The Trump Effect: #pussyhatproject.com

There's no nice way to say this: The Donald winning the US election felt like a kick to my lady parts.

#pussyhatproject.com

Personally, I had wanted to go on a media news fast on Election Day, but my kids are political news junkies (at ages 12 and 17!) ... and I had a feeling they would need an emotional chaperone through that evening; serves me right for raising social justice peaceniks.

When things started to tank around 10:45pm / 11pm Toronto-time I made them turn off the TV.  The next morning, I woke up and checked my device for the results and felt the world drop from beneath me.

1st thought: expletive expletive expletive. 

2nd thought : what am I going to tell my children? 

#pussyhatproject.com

I wanted to curl up and scream... but d*mn it. .. I am a parent and had to 'get my adult on' and be calm, collective and reassuring.

Parenting sucks.

My 17 year old daughter woke up before I got upstairs. I didn't have to tell her. I heard her weeping.  She let me hug her... and she never lets me hug her these days. I didn't end up telling my 12 year old son.  The daughter pushed past me and crawled into bed with him. She broke the news.

Like I said, we are Canadian.

This should matter less to us.
 
But it doesn't.  American friends: we are your neighbours.  We care about you. We care about the world.

One friend suggested I pick up my yarn and sticks and embark on a knit campaign much like I did back in the day of Rob Ford.  True, Ford was my 'muse' (see my blog posts from December 2011 - 2013), but the upcoming Trump Era feels darker... far more sinister and menacing.

Then I read about The Women's March on Washington https://www.womensmarch.com and The Pussyhat Project https://www.pussyhatproject.com and then beautiful serendipity struck.  I discovered that a gym friend is a member of Democrats Abroad and is heading to D.C. soon for the January 21st March on Washington.  Lovely Julie was thrilled that I offered to make her a hat.  What she does not know yet is I made two.  One for her friend as well.

I am not thrilled about inauguration day but I feel empowered about the day after!

Sending love (and a couple of hats) from North of the Border

#pussyhatproject.com

#pussyhatproject.com

Rebel Knitter x ♡ o ♡ x

#PumpkinCarving4KnitGeeks

Every year I feel enormous pressure to carve a cool pumpkin. 

I live in a neighbourhood bursting with creative types... and we have an annual Pumpkin Festival on November 1st each year.  So, yeah... a few triangles and a candle just don't cut it in my hood.  Yup. 36 years after graduating from high school... I am still succumbing to peer pressure. 

It's kind of ironic that I didn't carve a jack-o-lantern until I was in my 40s -- and not my early 40s at that.  My mishpocheh did not do pumpkin carvings. No pumpkin pie. Not even pumpkin kugel. Nada... and today I keep saying I'm Jewish, not Druish but my hood doesn't care.  So it's game on.

This year's carving is knit-inspired (hence the blog entry) and dedicated to all my Wooly Mamas and knit geek friends out there in virtual knit land...

Cool Panoramic - yeah, offspring #2 showed me how to do this

Hope the #^*%! squirrels don't eat it before Tuesday evening's festival....

As a dot dot dot ... here's a quick look at some of the pumpkins of Halloweens past... 

2015: Hamsa

2013: SkulLOL

2011: Skull Haunted House & OY VEI (in hebrew lettering)

 

2012: Owl & Che ... cuz... yeah.

2014: pressured to do two.. Dracula & The iPumpkin

It's not about blocking the haters... it's about hating to block...

Honestly.  I know I will need to block the bejeezers out of these puppies for them to end up measuring the exact same size... 

There's the lesson right there: same yarn, same knitter, same number of stitches and rows... different amounts of stress when knitting the Hamsa side and the Tree of Life side. 

And so I become Rosie the knitting Riveter ...

We Can Block it... Yes, We Can!

...and so it begins again.

Ideas are taking form.
The yarn was purchased long ago.
Let the Bar Mitzvah knitting commence.

Saying Goodbye; Creative Comfort

It had to happen eventually.

I knew it would. 

The time has come for our family to leave the elementary school whose community we have been a part of for the past dozen years.  

It's where both my children learned to read and write (in three languages).  

It is where friendships were kindled.

It is where the Friday afternoon knitting club had met (since 2004).

It is where the Lorax Project took root.
(See http://knittishisms.blogspot.ca/2010/06/double-mitzvah.html)

And so when the reality of our departure was imminent, I knew I could not leave this lovely group of people without one last knitting project.  With the Lorax Project in mind, I decided to spin the concept with a slightly different weft. The Lorax Project was a blanket, of sorts.  We sent our departing Principal into retirement with it. This new project was to be a redux, a revisioning.  But a project I would embark on alone.  Sometimes the toughest journeys are the ones we have to travel alone. I thought about what this school has meant to me (and my children) and from there, I came up with the concept that is

CREATIVE COMFORT:

Made from Eco Sock Yarn remnants, Creative Comfort incorporates a HAMSA, a TREE OF LIFE, the CHAI (Life Symbol) and the STAR OF DAVID.

Hamsa / The Healing, Protective Hand. Rebel Knitter c.2016

Magen David - To Shield and Protect through Cultural Knowledge.
Rebel Knitter c.2016

Chai / Life / 18 (the age of the school).
Rebel Knitter c.2016

The Tree of Life (based on an element from the Tree of Life Afghan)
Rebel Knitter c.2016

Anyone who knows me understands, in my mind sock-knitting is the ultimate form of cherished knitting. Consequently, to knit this piece with my favourite yarn was a natural choice.

