Image via Flikr Creative Commons, courtesy of Twilight Taggers
By Kristen Lamb
When I was a kid, my mother tried to teach me how to cross-stitch (I think it’s a Scandinavian thing). All the women in my family were masters at sewing, and my Tante Trine? She had such mad cross-stitching skillz that her pieces looked as if they were created by machine. I enjoyed cross-stitching and sewing…but was TERRIBLE at it. Everything I made just ended up looking like the cat coughed up string onto fabric. For years and years I started and abandoned many projects.
Thus, when knitting suddenly became the “cool thing to do” I SO wanted to learn…yet resisted.
That is, until I discovered Knit-Bombing.
Imagine this. Splinter cells of terrorist knit-bombers lying in wait to use their needles to create mass confusion. You live in NYC. You lock up your bike and go to bed only to awaken and discover your only mode of transportation has now been expertly woven into a cocoon and attached to the light pole you chained your Schwinn to the night before.
Original image via Flikr Creative Commons, courtesy of Barry Pouseman.
It’s so PRETTY? How can you cut it free?
Knit bombing (aka yarn-bombing) can happen anywhere and to anyone. Which makes me wonder. Does the FBI have a psychological profile for knit-bombers? How does a knit-bomber choose a target? What kind of planning goes into this? Do we finally have a solution for using colors that should never exist, especially in yarn?
Image courtesy of Flikr Creative Commons, via Twilight Taggers
Before discovering knit-bombing, I had no desire to learn how to knit. Yet the idea of creating a yarn-terrorist-splinter-cell intrigues me more than is probably healthy. Can one be a splinter-cell of ONE? Will the local craft store that offers free knitting classes make me sign a waiver that I promise to use my knitting needles only for the powers of good? Is the NSA tracking the sale of needles and yarn?
Hey, at least the trees will stay warm and stylish during winter…
Image via Flikr Creative Commons, courtesy of Cathy Wasserman
Thus, in a parallel universe where I wasn’t too lazy busy to learn to knit, what targets would I choose? While bicycles, sign posts, car antennas, trees and park equipment seem to be favored targets, I’d choose the following. I know I am outing myself, because if any of these targets turn up knit-bombed, well I just published my Manifesto (or Knittifesto, Yarnifesto?) right here.
A TSA SECURITY SCANNER
I want to be a fly on the wall when they show up for work and that perky Peek-A-Boo Machine is sealed shut with fabulous cable stitching.
TIGER WOODS
Might be his only hope for marital fidelity.
ANYONE DOUBLE-PARKED
They deserve it.
WESTBORO BAPTIST CHURCH
Only because I can use what’s called a “Faggoting Stitch” to piss them off a little extra. And also, who would ever cut them free?
CONGRESS
Because the country should be run by people who’ve actually lived in…I dunno…REALITY. Trust-Fund-Baby-Ivy-Leaguers need to GO. JUST GO. We need a single mom who’s working two jobs to pay off a student loan for a STATE college to be in office. Someone who’s had to use coupons, work for tips, or live off free Wendy’s ketchup packets and soup crackers. America needs the guy who’s worked the past four holiday seasons at UPS to buy his kids presents.
Knit-bombing could save the country.
And, like the jerks who double-park, Congress deserves it. ALL OF THEM.
Of course, now that you’ve seen my ideas for knit-bombing projects, it is probably clear why I was terrible at cross-stitching. I tended to pick projects far too big for me to handle. But for the knit-bombers hiding away out there? Feel free to use my list.
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Kristen Lamb is the author of the #1 best-selling books We Are Not Alone—The Writer’s Guide to Social Media and Are You There, Blog? It’s Me, Writer. She’s just released her newest best-selling book .
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