Double Mitzvah

I am so pleased to tell you all about what has happened with our little school Lorax project. It grew, and it grew, and then it grew some more until it became something much more than it was originally intended to be.

What began as a creative, environmental endeavor turned into a fabulous double mitzvah.

First, some marvelous child and adult knitters and crocheters came together and collectively assembled a magical array of texture, colour and pattern; joyfully displaying their phenomenal creativity.

Then, a school came together and collectively planted a massive grove of trees to honour their principal. Thank you to all who contributed to the recent fundraiser. As a community we more than doubled the reserve. We raised over $1,000 for the JNF!

Janet was speechless when I told her what we had done. I don't know if any of you have ever seen Janet speechless (I certainly hadn't), but she was. When I told her that the quilt was hers, she simply welled up with tears.

I went up to the JNF offices to present them with the monies last week, and they are truly impressed and thankful.

Thank you everyone on a collective job well done.

And on the 22nd day, she rested...

...At Last....

...She is Done...

With five minutes to spare before the beginning of shabbat on the 21st of May 2010, the Lorax Project was completed with bamboo dowel and tabs all measured and in place.

This collective project was born out of our school's eco-minded sensibilities. Using both traditional and alternative environmentally friendly yarns, members of the PPDJDS community have contributed knitted and crocheted pieces of various colours, patterns and textures.

Thank you to Moreh Seth for planting the idea of a school knitting project in my head last spring, and to all our talented fibre artists for their many hours of enthusiastic creativity and labour. Also thank you to Marilyn & Jonothan of Romni for guiding many of the knitters through the aisles to find the ethical yarns for which they were searching. The result is a rich and stunning collection that truly reflects our fabulously eclectic community.


Fibres used: Alpaca Wool, Bamboo, Banana Silk Fibre, Cotton, Hemp, Milk Fibre, Organic Cotton, Pima Cotton, Recycled Cotton, Recycled Silk, Recycled Wool, Sea Cell / Seaweed Fibre, Silk, Soy silk, Sugarcane Fibre, Tea-dyed Cotton, Tencel, Wool.

Fibre Artists: Ali, Debbi, Yafa, Rosanne, Zoe, Cindy, Jennifer, Meredith, Tanya, Liora, Cydel, Micah, Janet, Aviva, Jeremy, Dena, Caren, Shira, Elana, Rona, Jodi & Osnat

Day Three... and counting

When I explain to parents the benefits of teaching children how to knit, I mention that some of the fabulous skills they can learn or build on (almost by accident) are: attention to detail, creative expression, focus, fine motor skill development, math, and yes, even patience.

In this world of instant gratification -- and let us not forget that our children know ONLY a world of this kind.... a world of emails, touch-tone dialing, skype, texting, mobile phones and on-demand-in-flight-entertainment -- and this world of automation -- of remote controlled everything (including self dispensing soap & self flushing toilets) -- for them this is normal... In this world, learning the virtues of patience, long-term planning & perseverance through the art of knitting can be a subversive, fun way to teach these difficult 'old fashioned' foreign concepts.

So, when one of my 'ace' knitters came up to me this afternoon with a "Is it done yet?" I thought he was kidding! No. He was serious.

The plain and simple answer is: NO, J it's not done yet. But I am working on it. For goodness sake, it's only May 3rd. I was casting off L's square not 7 minutes prior to your question, and I arrived home 20 minutes after that to a paper bag stuffed into my mailbox with someone else's endeavor.

Besides 20x20 cm seems to be a highly hypothetical concept these days, it seems.... Rebel's got a serious balancing act playing itself out here...

Memo to self: remind kids to slow down and breathe.... remind myself to drink more coffee & crochet faster....

Here are some more pics of some more of the new squares.....

Lots & Lots of iddy biddy squares (sweet!)

This used to be Jen's white cotton with her permission, I dyed it using tea bags (orange pekoe, in case you are interested) -- btw, it was her idea.

Debbi's fab crochet

Osnat with Jade (awesome!)

Tanya's Jazzy Knit

Hope in English, Hebrew, Japanese, French & Sanskrit (using organic cotton, milk fibre, pima cotton, tencel, sugarcane fibre, seacell, merino wool, alpaca wool, & soysilk)

And there are many more squares.... stay tuned....

So, nu? Where are the squares?

Just to give you a teasy sort of view of how the Lorax Project is starting to shape up, here are some of the squares. Some are pre- some are post- and some are mid-connection... yes, even though it is not quite May 1st, I have started putting this baby together as the pieces come in... otherwise, it would never get finished before the end of the school term.... besides May 1st is not just International Workers' Day, this year it also is Shabbat. (Kind of a conflicting theme going on there, don't you think?)

This gives you a pretty good glimpse of how this is going to get put together. First, I must find 4 squares that actually 'go together'.... visually (colour, balance, theme) as well as spatially...

(they are not all 4"x4" or 8"x8"

... so it is a wee bit of a puzzle fixer upper at times).

Then I block them individually.

Then I crocheting them together a la granny square...

Then they get blocked again.

Then I crochet them into a 'finished' four-some...

Then, if the knitting and crocheting gods are in a laughing,

mocking, na-na-na-boo-boo kind of mood,

I block them yet again

in a sort of holy trinity blocking mikvah kind of way

....yes, yes, I know you are sighing with jealousy,

but, alas, not everyone can have this much fun on a Saturday night....

you just gotta be super lucky and fancy free like me.

But, yes, you too can live and dream like the Rebel Knitter....

make me a square!

