It's chic to knit and purl with the girls ... and guys

The Dominion Post ^ | 1/16/2004 | George R. Plagenz

[the_devils_advocate_666]

What's wrong with this picture?

A man and a woman are seated next to each other on a plane. She is reading a book, he is knitting.

If you said, ''Men don't knit, women do,'' that's not the right answer. Actually, there is nothing wrong with the picture.

More men are knitting today, including many whose names you will recognize -- such as Roosevelt ''Rosey'' Grier, a former star tackle with the New York Giants pro football team and the Los Angeles Rams; actors Russell Crowe and David Arquette, and Robert Gottlieb, former editor of The New Yorker magazine.

Knitting can also be an aid to your prayer life, some women have found. A few years ago, Chris Pokorny started a knitting/crocheting/sewing ministry at her church, the Edgebrook Evangelic knits hats, scarves, mittens, baby clothes, and other warm things for the needy.

''Every once in a while I will see somebody on the street wearing a hat or scarf that I made,'' Pokorny says. ''It makes me warm all over.''

''The only rule we have,'' Pokorny adds, ''is that we must pray for the person who will receive the item we are working on.''

Not many teenagers knit but it might be good if they did. Young people need to slow down and relax more. But boys are apt to consider knitting sissified.

They ought to meet Grier, the 300-pound, 6-foot-6-inch ex-pro football player of the 1950s and '60s.

Grier was the one who played the memorable role of subduing Sirhan Sirhan on the night of Robert Kennedy's assassination in Los Angeles in 1968.

In addition to his autobiography, ''Rosey: An Autobiography: The Gentle Giant'' (Honor Books, 1986), he wrote ''Rosey Grier's Needlepoint for Men'' (Walker Co, 1973). (Needlepoint is a cousin to knitting and crocheting.) Photographs of Rosey doing needlepoint appeared in the New York Times, on the cover of the Saturday Evening Post and on the centerfold of Look magazine.

And nobody would call Grier a sissy. Before Grier became a born-again Christian he had a ''roving eye and a yen for beautiful women.'' That's why, he said, he got into needlepoint. ''It was a handy device for striking up conversations with girls,'' he said.

Boys and young men, take note.

For the rest of us, knitting, needlepoint and crocheting can be a way of not only improving our prayer life and our social life but eliminating the pressures and stresses of 21st-century living. Knit one, purl two.

[the_devils_advocate_666]

Okay all you men FReeper knitters, you can now come out of the closet

[Byron_the_Aussie]

...actors Russell Crowe...

What a load of utter codswallop.

I saw Crowe and his mates on their Harleys out at the Bourke Roadhouse. There's NO WAY that bloke's a knitter.

[farmfriend]

Crotching an afghan right now for son. Older son quilts as do I.

[Bikers4Bush]

I'll stick to watching my mother teach my sister and others.

[the_devils_advocate_666]

Russell Crowe's a knitter, Russell Crowe's a knitter, Russell Crowe's a knitter, nah na nah na nah nah

[Byron_the_Aussie]

Grrrrrrr.....:)

[Mr. Jeeves]

He just doesn't knit on a Harley.

[TheBigB]

Not for me, thanks.

Not that there's anything WRONG with that....

[Byron_the_Aussie]

...he just doesn't knit on a Harley...

It's really hard to believe, Jeeves. He and his posse looked like something out of Mad Max.

[Lil'freeper]

Some of the biggest movers and shakers in the quilting world right now are men. Their work is stunning.

[GodBlessRonaldReagan]

biggest movers and shakers in the quilting world

That phrase is making my mind capsize...

[NutCrackerBoy]

If I were single, I would knit in order to attract women...

[kingu]

[voice from inside the closet] I'm not done yet...

[kingu]

Actually, I bead. Lane stitch (AKA Lazy Stitch) in both Sioux and Cheyenne style, gourd stitch, and applique. The wife does the knitting, though if I bemoan the speed of her making socks one more time, I've been told that I'll be knitting them myself.

Nothing in the world is better than hand knit socks, let me tell ya.

[KantianBurke]

"Our cup runth over Mr. Slave!"

[Lil'freeper]

LOL- not all quilters are little old ladies. :)

Here are a couple male quilters that come to mind:

John Flynn- an engineer even.
Kaffe Fassett
and Ricky Timms- who doesn't seem to have anything on the web- < silly gushing voice > but he's in all the magazines. < /silliness >

[GailA]

Men quilt, one of the nicest quilts I saw at a quilt show was of bi-planes, WW2 planes it was mad by a man. Simply Quilts this morning featured a quiter who painted HIS own fabrics then quilted applique quilts with it. They were fantastic.

I've been teaching myself to quilt for the past 4 years. LOVE it.

[GodBlessRonaldReagan]

It's not the fact that men knit that amazes me. It's the fact that the knitting world has movers and shakers! Who knew?

[the_devils_advocate_666]

Future movers and shakers...

[mountaineer]

I think Russell Crowe's a nutter, not a knitter.