Friday evening Dippy and Rockpool Candy made what SHOULD have been sufficient to get them into the Guinness Book of World records for the World's biggest crochet hook. You see, the Guinness people required that the hook be in a shape normal to an ordinary crochet hook (Dippy IS shaped like a normal crochet hook, wouldn't you say?) and be used in a normal way. AND Rockpool Candy did just that!! And so did Laurie Wheeler!! Both of these talented crochetiers made a total of twenty stitches to complete a giant spiderweb!
And here we have the Team! Left to right, we have THE fearless leader of "Ravelry's" Crochet Liberation Front, Laurie Wheeler, THE famous fiber activist and yarn sculptress Rockpool Candy, "Twisted" co-owner Emily, the totally charming Hazel, and her Mommy, Twisted co-owner Shannon. Oh and yeah that's me in the background, totally humbled by the greatness in front of me. Dippy was so overcome he passed out in the arms of all that talent and charm.
Could it get any better? YES!! Dippy and I had the honor of an audience with the Internationally Renown Author, Freeform Crochet and Bullion Queen, Bonnie Pierce!! Bonnie took a liking to Dippy and even threw a couple loops around the lucky guy's neck. Lucky for me, Bonnie's husband Bill was handy so Dippy didn't dare try any funny stuff. Ever generous, Bonnie graciously coached me in the nuances of a good bullion hook design, although she doesn't need hooky nuances to do bullions. In fact, I firmly believe Bonnie could charm a 30 loop bullion off a cactus. She's that good.
And here we have Ireland's Pride, Rockpool Candy in the midst of actually crocheting, all by herself, with Dippy (who didn't help at all). Rockpool did TEN actual stitches on the perimeter of the giant spider web that we crocheted (YES I helped!) with yarn spun right in the shop from fiber donated by Fearless Leader Laurie Wheeler. Rockpool set us up with strands of yarn that radiated from a center point, with a crochetier between each strand. One would chain a section from one of the radial strands to the next, then hand the hook (we used ALL Jimbo hooks for the project!)to the next crochetier, who continued to chain her two radial strands together, and the hook was then passed to the next crochetier and so on till the circle was completed, Then we'd switch to a bigger hook and do the next circle and so on, till we ended up with Dippy at the furthest and biggest circle. What a BLAST!! You shoulda been there!
And when Rockpool finished with her magic (I was AMAZED she was actually able to crochet with that lunk), she passed the hook on to Laurie, who crocheted ten more stitches and passed ole Dippy on to another crochetier who i stoopidly failed go get a name from (I think I was in shock) and so on. Just amazing! I mean that guy weighs 25lbs!! Not much you say? Just imagine balancing a 25lb pole in one hand while throwing crochet loops with the other! Just amazing!
And here's Rockpool Candy, famed crochet artist, caught in her own web! Actually, she'd putting the finishing touches on this webby wonder Saturday morning as we finished up and got ready to head back to the real world. But not before...
We got a visit from WALDO!! Can you find him? heh. Actually this is Leethal (Lee Merideth) who dropped by with her spinning wheel just as we were hanging the web. We finished earlier than planned so Lee and her very nice alpaca missed out on contributing to the web. Not that Lee is a stranger to the web.. she's a designer! check her out at http://www.leethal.net/index.html
All in all a great time was had, and I'm VERY grateful to Rockpool Candy and her Hubby Andy (what good friends we've become!!) for coming all the way from Ireland to do stitches with Dippy, and to Laurie Wheeler and Hubby Jeff for organizing and having The Crochet Liberation Front sponsor the event, AND to Twisted Yarns in Portland for hosting us. And I'm especially grateful to Twisted for their VERY generous donation to FARA (Friedreich's Ataxia Research Alliance) through their purchase of Jimbo Chophooks!
And thanks to all who helped us in Portland, especially my son Lance, his bride Crystal, daughter Kylee and dog Louie P. Wigglebottom for their generous hospitality and good eats!!
grateful
Jimbo
Diplohookticus Jimbosei's official statistics:
Diameter of shank (hook size): 15.7 cm (6.18 inches)
Length: 147 cm (57.87 inches)
Weight: 11.3 kg. (24.9 lbs)
First use: Oct. 30, 2009
At: Twisted Yarns, Portland Oregon USA
By: Rockpool Candy of Ireland
and Laurie Wheeler of Camano Island, Washington, USA
9 comments:
WOW, that hook is amazingly huge and intimidating looking - who's working whom here? That hook is not helping! ...but, maybe having completed that spider web will proof that it can be used...looks like everyone had fun with it ;-)
Doris
This was so cool. Thanks for sharing Dippy's adventure with us.
Tammy aka wiz3283
So what is the actual size of Dippy??
Oii, very interesting! should be fun to try a needle that!
Hugs..Jimbo!
What does Guinness know anyway? That HAD to be a world record! Congratulations to all!
THAT was full of awesome sauce.
Hey Jimbo!
That was too much fun, and I have to say those 10 stitches were felt the next day too! LOL
Dippy was a pleasure to fondle...cough...I mean use!
And big thanks again to Karol for putting up withour craziness and to your son & his family for so wonderfully inviting us into their home! That was the best dinner we've had a long time! Fabulous!
You are awesome :)
What a fabulous post! Grateful you snapped some wonderful action shots!
Impressionante! Muito linda esta agulha... é enorme!
Um abraço,
Rehaab Mabrouk
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