Up Close and Personal Social Knitworking

Breaking News. Rancho Santa Fe, CA
Reported by Marsha Wenskay AKA- Headknitwit

KNITWITS OF RSF TURN EIGHT: Happy Birthday Knitwits!


Eight years ago, local knit instructor Marsha Wenskay, decided she wanted to spread the knit love by starting a knitting group open to all that wanted to learn.


The no cost lessons and the love of the craft were what motivated her. She wanted to spread the love of a craft that she believes is an art-form in the right hands. Her motto of "no mistakes, just a little design detail" have comforted more than one distraught knitter. Her style of teaching combined with her ongoing support weekly, helps to keep the mistakes to a minimum.

The first evening eight years ago she opened the doors of her classroom and expected a handful of new knitters to seek out some lessons. Fourteen women showed up and Marsha started her aerobic knitting lessons. With giant sized 35 needles in hand and her back to the room she lead the ladies into the magical world of knit. As a conductor of an orchestra leads his musicians, Marsha was able to transform the never-knitters into accomplished makers of knit music.


She incorporated the yarn, needles, friendships,wine and snacks into a regular Wednesday night sit and stitch. Your secrets are safe and no topic is off limits.


The group has a roster of 40+ women from all over the community. They meet in a lovely room with excellent light at the Village Presbyterian Church. Average attendance is about 20 knitters each week. Everyone works at their own pace on the project of their choosing. The "Knitwits" participate in knit-a-longs as the spirit moves them. Currently, the group is working on Christmas Stockings for next year. February will find them learning fair isle knitting on a two-stranded
hat.

The Knitwits have contributed to many charitable knitting projects. Blanket squares for Project Linus, preemie caps, chemo caps, helmet liners for our troops, pink scarves for breast cancer survivors and the Heartscarves Project for survivors of heart disease.

Marsha has pet names for her diverse group of knitters. The "never-knitters" are on the roster because they want to attend the group and have no intention of learning the craft- yet. The "knitter-quitters" came and tried and have switched to another craft for the time being. The "incogknitos" do not want to be affiliated with any group, however are unable to stay away from the party. We protect their identity. The rest are affectionately known as Knitwits. All are welcome.

Every month or so, a brave new-knitter ventures in and finds that she will receive personal attention and group support in her quest for becoming part of a knitting sisterhood. This sorority unites every age, border, network, financial level or any status that can separate women. The act of knitting has been found to have the same medical benefits of yoga on the body and brain. The meditative and psychological joy is harder to measure. The internet has groups with knitting memberships that top one million.

Join us and join a party that you want to never leave. Happy Birthday Knitwits.

Local Social Knitworking

Vista group is bringing back "The Social Knit-work"

Clever Knits, a store in downtown Vista, hosts a popular social knitting night on Tuesdays

By Aaron Burgin

Sunday, January 23, 2011 at 6 a.m.

Charlie Neuman / The Union-Tribune

A group of women come together every Tuesday night in Vista to share their love of knitting. They meet at Clever Knits, a store in downtown Vista, which has three "social knitting" sessions a week.

Long before this decade’s social networks of Facebook and MySpace, many women would weave lasting relationships with a couple of knitting needles, yarn and good conversation.

It’s happening again, and a group in Vista is part of a nationwide revival of a movement spearheaded by women who prefer the connections made over cross stitch to those over the Internet.

It’s called social knitting, where women of all ages in the Vista group bond over the centuries-old craft, exchanging projects, patterns or just friendly chat in a shop full of brightly colored yarns and knitting needles.

Tuesday nights at Vista’s Clever Knits isn’t your grandmother’s knitting club, though. Conversations can get a bit naughty, which is why children aren’t allowed. And crocheters are welcome (apparently, they aren’t in some knitting circles).

Clever Knits, which by day sells knitting accessories and tools, opened in a downtown storefront in July 2009. Owner Helena Bristow said it was always her “wild fantasy” to run a store where women could gather and bond over yarn.

She’s been crocheting since she was 4 and picked up knitting in college.

“It’s a really welcoming and open environment,” said Bristow, who has twice dropped out of graduate school programs because, admittedly, she’d rather be knitting. Bristow moonlights as a UCSD employee.

“We have since the beginning wanted to make it really open, and this group of women has made lifelong friendships as a result of the Tuesday night knitting group.”

The Tuesday night group, which meets from 6 to 10 p.m., comprises 20 to 30 women ranging from age 20 to 70, some of whom drive from Poway and Rancho Peñasquitos for good times and a break from their everyday routines — and their significant others.

“It’s good for me, I really enjoy the company ... and it is worth the commute to be with all these people whom I share so much in common with,” said Jimelle Beavers, who lives in Poway. “There are some Tuesdays where my husband will look around and say, “Hey aren’t you going knitting?”

The ladies sit around and work on their projects, chatting about everything from politics to their significant others.

The regulars nickname one another. Melissa Silva-Torcedo is “Malabrigo,” named after the high-end yarn, after people couldn’t remember her name when she started attending.

“They would look at me and say mmmmmm, trying to remember my name,” Silva-Torcedo said.

“And then finally someone said, Mmmmmmalabrigo, which is this awesome yarn,” Bristow interjected. “It’s so delicious.”

