The Bird Cage
How making an Amigurumi or knit/crochet bird can symbolize our shared desire for hope and freedom.
Quick Shop Updates - Scroll Down for the Bird Cage Story
Now available at the shop…
LumosLumos knitting/crocheting neck lights in five colors and bags.
Star Wars, Beetlejuice, and Nightmare before Christmas crochet kits.
New Hardicraft knit and crochet kits including Fall and Holiday Themed.
Clean Cotton Supreme Speckled yarn - great for dishcloth gifts.
NORO Tensan Silk/Wool Blend in two colorways.
Coming soon…
Falls Church Fiberworks Trunk show the first week in November!
More hand-dyed colorways from Hummingbird Yarn in Bulky, DK, and Sport Weights (Minnesota)
Super Bulky, and Silk/Cotton blends from Handspun Hope (Texas)
Loops & Bee Crochet Hook Minder Sets
More books recommended by customers
Intro to knitting kit and Kits for Kids Crochet Away
Juniper Moon Farm yarn for sweaters and blankets
Upcoming Classes and Events (with spaces available)…
Learn to Crochet - Four Sundays in a row starting Oct 26th 4:00 - 6:00 pm
Information Session/Discussion - All about knitting socks. Laura will provide pros and cons for each of many methods for knitting socks. Participants can share their experiences and ask specific questions. Monday, Nov 3 6:00 pm - night before Veteran’s Day.
Information Session/Discussion - Using Remnants and Swapping Yarn, Saturday Nov. 8th 9:00 AM.
Two Session Christmas Stocking Class - Tues Nov 11 and 18 6-8 pm
Kid’s Class! Intro to Knitting for Kids - Thurs Nov 13 and 20 6-8 pm
The Bird Cage - This week’s Tale from the Yarn Shop
Have you felt like a bird in a cage lately? Wanting to work but not able to find a job, furloughed without clarity about when or if you will get paid, endless expectations others have for your time, internal thoughts about how you look or should look, overall underestimated?
I was walking through the local thrift store on my way to the yarn shop with just a few minutes to find a small bookshelf for the yarn room. This is the thrift shop I went into many times over the last couple of months and found so many solutions for problems I did not know I had that could be solved with furniture. This time, a majestic gold and black birdcage felt like an x-ray of a part of my soul, a representation of the need for hope and freedom I did not know was needed more than a bookshelf. I asked, “how much for the bird cage,” and the person busily getting the store ready to open gave me the price and said it had just arrived. I resisted the impulse to buy the cage and left with a just a silk covered box to display stitch markers.
As the day went on customers shared their stories, impacts from the government shutdown, concerns with our future government, and even doubting their ability to do attempt a project they love… I kept thinking about the bird cage. I could picture it in the yarn room where I was going to put a bookshelf, full of amigurimi plants and birds. How this bird cage could be a way to bring people together around the human need for freedom of expression through art. Just before closing, I just decided to walk to the store, three blocks away, birdcage to represent hope and freedom in the yarn room. I quickly made the purchase and let them know I was planning to carry the cage to the shop. The person that helped me earlier jumped in to help me before I could continue my masochistic pursuit to carry it myself to keep impacts of my choices contained. Surprisingly heavy, although tangibly metaphoric for a symbol of confinement, we moved at a slow pace, tried different ways to carry it, and stopped to catch our breath when we could. The best part was to see her face when I showed her the yarn shop entrance, mostly filled with items I purchased in the thrift shop and transformed.
Later that day I described this idea to my friend Kathie laughing about the absurdity of having a bird cage in a yarn shop, like we normally did at with random experiences at the end of the day. She remembered a that Emily Dickinson wrote a poem about birds and that related to hope and freedom. With this, the vision for the bird cage and connection to the yarn shop became clear. “We are all entangled” were the words in my head that lead to the name of the shop after seeing the pattern “Entangled” Co-designed by Chandi Agee and Jennifer Matlock, at Expression Fiber Arts. I started thinking about how if we are all entangled in each other’s cages, we could work together to open the door to the cage through creative expression.
“What if”, these familiar and sometimes exhausting words entered my thoughts, “we could use the bird cage as a stage for an amigurumi and/or knitted bird challenge to unit us around the desire for hope and freedom”. Here we are… the Entangled Things with Feathers (aka Bird) Challenge will be launched today through Ravelry. Please bring or send your hope bird (without real feathers please) to the shop (or ship to 103 Rowell Ct, Falls Church, VA 22046) by December 15th.
This could be a bird figure, or a coaster with an image of a bird, or what your skill/imagination wants to create that represents a bird. There will be a gift card reward for the most inspirational, funniest, and most creative, decided before the end of 2025.
We will donate the birds to a local hospital or charity that provides joy to the less fortunate after the challenge if not retrieved by January 30, 2026.
For inspiration, I found a short discussion about the poem, “Hope” is the thing with Feathers, by Emily Dickinson, in a Lawerence Public Library blog by by Mmoore January 19, 2024 with an image that was too on-the-nose not to share:
“Hope” is the thing with feathers -
That perches in the soul -
And sings the tune without the words -
And never stops - at all -
And sweetest - in the Gale - is heard -
And sore must be the storm -
That could abash the little Bird
That kept so many warm -
I’ve heard it in the chillest land -
And on the strangest Sea -
Yet - never - in Extremity,
It asked a crumb - of me.
Notes: Originally titled “’Hope’ is the thing with feathers - (314)”
Copyright Credit: Emily Dickinson, “’Hope’ is the Thing with Feathers” from The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson, edited by Thomas H. Johnson, ed., Cambridge, Mass.: The Belknap Press of Harvard University press, Copyright © 1951, 1955, 1979, 1983 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College. Reprinted by permissions of the publishers and Trustees of Amherst College.
Source: The Poems of Emily Dickinson Edited by R. W. Franklin (Harvard University Press, 1999)
Kelly, this is such a beautiful concept and I can understand why you were so drawn to this cage. You put it in the perfect space and I am looking forward to seeing it in person. We all need reminders of the importance of hope, especially these days. Thanks for sharing your lovely story!