Meredith & one other square

recycled wool & silk & banana fibre + one of Jodi's awesome diva crochet stitching

Janet's groovy knit + one flower (hand painted New Zealand wool)

when I pulled this back because it looked like there was a slight conflict in the Arctic & Atlantic waters (hmmm - do you think this could have had something to do with that whole Iceland affair?) Any interruptions during this process received a sharp "shushing" from yours truly: Keep quiet, please, can't you see Mummy's trying to save the world here?

Debbi.
You are right.
I haven't blogged in a while.
I guess, I was holding out for you to start crocheting me a square.
Yay... it worked.
And just because you actually dug deep into the back of your closet to find your yarn & hook, here are some more visuals to inspire you to hook on...

The Mazel Tov Magen David in reverse stocking knit motif.

Four. Four. Four times the love.

"Unless" -- My favorite single word directly from the realm of Seuss' Lorax.

The Tikuun Hamsa: Repair & Protect

Last week someone asked me some excellent questions about the project:

Q: Huh? Why are you doing this?

A: Community spirit, community action & to make right the wrongs of the evil knitter 'The Oncler" (see blog entry of March 14th)

Q: Why not all the same yarn? all the same patterning? uniformity? etc.

A: This project is about pluralism, inclusiveness and the mosaic that makes up our micro & macro communities. It's what I love about my children's school, the city & country in which we are fortunate to live.

Q: Why is it called the Lorax Project?
A: Seriously? OMG, you haven't yet read it? I some how missed out on it as a child & was lucky enough to have children who are Seuss fans. Run, don't walk. Get to a library f-a-s-t!

Lorax Project Update

The squares are starting to really come in now.
I am still not entirely certain how 'big' this baby is going to get.
Will start posting some photos soon.

-Rebel

My Lorax Project

Last summer, after reading Dr. Seuss' THE LORAX to little Ziggy, I came up with this phenomenal project for the kids' school... sort of an community event / fundraiser / artsy fartsy thing... also, the look of horror my little boy's eyes when he realized that the Oncler, a villain/naughty person in the book, was an evil knitter that destroys the world... "Mum.. you wouldn't do that to the Truffala trees, wouldya?"

Yes, I had an environmentally tuned in 5 year old. which was great, but, oh my - oh my - I had to redeem the knitters of the world in his eyes...

So that's when I came up with The Lorax Project: I posted it in the school newsletter:

Do you knit, crochet or work in textiles? Do you know someone who does? The Friday Lunch Knitting Club is starting a collective project and we'd like to invite you to participate. In keeping with our school's eco-minded sensibilities we have been discussing, and using, environmentally friendly yarns.

What you need to do: Knit/Crochet/Weave/Embroider one 8"x8" (20cmx20cm) (or 16”x16”//40cmx40cm) square in 100% natural fibre (cotton, soy, wool, silk, tencel etc) or 100% recycled yarn. No synthetics. Also, please no linen for reasons of kashruth. You decide the colour, the pattern and texture. Produce 1, 2, 3 or more squares. Then contact Rebel Knitter who will be piecing our Community masterpiece together.

When do you need to get this all to her? May 1st, 2010
What then? We will display our collective project in the school hallway and have a silent auction with the funds going to an environmental / tree planting cause : THE JNF.

Sounds great, right? Only. I have NO IDEA if I'm going to one, two, or fifty squares.... so I'm knitting, I'm crocheting, I'm even considering macrame-ing... OMG, what was I thinking?

So far I have knit a Banana Fibre Square. A Merino Wool Square. A 60% Wool / 40% Recycled Silk Square. And a lot of Cotton... Lots of Intarsia. Leaf Imagery. Bird silhouettes. Peace Sign. Butterflies... and of course a large square with the Lorax's most salient message "Unless" knitted into it... ahhh....

My student knitters seemed overwhelmed at the thought of an 8" x 8" square... so I told them Okay, how about 4 gauge swatches instead.... that seemed less daunting a task, somehow.

We'll see what we get.... But here's the FUNNIEST part. Rebel Knitter has been know to labouriously re-jig camisole or sweater pattern in order to avoid sewing seams... (It's not a laziness thing... it's a mix of aesthetic reasoning & the fact that my 45+ year old eyes just go boinky on me after a while.... so, let's see.... how many seams do you think this little sucker of an afgan is going to need...

I can hear you all cyber-laughing at the Rebel Knitter.... ha ha ha... yuppers, what the *&%^$ was I thinking?

But, yes, my son thinks I'm cool - and I have assured him, this project is no thneed....

I will post a photo of the finished product in good time. In the mean while, however, I have an ophthalmological appointment I think I need to make.

Rebel Knitter's Purim Costume

They stared at me intently. Hands on waists & wide-eyed.

If you're coming to the school to teach tomorrow, you HAVE TO, HAVE TO, HAVE TO have a costume. It's the Purim Carnival, you know... Duh?!?!?

Um... Okay.

I'm not a Queen Esther or Vashti type so, I needed to come up with something.

Fast.
As I teach knitting on Friday afternoons at the kids' school & the tooth fairy has visited my house twice this past week, I had to go with the combined theme.

Here she is:

I know, I know, no image of the rebel herself in the shots, but hey, it's kind of hard to photograph the wings on your back when you're also the photographer.

Also, I wore my most fuzzy bright mohair cardi (yes, after it was all knitted up I figured out why the skeins were on sale). I call that sweater my Wookie Cardi. Also A couple of 10 mm needles criss-crossed through the back of the wings/sweater to show that I'm a Hard Core knitter, you know...

&

Oh, I almost, this little gem (as modelled by my dear daughter)What is a knitting Fairy without her trusty "frogger"....

How much fun is that?