knitting dolls

knitting dolls
There are lots of different ways to set records with knitting, and a group of Vermont elementary school students hopes to make a big mark with a giant ball of finger-knit cord. The project was the brainchild of two second graders, and they and classmates have been working on the project all year. The unofficial tally for the length of their knitting is more than 5 miles, which would handily beat the current record of 3.85 miles, set in Austria. Eight-graders in New Hampshire are working on a project to make life a little brighter for kids with HIV and AIDS.
They're knitting dolls that are used instead of packing peanuts in shipments of medication taken to clinics in Haiti and Africa by people on mission trips. Some of the kids had to learn to knit in order to take part in the project. A Massachusetts yarn shop that works on the project says it has shipped more than 8,000 dolls as part of the project.
A pair of New Zealand artists wants to dress up the town of Nelson in time for the Rugby World Cup. They plan to put large-format photos of locals and famous people in "blank spaces" around the city as well as decorating trees with
knitting and fences with cup art. The artists say they want the
displays to be a "punch...between the eyes" for visiting journalists and a way to attract people who aren't rugby fans. They say the art would showcase the town's "quirky sophistication" as well.
The British heart charity Arrhythmia Alliance is looking
for knit hearts and blanket squares to be sold to raise money for the foundation that raises awareness of the problems of irregular heartbeat and helps people with the problem. The group says knitting is a natural craft to be tied to the heart because it's something that people can do even when they're recovering from strokes or other heart-related health problems. Finally, in more British knitting news, the people of Sussex are apparently the most knit-obsessed in the country. It's been two years since the Craft Council launched a craft club initiative for kids, and 5 percent of all the clubs that have been set up since then are found in Sussex. It's great to see the next generation taking an interest in an old art form!
I'm not the sort of knitter who spends a lot of time thinking about what it means to be a knitter. I learned to knit when I was a kid, and though I've always had feminist tendencies I never really thought about whether knitting was a way to transcend
stereotypes of what it means to be a woman or if in reality it was
poking the sisterhood in the eye. I've just
always liked doing it.
In the Loop: Knitting Now by Jessica Hemmings.
Black Dog Publishing.
I also don't think of my knitting as art, which
the artists who are spoken about and write the essays in In the Loop: Knitting Now certainly do (and are). This collection by Jessica Hemmings includes 19 essays about what it means to be a knitter, an artist, an activist or any combination of those. The book and the essays take a scholarly approach to knitting and the use of textiles as art and a means of protest. All of that scholarship can easily go over the heads of knitters who don't have a grounding in art criticism, comparative literature or a similar field.
I have none of those things, but I did still enjoy this book for the wonderful array of illustrations of knit art and for the point it makes that knitting is a subject worthy of being looked at in a serious way. It's just another reminder of the big, wonderful world that knitting is, and the wide array of characters who can be found in it.。