Thursday, March 31, 2011

knit graffiti, part ii

Spring has been here for over a week now – and so I finally took down the knitted Christmas lights that have been hanging outside my favourite café for the past few months. They have weathered the winter amazing well, but since the snow is melting, their time really is up.

But I couldn’t leave the tree empty. It looked so bare once stripped of the festive lights. And so I hung butterflies and a little bee – signs of spring.

The installation of the knitted lights had been done under cover of darkness – late at night after the cafe had closed. But over time, word leaked out that I was the one behind the installation, so secrecy didn’t seem so necessary this time. Plus, this installation required a lot more tying of fine knots – something which would have been quite difficult in the dark.


So any attempt at subtlety was abandoned. I walked up to the barristas and asked to borrow a step ladder. Oddly, one of them thought I said ‘steam pitcher’ and offered to bring me a broken one from the back. He disappeared, leaving the other two barristas and me wondering why he was offering a broken ladder. He returned with a small metal container used to heat milk. It was maybe 6 inches tall, so really not too helpful for reaching the higher branches.

Misunderstanding righted, a friend helped steady the ladder while I took down the lights and strung up the butterflies. The barrista, walking by later, commented that we could have totally done that with a steam pitcher.

Again, oddly, while we were hanging things up, a woman stopped to admire the project and then gave us each a business card. I didn’t think knit bombing was a networking activity, but apparently it is. Her site has the tagline – Handmade by Mother – so you damn well better wear it.

We also got chatted up by the local Conservative candidate and his staffer. I wondered why two men were been so enthusiastic about knitting, until I recognized the candidate who’d come begging for signatures at this cafe a few days before.

So certainly much less of a stealth operation this time.

2 comments:

  1. Ok, it was me. I leaked it out to the Bridgehead folk. You deserved the recognition for an awesome job. Perhaps I will add my felted bee to the others thus promoting everyone and anyone to get involved. :-)allegra

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  2. Yes! Please add more bees, butterflies, birds... the more the merrier. (-:

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