Literally.

Today was the day — the official yarnbombing of Joy Kogawa’s cherry tree. I contributed about 100 blossoms and arrived this afternoon to help install the yarn blossoms (and bark!) on the tree.

The executive director of the Historic Joy Kogawa House Society managed to get a fire engine with ladder to help install the blossoms in the higher branches. My dad also dropped off a ladder and I made my way up into the tree (I probably should have signed some sort of liability waver first, eh?).

It was a gorgeous sunny day; the first day of Spring in my mind. And the tree looked absolutely fantastic. There were well over 500 blossoms by my guess, and it was amazing to see the literary community collide with the yarn community. Fantastic day.

Photo above of me in the tree taken by my friend, Jason Vanderhill of IllustratedVancouver. Photos below taken by me.

Finishing touches on the cherry tree bark | My “tag” with one of the blossoms I made.

Finished tree full of blossoms. Even started covering the apple tree beside it and the neighbour’s tree!

A couple months ago I saw a tweet from Leanne Prain, one of the authors of the book Yarn Bombing: The Art of Knit and Crochet Graffiti. The tweet linked to the yarn bombing website and said they were organizing a yarn bombing of the Historic Joy Kogawa House’s cherry tree.

This immediately sparked my interest as it merged two of my passions—yarn and books! And I immediately knew the perfect yarn to use (from my stash too) and started crocheting blossoms.

I also had a thought— at my new internship I’ve got the chance to contribute to various magazine websites (I’m in the digital editorial department). So I mentioned the yarn bombing to Granville Magazine‘s editor, Hilary Henegar. She liked the idea and said to go ahead with the article.

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The Period of PURPLE Crying and the BC Children’s Hospital are raising awareness about Shaken Baby Syndrome by making hats for newborns.

We invite you to join our mission: make a PURPLE newborn baby cap so we can give select babies born in British Columbia the week of November 15th a gift to coincide with Canada’s National Child Day. Please share your knitting or crocheting skills to help Prevent Shaken Baby Syndrome BC.

By making and sending PURPLE newborn baby caps to be given to babies across the province, you will make a difference by:

• Raising awareness for this life-saving project that promotes crucial parenting skills, infant/parent bonding, and understanding of a typical early infancy stage that every baby goes through which is frequently misunderstood.
• Participating in a growing, province-wide grassroots effort to educate new parents about the normalcy of early infant crying and how to cope with the frustration that can accompany it.
• Assist in promoting the Period of PURPLE Crying – Prevent Shaken Baby Syndrome BC so that parents (and all others) learn to understand normal increased early infant crying and that crying is a key trigger to shaking.

I’m off to dig up a pattern and some yarn to make a hat. If you have a chance, you should too! I grew up in the same neighbourhood as the BC Children’s Hospital and often went late at night for rogue ear infections. The staff are friendly, the facilities are nice, so whatever I can do to help, I will!

Visit The Period of PURPLE Crying — Prevent Shaken Baby Syndrome BC: Facebook event | www.purpecrying.info | Twitter

What a Yarn!

There’s one love that we all share: yarn. Blog about a particular yarn you have used in the past or own in your stash, or perhaps one that you covet from afar. If it is a yarn you have used you could show the project that you used it for, perhaps writing a mini ‘review’. Perhaps, instead, you pine for the feel of the almost mythical qiviut? You could explore and research the raw material and manufacturing process if you were feeling investigative.

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Revisit a past FO (finished object):

Bring the fortune and life of a past finished project up to the present. Document the current state and use of an object you have knitted or crocheted, whether it is the hat your sister wears to school almost every day, or a pair of socks you wore until they were full of hole. Or maybe that jumper that your did just didn’t like that much…

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