But what does it mean?

Aside from the obvious symbolism of the iconography chosen, the overall idea was most relevant. It is a piece that looks like it belongs as part of a larger woolly fabric... that is intentional.

As any parent will tell you, when you have a toddler who loves their security blanket so much that you need to train them off of it, because quite simply, they are too old to be shlepping their threadbare, shabby, old 'banky' all over town.... one of the most common methods is to cut a corner off the tattered comfort piece and slowly wean the child by decreasing it's size daily or weekly.  I flipped this idea on its head a wee bit.  I created that 'corner' to leave behind at the school.  I, on the other hand, get to keep the lion's share of the fabric that is far from bedraggled: the intellectual fabric that are my children; these wonderful educators and the staff of this school helped weave their sense of social justice, they succeeded in inspiring curiosity, nurturing and honouring diversity as well as in creating a safe and warm community in which to grow and learn.

Thank you PPDJDS.

We will miss you.

Cherished Knitting

Over the past year, I have read far too many obituaries of people I know or know of. Relatives, friends, schoolmates, parents of friends, celebrities and work-related acquaintances.  Far too many have gone this year. 

Besides the natural evocation and contemplative impact I encounter upon reading a commemorative death notice, one of the most lasting marks impressed on my heart has been the use of the word cherished by those who remain.  

Cherished husband... cherished father... cherished son or daughter... cherished mother and wife...  

Were they indeed cherished when they were alive? 
Did they feel protected and lovingly cared for?  
Were they adored? 
Held dear? 
Doted on? 
Revered? 
Admired and held in high esteem every day of their lives? 
Not just after their time here on earth...as memory? 

Do we remember to ensure that the people we call our loved ones know they are treasured when they are animated participants of our everyday existence?

If not...Why not?

Feeling cherished is, in all probability, one of the most important contributors to general health: healthy relationships, reduced stress, greater motivation to succeed, and overall successful functionality.

Why is it such an easy word to write in a death notice, and such a difficult task to perform on a daily basis?  So many people I know tell me how they don't feel appreciated at home or at work; don't feel that their families care about them as much as they should.  Taken for granted. Taken advantage of. Ignored. Scapegoated. Does it really take that much energy to cherish?

I think not.

We have gotten out of the habit of cherishing the people in our lives.

Sometimes slowing down our fast paced lives is the secret recipe to Cherish.

Fast food. 
Mass produced clothes. 
These are some of the culprits of the NonCherished.  

Some of us who still enjoy constructing meals that take hours to prepare -- we know that we do it, in part, to show friends and family how much we care.  Yes, we could cater, yes, we could shortcut our way through an aisle at Costco: but we don't.  Festive meals strengthen tribal bonds of friends and family.  We break bread to make connections.

Similarly, as Knitters we create for those we cherish.  We measure and slowly fasten loops to unite simple fibre into an expression of adoration: scarves shield, sweaters enshrine, socks preserve, mitts embrace, and hats guard against malice for the people we care about.

Most knitters I know are constantly knitting gifts.  Many more knit for charities.  In fact, I believe that to share something you have created with someone you have never or will never know is the ultimate form of cherish: 'I don't know you. But I made this for you. Because you matter.' That's what I wrote on the note I slipped into the hat I knit for the 1,000 Stitches for Syria Project.  Those words along with 'Welcome to Canada.'

It's one of the reasons I knit socks as gifts. Socks look difficult, but once you wrap your head around their construction, they really aren't all that more arduous than a hat or shawl.  Yes, they are more than show-offy displays of "hey, look what I can do! I can turn a heel and knit with 5 double pointed needles at once"... but when you need someone to understand just how much you cherish them, socks are a genuine indication of just that:
 
"If someone makes you a hand-knit sock they really, really love you. Why?  Because a sock is knit with what essentially are toothpicks and dental floss, the knitter must screw up their eyes to keep track of those teeny tiny loops and learn to master a perfectly turned heel flap -- not to mention putting a knot in their neck to do it -- and in the end, voilà, a sock... You see, you know they really, really love you... because THEN they make you a SECOND SOCK TOO!" (Knittishisms, 2008)   Yes! They cherish you THAT much!

It's time to remind the people in our lives that we cherish them. Say it. Knit it. Even when you'd like to throttle them... hug them and measure them for a new cardigan.  It's better than a solemn farewell printed in a daily broadsheet that they will never read; and it will do you both a world of good.

Sock Knitting is my Happy Place

You know it's too many when you've transformed your yarn stash into a sock stash trove.

I have been cleansing both body and spirit through a long cathartic knitted process that could be described as PTSKD (post traumatic sock knitting design).  

I believe the enormous pressure of last Fall has been successfully washed away via the stitch by tiny stitch creation of footwear.  Becoming a real-live, ole-skool style, 3D printer of socks, was the only way to successfully weave a secure fabric of my cosmos back into solid footing.  Sock Therapy, would be an apt description; the creative process so closely linked with resuscitation and renewal.  And now....what next?  My Mum brought me some lovely handpainted DK yarn from her travels through Alaska and my immediate thought was "SOCKS! YAY" ...but no... please note: suggestions for a non footy, one-skein wonder are most welcome.

I am about to embark on a year long Knit Your Own Bar Mitzvah: Maverick turns 12 in the morning. 

It is time to start planning, designing and creating Maverick's iconic Bar Mitzvah 'ritual' items.  Stay tuned... ideas are forming, and how they manifest themselves over this upcoming year should prove, I hope, engaging for you readers.