The Happy Hookers got 2024 off to a cracking start with the first of their projects this year - we do love a good community project! June marks the 80th anniversary of D Day and inspired by the UK postbox toppers she's seen on Facebook, Tansy Forster (an Englishwoman who now lives close to the D Day beaches) decided the event should be commemorated in France with an exhibition of 80 knitted/crocheted scenes inspired by the film 'The Longest Day'. And so 'The Longest Yarn' project was born - click on the link for lots more information.
The project has now taken off big time with crafters all over the world taking part, so naturally our group decided to join in. We started off by making some cornflowers* to attach to the 'skirts' surrounding the 1 x 0.5 metre scenes at the back end of last year. Sadly we missed the boat to add more to our tally of 11, and also the opportunity to craft the various flags of the allied countries involved as the project really picked up the pace whilst we focused on other projects.
Instead we turned our attention to making sunshine yellow poppies for another part of the display and met on Saturday to make the 20 we'd committed ourselves to. We nearly missed the boat again, but Michelle quickly got in with our promised allocation just in time last week. Unlike the hundreds of red poppies we made for the Chippenham cascade, there are no black centres required as a 'sea' of yellow is needed for the design, and we were pleased we already have plenty of simple patterns on file to adapt from that time, alongside the Hobbycraft version on the main project's files.
Just like before, we've left the tails on to help with fixing them onto the designated background over in France later this year. We completed our allocation in good time on Saturday, with plenty of lively chatter plus biscuits and refreshments along the way. The completed flowers are now winging their way to one of the UK co-ordinators ready for shipping over to France.
Michelle also collected some more cat blankets on Saturday destined for Bath Cats and Dogs Home and we agreed if anyone would like to make some more we will continue this as a background project for 2024. Anyone is also welcome to make hats and scarves for Doorway throughout the year, prior to our specific meeting for this activity in October. NB contributions from any Belles knitters out there are also welcome for these two community projects.
*Cornflowers are the French remembrance flower