Yarn Bomb Beaufort

According to Wikipedia "Yarn bombing is a type of graffiti or street art that employs colorful displays of knitted or crocheted yarn or fiber rather than paint or chalk.While other forms of graffiti may be expressive, decorative, territorial, socio-political commentary, advertising or vandalism, yarn bombing was initially almost exclusively about reclaiming and personalizing sterile or cold public places."

I have a part-time job of placing exchange students with host families. It is not always easy finding families to open their homes. If they are a interested, there is something else holding them back, like moving or their husband or the size of their house or the schools. Life happens. I love when I find families that jump right in and we finish up the process in a couple days and before I know it, they are selecting their student!

One day I came up with an outside-the-box idea about getting the word out there. Yarn Bomb Beaufort!
I have been browsing yarn bombing for years. I bombed a couple trees at our Athens home and at the school I worked. I put a scarf on the mascot eagle statue in front of the school.
So I have been plotting for a couple weeks. Driving by locations, measuring objects with my tape measure, knitting every night...
I am actually using scraps of projects I started and never finished. I pulled out the unfinished projects, binded them off, and plotted where they would go. The yarns I am using vary from wool, acrylics, hand-spun, and cotton. Most balls are left over from other projects. 
I have about 12 places I want to bomb in Beaufort. Joe is going with me tomorrow night on our date so I can sew them to objects in Beaufort. I gave myself the deadline of Friday night (4/17) to be ready by. I made a blog and post about my reason for yarn bombing Beaufort and made a QR code. The QR code will be tagged on each item that I knitted. The goal is for people to scan the codes and then call or email me if they want to host an exchange student. My second intent is to get publicity in the newspaper or on Eat Sleep Play Beaufort so that I can reach more people. Only Joe and my counselor know about it so far. Her response was, "I hope you don't get arrested." 

I thought about the "event" all day Friday and finished up some pieces and tied the tags on. 
Wrapped around a tree at the Port Royal Farmer's Market
On the sea wall at the Waterfront Park
On the staircase at Common Ground
On a pipe on Carteret Street (my favorite)
On a stop sign on Paris Avenue in Port Royal
On a tree on Paris Avenue in Port Royal
Joe was my accomplice. He was a little nervous about going with me because of guilty by association. He took photos of each bomb for me. He wore camouflage to be funny. After we left the Open Mic Night, we went back to the van to get my canvas bag. Joe was pretty patient with me for the most part. We started at 9:30pm and arrived back at home at midnight. We had to stop to get water and use the restroom at Parker's in Port Royal. We were able to get 10 done on Friday night. We did 2 more on Saturday morning before picking up the kids from my parent's house.
On a YMCA bike rack
On the McTeer bridge
Bathing suit top on a mermaid 
This bathing suit top was originally on a statue outside of the Beaufort County Library. When we drove by Saturday morning, it had already been removed...My heart sunk. My father had a book signing for his published book that afternoon so when I went to that, I asked about getting the bathing suit top back. The employees told me that they loved it and they posted it on their fb page, but they couldn't leave it up. She also said that my QR code gave an error message!! Panic hit. I scanned it myself and I got an error message too. The QR code I used was a preview only so it didn't work. The first voice I heard in my head was my husband's, "Did you check to see if they worked?"  I had checked them prior to printing them. I rushed to a computer in the library, created a new code, printed it, and rushed to Staples. I could not relax and calm down until I knew all my "bombs" had correct codes on them! Along with each code, I also wrote my website so it could be accessed by people that didn't have QR readers. My website is loveexchangestudents.blogspot.com.

Joe and the kids rode around Beaufort with me so I could put new tags on them. It didn't take nearly as long to change the tags out as it did threading the knitting around objects. When I finished tying the bathing suit top on the mermaid, I could breathe! We took the kids to the park. 

On my blog, I can see page views. It looks like after I changed out the codes, I had a few views on my website. It has also been a rainy weekend so the weather hasn't been as beautiful where people are out seeing them. I have plans for a few more yarn bombs in Beaufort that I hope to complete real soon. I am waiting on Eat Sleep Play Beaufort and the Beaufort Gazette to jump on this story and give it the publicity it deserves!

What do you think is a good spot in Beaufort to yarn bomb?
R

Since I wrote this blog, I bombed three more locations. Now I have 15 total in Beaufort.






Comments

Lynn Hopper said…
I loved your yarn bomb on the drain pipe outside Fordham Market, but although I have looked (and am often in Port Royal) I have only seen one other. I did e-mail someone at the Gazette about it, but have not heard back. I'll try again. I'm a retired newspaper editor and if it had happened in my town, I would have been all over it. Good luck and I will keep looking. I post them on Facebook, but most of my friends are in Indiana.
July 6, 2015 at 5:00 PM
Rebekah said…
Thank you for your comment. Some were removed like the mermaid bikini and the Chambers bridge and a chain link on the seawall in the Waterfront Park. I am going to put my business card on them instead of the QR code because they are not being scanned. I can see how many views my blog post gets. I will probably add some more downtown before the Water Festival since it will be heavily populated. Common Ground left their up on the staircase, but I think I am going to put another fresher piece on it since it has weathered. Thank you for your support!
July 11, 2015 at 11:26 AM
Rebekah said…
I have one of a tree on Paris Avenue, Dockside, and a stop sign on Paris Avenue. Also, one at the Port Royal Farmer's Market. There is one on a park bench at Port Republic and on the McTeer bridge on the walking lane.
July 11, 2015 at 11:28 AM
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