Yarn Bombing in Tauranga

Braille Music Transcriber, Moya Michalakis, writes:

Every year Greerton Village (in Tauranga), holds a festival of “Yarn bombing”-wrapping tree trunks in knitted and crocheted blankets decorated as works of art.

This year, each tree represents a song title, and supports a charity. There is a facebook page where you can Like the page, nominate a tree in the “Comment” and thereby vote for whichever entry (en-tree!) you think is best:

I was involved in a small way with the entry which supports the Blind Foundation. The tree trunk is wrapped in the foundation’s colours of yellow, orange and red, and was knitted by members and volunteers. The song chosen is Stevie Wonder’s “Sir Duke”, which has appropriate lyrics:

Music is a world within itself

With a language we all understand

With an equal opportunity

For all to sing, dance and clap their hands

One of the organisers of the Blind Foundation’s tree, volunteer Jayne Popham, asked me to braille the first couple of lines of the words and melody. I Perkinsed it onto a sheet of nice sturdy braille label plastic, and then Jayne mounted it over the print-out, and displayed it beside the tree. The result is a beautiful brightly wrapped tree trunk, decorated with knitted music symbols.

The trees lining the whole main street are all decorated in a similar way, making it a very bright and cheerful display. There are about 40 such trees, each showing great imagination and humour. Most popular with the children was the Puff the Magic Dragon entry, and also Thomas the Tank Engine. Other songs include “Octopuses Garden”, “All things Bright and Beautiful”, “Over the Rainbow”, “Strawberry Fields”, “Puppy Love”, “Buttons and Bows”, etc.