Needlecrafters at Boardwalk

February 23, 2012

Our February meetings were among some of the best we have ever experienced due in part to our new customers/members. One of our newbies, fresh from Arkansas, knits socks. She really gets them completed quite fast. Another lady is just putting the final touches to a baby blanket-tree of life created by Nicky Epstein. I was very impressed as I know this to be quite a difficult pattern with no two rows the same. We also had some gentlemen join the group—one is knitting wash clothes and the other knits pullovers. The latter gent started knitting when he had the shakes after being in an auto accident.

The history of men knitting is a long one. In some cultures it is the man who knits, even today. From my own family history, my granddad could knit. He had many careers in his life—a miner in South Dakota, he worked for the Pacific Railroad laying lines across America, he worked for Henry Ford in Detroit, he was a fisherman off the Cornish coast in England, and when he retired, he had been working at the military air base in St. Mawgan, Cornwall, England. When he was out on the boats, he would take apart his old pullovers and knit them for play pullovers for his three sons. Re-purposing at its utmost, don’t you think?! My grandmother would do the fancy knitting for the boys (school and Sunday pullovers) as well as items for granddad, herself, and daughter. I even had a boyfriend who could knit (that was back when the dinosaurs still roamed the earth).

Although I talk a lot about knitting, please remember our group is about needlecraft and that can encompass all sorts of handiwork, and many of us in our group do all sorts of handcrafts. Personally, I am partial to knitting but that is because I have been doing it since I turned five. So…..don’t let my talk about knitting intimidate you. If you do counted cross-stitch (for example) come and join us.

Hope to see you soon.
Joyce D.
Boardwalk Branch