Graffiti Knitting

After lots of not spending any money at all, I took the boys to the coffee shop for a cookie. I figure we deserve a break now and then. Aleks sat drawing pictures of skulls and water bears for all the employees, as he is accustomed to, and I tried to keep Bastian from running amidst the studious hoards and their many laptops. We also had a nice long chat with an off-duty employee and friend, Felicia, while she sat knitting.

Felicia was knitting a hat, but I told her about how I'd planned to do some graffiti knitting that very evening with the boys in tow. I'd worked up a swatch ages ago for the specific intent of wrapping it about a pole in Coventry, but had not yet managed to get it actually mounted. A Facebook exchange earlier in the day on Poetic Terrorism reminded me that I still needed to get my Slytherin swatch up there.

Thus, after cookie and my coffee, that's just what we did. The boys whined as a light drizzle fell upon us and I insisted they hold tightly to my bag so I could both stitch up a seam and make sure they didn't run in the street. Passersby glanced our way bemusedly and one woman said, "Is this a bit of public art?" To which I replied, "Yes!" And she responded, "Wonderful!"I'm considering a Gryffindor swatch for the opposite pole. My hope is that others will notice and begin adding bits of their own. I was sure to choose poles that were generally left unaddorned for holidays and which were cold and sterile and in great need of sweaters.
Afterwards, we went to Tommy's for dinner, a real treat to round off our time out. Then on the walk home, we got caught in the rain and bitterly cold wind, which made the whole of the day - despite the cookie and dinner out and all the talking and visiting and drawing - the Worst Day of Alek's Life.

Alas, there is no pleasing the kid. He's suddenly going on 15, it seems. He talks of wanting to be a teenager so that he can be "cool." I've assured him that teenagers mostly just want to be adults and that the whole of adolescence is immensely frustrating. I don't think he's taking my word for it. I don't think he should either.

We talked about it more later and he decided that it was both the Best Day of his Life due to the cookie and dinner and talking and drawing and visiting and the Worst Day of his Life due to the getting caught in the rain. He said the graffiti knitting was just boring. Harumph.