From Fleece to Fabulous: Taking It to the Limit
Beth Smith shows us how childhood knitting opened the door to fiber art
For decades I’ve watched my friend Beth Smith’s nimble fingers pick up a board game piece, move it, and ruin my day. Yet only recently have I discovered the full panoply of amazing things those fingers and that mind can do — all within the world of fiber.
Beth’s from Holland, Michigan. I spent ten years in Michigan’s lower peninsula getting overeducated, two of those in frosty Grand Rapids, not far from Holland. I came to appreciate the region’s unisex wardrobe of wooly hat and scarf, corduroy pants, flannel shirt, and boots. Hand-knit hats and scarves are cherished.
Like many women, Beth learned to knit in childhood. One summer, while her parents were absorbed by graduate school, her grandmother stepped in as babysitter. Beth was six and her sisters four and eight. Her grandmother gave each girl a wooden spool with nails driven in one end and taught them to knit on it. She showed them how to loop yarn over the nail heads and make a knit tube snake out the bottom of the spool. Beth’s grandmother then showed the trio how to coil the tubes, sew them together, and make mats.
