KIP

This weekend, I was KIPping. KIP means "Knit in Public," and Saturday, June 10, was the second annual World Wide Knit In Public Day, a day for knitters to get out and knit, in public. Novel idea isn't it? Some knitters are regular KIPpers, others, only KIP in groups, still others, are shy about their knitting and don't KIP at all. WWKIP is a show of solidarity among knitters and honestly, knowing that knitters all over the world are out and about displaying their enthusiasm for fiber is rather exciting. For the longest time, knitting had the reputation of being stiff, dowdy, and just down right uncool. Knitting was relegated to parlors and was not carried to the local pub. Only a certain type of person knitted. Not anymore!

My WWKIP celebrations began with taking my knitting to a 9:00 am birthday party screening of Cars. The knitting stayed in the bag. The movie was just too good to take my eyes off the screen. Seriously, it was very good, go see it, just don't expect to knit while seeing it. After the movie, we rushed to a baseball game where I knitted on a tangerine hat for Italian's cousin in California who is having twins. I'm winging the pattern and was shocked to see that it looked like a fruit of some sort. There is a little stem on the top and little leaves. (A picture and a pattern are coming.)


After the game, I drove downtown to my knitting groups KIP event. We knitted while drinking beer (it was a pub) and dining on fish and chips (I am Irish). While knitting, drinking, and eating, I looked at the other people there and was amazed at how different everyone in my little knit group is. We range in age and background. Some are politically conservative and others are politically liberal. Some of us are parents and some of us are single. We even have a guy knitter who comes and hangs out with us. We listen to different bands, and come from different cities. We like different foods and we live in different parts of our city. Shoot, some of us even live in a different state all together. We have a lot of differences, but we always have fun when we are together knitting. And really, how cool is that? If we were to have met without sticks and yarn in our hands, we probably would not think twice about the meeting. We would probably not try to form connections because we may not have seen how similar we really are. But because we are knitters, we look forward to seeing each other. We look forward to sharing what is going on in our lives. We look forward to being with others who share our interest and for the two or three hours that we sit and knit, we look forward to being knitters, and being with others who understanding that part of us.