Some people can
never remember how their friendship began. Others never forget. Of the 10
friends who met at the Palisade Library on Tuesday, Feb. 19, eight have similar
memories of why they became members of the local Knitting group.
They met almost three
years ago when the library was in the Old Palisade High School annex. Two friends, Beth Washington and
Yoshiro Iznuri, were busy with work and family, but over lunch at Mumzel’s they
wondered “if other local women would like to meet to knit and talk.”
Librarian Karen Mahewy
encouraged them to start a knitting club and hold it at the library. They
posted an announcement for the first meeting on the bulletin board and then
advertised it on the library calendar.
“For me it started
with the list, a list on the desk. ‘Sign up if you want to come and knit.’ And
I signed it. It was in the old library, and we met on a Thursday or Friday, two
years ago,” Elaine Korver said decisively.
“We switched to
Tuesday because Beth (one of the founders) could not come. That’s when we
switched to Tuesday, so she could come, and I could come.” Elaine smiled.
Now each Tuesday
morning several ladies arrive at the downtown Palisade Library carrying varying
bags filled with their knitting needles, balls of yarn and pieces of bright
pieces of their projects. They do not stop until they drop their colorful bags
on the tables in the back room of the library. These are the Palisade Knitting
club.
“It is not really a
club. We are just a group of friends who are busy (and who isn’t),” Beth said,
“who like to knit or crochet.”
They come in casually
one or two at a time around 10 a.m. No matter if it is two or twenty, this
group is not a club with set agenda, goals or a mission. The Knitting ladies
are a loosely structured group of friends who meet for an hour or two, just to
sew and enjoy the camaraderie of friendship.
“It is a come-and-go
type of meeting with a focus on knitting and learning from each other. Yet we
are friendly and have fun.”
So when they arrive
they pull out their sewing bags and begin working while sharing advice, help
and laughter as they talk.
Skeins of color flash
through their fingers and every-growing pieces are admired.
At age 84 Yoshiro
Iznri is the oldest member of the Knitting Ladies, and as Elaine said, “she is
one of the founders of the group,” but Yoshiro points out, “Everyone helps each
other.” She has moved the most of all the members before settling in Palisade
in 2007.
“I was born in
Bighorn, Wyoming. My family moved to California. I and my sister went back to
Japan when I was 14 to go to school while my parents and brothers were moved to
a Japanese American Interment camp in Arizona. I came back to California after
I married, and my son Hero who owns Inari restaurant brought me here in 2007.”
She explained her travels and her artistic experience.
“I first learned to
knit on a knitting machine when my son was little. Hand knitting was different.
You have to pick it up yourself.” This is what she did, but not by reading the
pattern.
“That’s how Beth and the others help me. I can read the
instructions, but get lost. They explain it to me, and I can do it.”
“She can just look at
a finished piece of knitting, and recreate it exactly.” Beth said.
“Our range of knitting
experience in the group is from beginning to expert. The focus is on knitting,
and while there is teaching and learning from each member it is a friendly and
fun. And everyone does her own projects.”
Newest member Lucille
Barber joined the group last month, because she wanted to learn how to knit a
Ruffle scarf, the trendy multi-colored scarves that people have been selling at
the craft fairs last year. Lucille saw them and said, “I wanted to learn, and
it is easy, only six stitches.”
Finishing up number #7
of the Ruffle scarf design, she doesn’t plan to sell her scarves. “Right now,
I’m making them to give away to my twin daughters and daughter-in-law or
friends.”
Lucille may be new to
the Knitting Ladies, but she is not a beginner in knitting. “My mother did
every craft in the world, and taught me back in Iowa.”
Pennie Snavely came to
the group in December, and she has years of experience in crocheting and
knitting. She and her husband Richard took a two and half month vacation to
Alaska in their 5th Wheel last spring.
So she shares with the
others her experience of using on-line knitting sources. “I don’t deal well
with buying yarn locally. I go to Knitting Paradise.com where you can get free
patterns, and information about free sites. I wanted to do an afghan, and went
to knittingparadise.com and this lady from Maine sent me a pattern for free. I
have gotten information from all over the world.”
Another member Dianne
Swett has been knitting and crocheting since she was 12 years old. She and her
husband moved to here a year ago from Wisconsin, and she said, “At first I
mispronounced the town name wrong. I would tell my friends I live in Paradise
instead of Palisade.”
She greatly likes
living in her old Victorian house, “not the pretty one, but the more homelier
one,” than her neighbor, she jokes.
Dianne keeps everyone
laughing as they work. They can tell she is still partial to her old state
football team, the Green Bay Packers. This week her color choices for her
washcloth project were bright green and yellow.
The only other
International traveler in the Knitting group than Yoshiro is Sheila Ruth. From
northern England near Westminster, Sheila was 24 years old when her 2nd
husband moved her to Boulder, then to Grand Junction. It took her 20 years to
get him to move to Palisade. But in April 2011 she came to the Library, and “I
saw the library poster. I thought this would be a reason to get out of the
house, and have a little bit of a social life.”
Sheila joined the
group in October and says, “I love it. This is a nice group of ladies. We help
and share patterns, ideas, food and friendship.” She is always smiling but
serious as she works on her 2nd scarf in the cable stitch, and she
has made an afghan.
Not all of the Tuesday
morning group can come and stay for the entire time, or even make it to every
meeting. According to Yoshiro, they have 20 names on their membership list.
Today only nine were there for the full work time. Mary Leonard said she was
between projects and left after the beginning, and several others could not
make it due to appointments or work, full time or part-time.
Belma Morales came in
after the first hour with an unfinished bright pink cowl and hat. She received
individual help from Yoshiro. Then she went back to her family’s orchard.
That’s what some
members do—Come and go—as they need to do, or stay and talk. The Knitting
Ladies are loosely structured to work around what the individual wants and
needs.
As the two hours were
ending, all but two ladies were still talking and stitching after the noon
hour. Elaine Korver and Yoshiro reminisced about the club’s beginning and
changes.
“It’s
exciting to see how we’ve progressed. People can knit, crochet, and weavers. We
are having fun. Everybody helps everybody.”
“I’m
probably the one with the least amount of knitting skills in this group. I
knitted in junior high to my late twenties. I started with knitting washcloths.
Now, I’m doing socks. Now I am getting back into it.” She pauses with a sigh,
“Yes, everyone has given us something to learn and use.”
The
clock ticks after noon. Their knitting is rolled up and packed up in the bags.
They leave casually, one or two at a time, saying good=bye until next week. The
back room in the library seems dull and empty, the cheerfulness and colors are
gone.
Calling
them just a knitting group is a misnomer because the ladies who meet each
Tuesday are more that knitter. They are a wonderful group of ladies who help,
teach, laugh, share, listen and enjoy each other’s skills, talents, creativity
and personalities.
Whether
you can sew a fine seam, knit, crochet or embroider, come join the group.
Together they form the Palisade Knitting group, loose-knit friends of various
ages and backgrounds who share a common thread of sewing.
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