the eve of the craft bombing week

The day of the 'bombing' had arrived and it started with a bombshell@

the lovingly created

the greatly admired well dressing

 over Penicuik's well

to brightly honour Cowan's care for the town...

we had to remove it again as one or two people reported it as offence after they showered us with highly offensive language  We are very sad for Penicuik in this respect.

But we can truly understand that some craft decor might not be to everyone's taste - and that a treasured monument deserves TLC. Well - we'll let you judge whether the gentle beauty and care (result of many hours of work) you see above, and some watersoluable crayon drawings (by a very enthusiastic crafter, oh dear, these volunteers!) and the applause and brightening faces of dozens of bypassers during the few hours when the waters flowed again are not the TLC this well and monument deserves?

What was left to decorate was then the trees and railings and lampposts (and there are loads of them!), as well as a couple of participating houses.

Feel free to check out more pictures here  - Only a tiny fraction of what has been done....

It was an  AMAZING amount of work that has happened: all the crafting (and thanks to our generous fabric and fibre donors, beautiful crafting) and then all the mounting. And all the work still to come of monitoring the craft bombs conditions and taking things down next Sunday...

We hope you will come to the town centre and have joy at seeing the colour. And please also help us by reporting to us at PCAA (West Street) if anything is not right
 We would have loved to cover all the sad looking sights in our town - like this wall:

But in the end decided not even to use the barbed railing above for the rainbow banner, but to stick to the trees..

and participating places

We were asked to say a few things why we took part in this national craft bombing week.
Well - different people do it for different reasons: some like to get together in a group to craft for a shared purpose, and others like to beaver away alone, explore ideas and share in the fun of still being part of something greater, locally, and nationally.
What all share is the wish to make their local town a brighter place. A firm and evident conviction that creating something beautiful is bliss, and an acceptance that different people have different notions of what is beautiful and that it is nice to be different.

.................... more from us to follow soon

find out more about what happens Nationally here this week:

http://www.voluntaryartsweek.org/