Space Invaders: a group project

Spencer Diamond here.
So I decided to try something new. I have all these crazy ideas for a yarn bomb, but I am only one person. I can't make all my ideas come true quickly.
The easiest solution was to get other people to help me. So I looked at all my friends and found two fellow yarn crafters ( a knitter and a crocheter) and asked them if they wanted to help me with a super secret yarn bomb.

The super secret yarn bomb was to cover the rail outside our campus with the solar system. Sun to Pluto (which I still consider a planet... and so does spell check apparently, because it wants to capitalize it). No moons, cause I am not insane.

The Sun (done by Botanical Garden)

Mercury (done by Botanical Garden)

Venus (done by Botanical Garden)

Earth (done by Botanical Garden) Sorry the photo quality is poor... I was freezing.

Mars (done by me, Spencer Diamond)

Asteroid belt (done by me, Spencer Diamond)

Jupiter (done by me, Spencer Diamond)

Saturn (done by me, Spencer Diamond)

Uranus (done by Black Pluto)

Neptune (done by Black Pluto)

and Pluto (done by Black Pluto)

We all worked on the sleeves, and I added the felt pieces on the Sun and the stars.
All in all working with others has turned out great. It has taught me what to expect from a larger project, which is that they look incredible once realized.

I also made a video of the whole bomb posted to my tumblr if you want to take a look at that.
This was an amazing project. Botanical Garden came up with the name. Other people took photos too, so hopefully I can do another post later this week with better photos of the planets.

And for the first time, I was confronted with security when doing a yarnbomb. They did not like our big project. So I have also learned that with big projects, you are testing societies limits more. I absolutely believe they will take it down Monday, but that's what you get sometimes.

This is definitely something I want to do with my yarn bombing crew again!

Who? The Doctor, that's who!

See, the problem with working on large projects is that I don't get out to yarn bomb as much as I might like.
Oh sure, I could throw a couple swatches out there if I wanted, but I think I have moved beyond that part of my yarn bombing career. I feel a greater need to do bigger projects and more involving ones.

I see a lot of bigger projects online. I think that main difference is that a lot of those people have crews. And I am still mostly alone.
I did co opt some people for a secret group yarn bombing project, but more on that later.

Today, I have lovely distractions to show you.
No, they're not yarn bombs, but they are a recent addiction.

You see... I discovered Doctor Who. The reboot, even tho my gf now wants to watch the old ones as well.
So I made an Ood hat.

The ball actually lights up too!

I want to try another one and see if I can get even more detail into the face.
Next we have one of the the New Paradigm Daleks.

This one is Scientist Orange.

And this one is Drone Red.

I am working on Supreme White right now.
I am also working on my IYBD project... which is huge and time consuming. Can't you wait?!
See you next time, hopefully with a real yarn bomb.

Very Happy Valentines Day

My Valentines Day was great.
I understand that it is a mostly ridiculous holiday (mostly because the single and bitter people in my life try desperately to make it so), but I enjoy parts of that ridiculous. Like silly limricks and witty v-day cards that I make by printing things off the internet.

But mostly, Valentines day is about hearts for me.
For years I have been giving my gf hearts for v-day. A crocheted one, a painted one, one that I picked up on Halloween that actually looks like a real heart in meat package (she didn't like that one so much).

This year, instead of a heart, I gave her chocolate and books.
And we made these hearts.

Can you tell which one is hers?

The one full of love <3

I know. I'm terribly cheesy. And my first heart at the top was a little sad.

Happy Valentines Day everyone.

Happy 2 year anniversary of yarnbombing! You have crabs!

Lawl.
So yes. As of today, I have been yarn bombing for 2 whole years. Since February 12th of 2010!
I honor of this momentous occasion, I did a little side project I have been meaning to do for weeks.

There is a statue out front of the Serious coffee in James bay, of a person riding a bike. My roommate commented that their head is vaguely spartan helmet like, so I have dubbed this the Spartan cyclist.
Anyway, they have a basket on their bike, so for whatever reason (I secretly blame Lex and Sabine) I decide to put crabs in her basket.

It is a pretty west coast concept I like to think.
Riding around with crabs in your basket.

There is a cute orange one,

Bluey greeny one,

And a lil yellow one.

