unleash the power of inspiration...

                                         unleash the power of inspiration...

Changing Seasons - Not quite Fall...yet

September is one of those months which seems to have strong associations for most people. This is probably because as children it was the start of the new school year.  For many it still has that strong back-to-school feel and I know lots of people start to look forward to the winter festivals. But for me September holds one more blast of summer-like fun before heading into those long winter months. I am a big film lover and living in Toronto September means TIFF (Toronto International Film Festival).



A couple of years ago I saw an Icelandic film The Deep at TIFF. I must admit I picked it out of the huge line-up of films for two reasons; one -I had been to Iceland the year before and two- I had hoped to see a plethora of traditional Icelandic sweaters just as I had when visiting the country itself...but sadly that wasn't the case in the movie.


The film is based on a true story of a fisherman who is ship wrecked and miraculously survives for many hours in water so frigid that it would kill most people in just a few minutes. It’s an amazing Saga-like story of somebody overcoming all the odds. But as great as the film was I was disappointed however, as only one or two of those beautiful yoked Lopi sweaters appeared on screen.
​ 
 I have a friend Norm Wilner who is a movie critic – he is in fact the husband of designer Kate Atherley. He is heavily involved in reviewing movies and interviewing actors, directors & producers during the festival but even though I know that he was super busy I dropped him a quick message to explain my disappointment. I knew he would understand my feelings after all he’s married to Kate who is also geeky about knits in movies. We exchanged a few messages and somehow ended up hatching a plan that I would now base my reviews of the movies I saw based on how good the knit content was. My critique would be based on a “skein out of 5” scale. I still secretly hope that Norm will one day use my scale in print. 

 Cut forward a few days when it turns out that Norm was interviewing the director of the movie. So he asked about the lack of sweaters (I love Norm for this). It turns out that it had been a conscious decision to not feature them. I was so thrilled when I heard the reasoning. It turns out I’m not as crazy / geeky as I thought. In setting the scene for the action, the moviemakers had struggled to find a way to show that the hero of the story doesn’t feel the cold like most people do. So they decided that showing him not wearing a traditional sweater (and with his coat unfastened) would do the trick. The story unfolds and, through a battery of tests performed on him, we discover that he has a layer of fat that is akin to blubber that insulates him. 

​ Luckily this phenomenon has never been seen in others, so as the season turns colder we will all still need our lovely warm sweaters. Of course they won’t help us if we are shipwrecked but it's a risk that I can live with. In case you are wondering I haven’t seen anything that would garner even a 1 skein out of 5 during this current year at TIFF but I’m still holding out hope. 


Thank-you for reading and I hope that you enjoy the photos - this month photos of late summer / early fall's bounty and new boots (of course). Please check back next month to see what my latest fascination is.



 See you next month!       

Fiona xxxx














On-line, on-nine

Monthly post on the 9th of each month!    


On-line, On-nine September 9th 2014