We're In the Newspaper!!!!

Sat, Sep. 23, 2006 -- Centre Daily Times 

Friendships, fabrics

formed at knitting club

A renewed interest in crafts is sweeping the nation.

Perhaps the desire to knit, quilt, or sew can be chalked up to a desire to get back to simpler pastimes, or maybe it can be traced to the domestic influence of Martha Stewart.

Whatever its origin, infectious nature of the crafts bug is nowhere more evident than in the group of women who meet bi-monthly at the Centre Hall Community Library to knit.

Unlike the popular perception of a knitting circle as a group of ancient ladies stitching on lap robes and sipping tepid tea, the membership of the Penns Valley Knitters represents a wide range of ages and knitting ability.

And the group is quite a bit more raucous than you'd expect people who rely on the good nature of the librarian on duty to be. Between bursts of laughter and some good-natured ribbing, talk swings from patterns and stitches, to family updates, to who's hot on "Grey's Anatomy."

"It's not your grandmother's knitting group," says Lori Corman, of Zion. Then, after a moment of reflection she adds, "Though I bet they talked about stuff like this too."

The group was founded by Kim Bierly early in 2005. Not a guild or a formally organized the club, the group members don't pay dues to belong, they simply show up at the library on the second and fourth Thursdays of each month.

"It's a social time too, and that makes it nice," Bierly says. Most everyone is there because they knew someone else who was joining the group. "One person brings a person who brings another person and so on," Bierly says.

For friends Jeanie Wiker, of Millheim, and Chris Doren, of State College, the twice monthly meetings in Centre Hall offer a chance to get together at a midway point between their two homes. Tina Dix and Freya Phillips go horseback riding together during the summer and fall. The Penns Valley Knitters gives them something to do in the colder months.

"We needed something to keep us off the streets in the winter," Phillips says jokingly.

Part social club, part crafters' support group, the knitters trade ideas and help each other out on projects. Like several knitters in the group, Corman only recently took up the craft.

Others are coming back to the hobby after taking several years off. Billy Mazza, a retired educator from Lewistown who now works at the yarn shop in Centre Hall, is the group's go-to woman for advice. A shout of "Billy 911" sends Mazza around the table to inspect and correct another knitter's stitch.

What everyone in the group seems to have in common is an inability to sit still, which explains in part why they took up the hobby.

Everyone in the group confesses to knitting while watching television. Barbara Penstone admits to knitting on car rides and at hockey games. When asked to explain the allure of the craft, she says "It's an artistic outlet."

So much practice has caused the knitters to quickly outgrow the furry and fuzzy novelty yarns that are common in craft supply stores. The rarer and more expensive Peruvian and Alpaca tweeds have their attention now. As their knowledge of stitches grows, their knowledge of wool and the regions where it comes from grows, too. "People start looking at sheep instead of puppies," Penstone says.

It's probably unlikely that any of the Penns Valley Knitters are going to turn to sheep farming to supply their yarn habit, but Bierly hopes the group continues to grow and bring new knitters into the fold.