“Like me, so it’s a perfect nickname,” Silva-Torcedo fires back, prompting laughter at the table.

Knitting has been around for centuries, but is making a comeback during the 21st century as many women are turning to the pastime as a way to meet friends and enjoy the camaraderie that comes with the shared interest.

Websites and social networking sites such as Ravelry.com have helped launch hundreds of knitting groups across the country.

“There has been a resurgence and interest in slowing down,” said Kerry Wills, a New York Daily News reporter who wrote the 2007 book “The Close-Knit Circle: The American Knitter Today.”

“Our lives have become overwhelmed by technology and the demands of work, and knitting, along with other crafts, is enjoying a revival because it gives you an alternative to that pace.”

There’s also a sense of pride in watching the strands of yarns become a creation — sometimes over a period of decades — Bristow said.

“A lot of my friends play video games or go to the movies, but when you’re done with a video game or a movie, what do you have to show for it?” Bristow said. “It’s unlike any craft because your fingers touch every strand of that yarn, which is kind of amazing and special.”

Clever Knits is at 214 S. Indiana Ave., Vista.

aaron.burgin@uniontrib.com

Social Knitworking

In the middle of her recent book tour, Debbie Stoller got down on the floor of her Seattle hotel room and blocked out a shawl she had just cast off her knitting needles.

She’d made the shawl using her own bamboo-wool yarn and said she was happy with it. But you could tell from her tone that she would have been happier if she was still working on it.

“I am a process knitter,” she says. “I have more interest in doing it than in the results.”

If you aren’t a knitter, you might not know Stoller’s name, but you’d be hard-pressed to find a woman in North America who hasn’t heard of her stitch’n bitch groups — small home- and shop-based knitting groups that have swept the continent, bringing a new enthusiasm (or should we say obsession?) to knitting.

There was a time not too long ago, when knitting was just about the most uncool thing a young woman could do. Well, except maybe crocheting.

The second wave of feminists rejected needlework along with many other domestic arts in an effort to free themselves from societal limits, Stoller says. Very few knitted and purled during the 1970s, ’80s and even the ’90s.

But then along came Stoller, a self-proclaimed third wave or “girlie” feminist with a PhD in women’s psychology.

Stoller rediscovered knitting as a young woman in 1998 and set out to “Take back the knit,” a play on the women’s movement chant “Take back the night.”

“I understand why they rejected it,”Stoller said from her Seattle hotel room. “But it also got devalued and these skills are a big part of women’s history.

“The third wave in the late ’90s had a different strategy. They had a strategy of reclaiming, which gave it value in a new context.”

For Stoller, that value was in the delicious pleasure knitting gave her. She became a knitting evangelist and invited all comers to meet in a New York café and knit, talk and share expertise. She called it a stitch ’n bitch group. She wasn’t calling herself a capital B who stitches. She uses the B-word as a verb for what women do when they get together.

The name grabbed people’s attention and gave knitting an edginess it hadn’t had in years, at least not in North America. Twelve years later, stitch ’n bitch groups are almost as popular as book clubs.

“I don’t think anyone has done more for getting people back to knitting than Debbie Stoller,” says Anina Hansen, co-owner of Urban Yarns, who recently brought Stoller to Vancouver as part of her tour promote her fifth book, Stitch ’n Bitch Superstar Knitting.

Up until now, all her books have been for beginners. They offer clear step-by-step instructions, techniques and patterns so that anybody can learn.

Her first knitting book, Stitch ’n Bitch: The Knitter’s Handbook, was published in 2003. It became a New York Times bestseller and has sold more than one million copies. She has since written Stitch ’n Bitch: The Happy Hooker for crochet and Son of Stitch ’n Bitch for male knitters. She has also developed her own yarns.

“Women in their 20, 30s, 40s would look at her book and say ‘Okay, I can learn now,’ knitter Kathleen Seeley said. “I don’t have my mother or grandmother beside me teaching me, but I can learn from [Stoller] because she has very detailed descriptions. It’s kind of the pop culture of knitting.”

Hansen says Stoller can be credited with bringing the cool back into knitting, giving it a buzz that our grandmothers couldn’t offer.

But Stoller takes umbrage when her books are described as being unlike anything your grandmother might do.

“It always feels like a poke at grandmothers,” she says. “And I think it is your grandmother’s knitting. It is exactly your grandmother’s knitting. It is part of a centuries-old tradition that we engage in, and I think that is what is wonderful about it.”

Stoller can take a bit of credit for adding the communal dimension to today’s knitting culture.

It has become a way to stay connected with friends in this busy world, or to meet kindred spirits when you relocate.

“I really think the communal aspect of knitting has really been central to this trend of the past decade in a way that it never was before,” Stoller said, “first with so many stitch ’n bitch groups forming where people meet in person, and also on the Internet where people share patterns and information. I think that is interesting.”

In her new book, Stoller introduces knitters to the next level of knitting techniques. She has easy-to-follow instructions for colour and stitching techniques such as aran, intarsia, lace, cable and steeks. As with all her earlier books, she includes patterns as well. But this time, she also explains how to make your own. It’s very mathematical.

“There is an immense amount of information,” she said. “I wanted to put a warning on the cover: Caution, very explicit instructions inside. I get very explicit about how to design a sweater.”

kgram@vancouversun.com

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