- December 16, 2025
Knitters at The Ball of Yarn meet weekly to make sweaters, beanies and baby clothes to donate to hospice and hospital patients.
BY EMILY BLACKWOOD | STAFF WRITER
Knitting, although it's still popular among certain elderly crowds, isn’t just what your grandmother quietly does while watching T.V.
Loud laughter and casual chit-chat filled the Ball of Yarn every Thursday as a group of 10 or so women work eagerly on finishing their projects. Baby overalls, men's sweater-vests and fall-colored beanies hung throughout the store, each item already labeled with a gift tag.
“The little baby outfit up there is for mom's great-great grandson and my great-great nephew,” said Sandi VanEpps, 66, who co-owns the store with her mother Pauline Orlowski, 85.
“We get the shop filled up with all this stuff, and then about after Thanksgiving, we get it emptied out and start on new ones,” said VanEpps.
And their families aren’t the only ones getting handmade gifts. This group of ladies donates its knitted creations to the Halifax Health Hospice of Volusia and Flagler counties, Florida Hospital Memorial Medical Center's Cancer Center and Florida Hospital's Pregnancy Crisis Center and Labor Division.
VanEpps, who has been knitting since she was 9-years-old, said giving back in anyway you can is important.
"The community takes care of us and we can take care of our community," said VanEpps. "There is a need for it. We as people need to give back to our community, where we can and what we can do. We can knit."
As a thank you, the Florida Hospital Memorial Auxiliary will host a free breakfast to the knitting club 9 a.m. Nov. 20, at The Ball of Yarn on Granada Boulevard.
"We're giving a thank you for all the time, their free time," said Suzanne McNeil, vice president of the auxiliary. "They buy their own material and these ladies have never been credited for what they do, other than a small sheet of appreciation. They need more than that. They're making sweaters for the next two months. That's money and talent that these ladies have that goes unrewarded."
Among the great aunts and grandmothers were a few younger faces in the group. Breanna Reitano, 16, and Kayln Lis, 25, learned how to knit from their grandmother, who usually accompanies them to the knitting shop.
"I feel like it's an up-and-coming thing," said Lis, who has been knitting for a year now. "I think it's just a lost art. I don't want it to skip our generation."
VanEpps says that they get a lot of young people in their beginners classes, but the word "young" is relative.
"To us, the whole world is young," VanEpps said with a smile.
Visit theballofyarn.com, or call 672-2858.
