World Wide Knit In Public Day is a notion that is already, mostly a common practice for knitters, I believe. Never the less, it’s fun to have a day during the calendar year that knitters can plan to spend, doing what they love. For me, I guess, the most astonishing aspect of this special day, is that it’s a world wide concept. That is significant!
I think the development of Ravelry has really brought the world together…the stitching world. With all the groups, designers, focus on yarns, and patterns, and a way to organize your projects, and even your stash, you search for a project made with a certain yarn and find that the person that knit that project lives in Canada, or New Zealand, or Ireland, Japan or Norway. It’s an amazing world wide thing!
Back to the concept of knitting in public, it is in some regards what knitting is all about. It’s a great creative outlet for sure, but it’s a way to keep hands busy. If you hate to just sit on the ferry boat on your way to work, or the bus or train. If you hate to just sit there waiting for the doctors appointment (my all time high was 2 hours, and that was pre-knitting). In those instances, we are knitting in public. I have to admit though, when I am knitting in public, I could look around and not see a single person knitting, or crocheting. It has made me wonder, with 7 million members on Ravelry (that is a world wide figure, and not every knitter is even on Ravelry), and 1,044 yarn shops in the USA alone, why don’t you see more people knitting in public?
I don’t know the answer to that question, but I do know that World Wide Knit In Public Day is every year in June. Even though it’s a busy time of year with kids getting out of school and graduations and Fathers Day around the corner. I always go to the event that the Churchmouse Yarns & Teas holds. Cold or warm (yes, sometimes it’s cold in June in the Pacific Northwest), we have a great time. They serve us tea and cookies, we shop, visit, knit and the passers by look on and notice what we are all doing, and some even stop to say hello and look at our work. I think it does help the craft. It’s like a small planted seed into the minds of others.
If you know of a World Wide Knit In Public Event or get invited to one, you should strongly consider going. It’s fun and part of the wonderful community of stitching. These are pictures from this years event held on Bainbridge Island, at Churchmouse Yarns & Teas! If you have any pictures you took, email them to me and I will add them to this post. Calling Alaska, California, Texas, New York, Idaho, Vermont and all the states – we’d love to add your photos. You can click on any of these photos to see their larger form~