The blue one and the orange one have labels attached to them. It is one of my more forward attempts at self promotion. It simply lists the urls for this blog and my tumblr one, and a thank you for enjoying my art.
Which I really hope everyone does, but I know some people don't like it.

Here's to 2012! And a wonderful start to my 3rd year of yarnbombing!

Let's go fishing!

My gf was on the bus today, listening to the bus driver describe the two routes that go into my neighborhood. She said the one goes to the thrifty's and the other goes by the fishing pole.
Now, when she told me this, I was stunned.
Especially since the fish got stolen new year eve.
But apparently I have created a landmark.
And the proof is in the writing. This isn't the first thing my gf has found that validates peoples love in the fishing pole. About a month ago she found this piece of paper shoved just inside the pole.

It reads as follows:
"This is a simple thank you. We appreciate the time you took to create this!"
I must say, I nearly died when she brought this back for me. The txt she sent me about it almost made me cry.
Anyway, with all that backing it up, I couldn't just leave the fishing line empty. We can blame the empty line for the last couple weeks on poor fishing, but today we caught something!

This lovely turquoise and yellow fish is now dangling happily from the line.

I have other ideas for fish and such that I can catch as well. We will have to see how it goes.

The rod itself has taken some damage as well. This is the first bomb I have gone out and had a hand in repairing, but in this case it's not so much as repairing as it is redoing. It's like reusing the tags people have destroyed.

If the rod doesn't hold up however, I will have to make a new one, because apparently this particular yarn bomb is enjoyed.

DAVIDsTEA gets Yarn Bombed!

I don't know about you, but I love tea.
Seriously, I have a caffeine problem. So finding tea was nice (as opposed to my energy drink addiction of which I am 2 years off of them! Whoo! or my Pepsi obsession... where I was drinking it even if I thought it didn't taste good) because it offered me caffeine in a variety of different ways, as well as offering me health benefits instead of detriments.
Enter DAVIDsTEA. My roommate and I were wandering around Hillside after class one day when we came upon a tea shop. Again, I love tea, so it was not hard for the lovely ladies behind the counter to lure me into the store. Once inside, I met Laura for the first time. She's the manager at the Hillside DAVIDsTEA location.

It's hard for me to know whether it was Laura's sunny disposition or the magnificent iced Happy Kombucha that she made for me that kept me coming back, but either way I love me some DAVIDsTEA.
In honor of my love of DAVIDsTEA (and Laura and her awesome staff!) I decided to create this yarn bomb flag.

(Those are the types of teas around the edge, in the order that they appear on the tea wall. Green is probably my favorite. How about you?)
And then last night, I tagged DAVIDsTEA.

I had to ask Laura for tape tho. I forgot mine. Remembered my camera at least.
Here's a photo of Laura with the DAVIDsTEA flag that I made. She's awesome, and she really seemed to like the yarn bomb flag that I made.

I hope you all like it too. And drink DAVIDsTEA! May I HIGHLY suggest Elf Help before it goes out of season (as it is an x-mas related tea), IT TASTES LIKE MAGIC!

Knotty by Nature welcoming bomb

So I went back to KBN today. The granny square pole was still up and it looked great in the daylight.
(on a side note, we rode our bikes, so this took us by the camo pole and it was still up!)

Even the door handle tag was still there, and a number of people really seemed to like them as they went into the store.
I met up with my wonder friend, and she gave me the swatches she said she would. My roommate and I then got to work stitching them together. Took about half an hour, but then we attached them to objects outside the store.

First up, the garbage can.
This was... a little smelly. But it was right beside the granny square pole, and there was not much outside their store.

I think it looks really awesome with its little band of color. The green and white square flag like thing is my favorite.

There are some interesting types of yarn/fabric that my friend has used in here. She makes little swatches to test out patterns and yarns. They end up being perfect for my sort of art.

Next I did this lovely drainpipe work. Sewing together work courtesy my roommate.

Followed by this small pole cover, because I wanted to show off Ryan's, one of the owners of Knotty by Nature, yarn bicycles by the light of day.

I think this turned out really well.
But I have learned something about yarn bombing from this project and the 21 days of yarn bombing that happened in November.
The big projects, the involving ones; those ones come across as the art they're intended to be.
So for 2012, I am looking forward to trying out more large, involving projects, and less small tags and swatches here and there.
I hope it sounds exciting!