WWKIPD is World Wide Knit in Public Day.  It began in 2005 and the point is for
knitters to “ show the world that knitting’s not a dead or dying craft and to
help expand the idea of what a knitter is.” (taken from Stephanie
Pearl-McPhee’s – aka The Yarn Harlot’s – daily calendar)  A noble goal and an excellent excuse to knit
– especially in public, of course.

There are events surrounding WWKIPD around the country and,
one can only suppose, around the globe. 
There is even a website: www.wwkipday.com.  But I got kind of confused about the whole
thing this year because I found differing dates for wwkipd events.  Turns out (according to the website) that the
“day” has morphed into a 9-day stretch of options – i.e. anytime from June 12^th
to June 20^th is fair game for scheduling your event or, I suppose,
simply knitting in public on your onesies.

I can see the practical reasons for extending the “day” to a
sort of “season” (kind of like the 12 Days of Christmas).  For example, in Portland, Oregon
(where I happened to be last weekend) they held it on the 12^th – the
same day as the annual Rose Parade there. 
Locally, I have seen events scheduled for the 19^th – perhaps
the day works better for the organizers. 
Certainly, knitting groups that meet weekly could “knit in public” on
their usual meeting day – if they are not already doing so.  So, it is probably a good idea.

But I kind of prefer the “let’s drop everything and take our
knitting to the streets” attitude of the single day event.  It felt more like a solidarity thing. (maybe
less like a yarn shop promotional opportunity). 
I felt like on that day, I might run into knitters in coffee shops or
parks.  Kind of like Halloween when
people wear costumes to the grocery store. 
I felt a sort of moral obligation to knit publicly on wwkipd over the
past couple of years –but this year it seems like “well, it would be good to
try to do so sometime during the week.” 
And since I frequently knit in public anyway, well, it would not
actually feel like a big deal to me.  I
miss the emotional impact of  the
single-day wwkipd – even as I do appreciate
the opportunity for knitting events in our communities.