asked a few times how I think knit and crochet graffiti will evolve, and if it will stick around. I think what has happened today is a testament to the fact that yarn bombing is only limited by the imagination. And, as we all know – crocheters and knitters really have no limits when it comes to imagination.

Here are a few of my favourite pieces:

M is for Martha

The CrabApple Cacti

and Leslie, who has an amazing story told by images and a few words. She says: And yes, the first thing I knitted after 25 years of knitting nothing was a sweater for a tree.

Eek!