The Berlin Citizen | theberlincitizen.com
Thursday, December 19, 2013
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Crafting provides break for town employees The Berlin Citizen
The first rule of the Town Hall Crafters is don’t talk about work. Period. If you talk about work, you have to leave. I learned this the hard way. Every Wednesday, some of the female employees who work at the Town Hall gather around the long table in the office of the Public Works Department. During their lunch hour from 1 to 2 p.m., the ladies put office work aside and pick up knitting needles, a half-finished quilt or a crochet hook. The women share crafting advice, relax from work and focus on the positive,
they tell me. The women around the table knit scarves and one works on a quilt -- a Christmas present for a family member. They didn’t want to share their names and they asked me not to take photos. This was crafting hour. One woman showed the group one of her latest projects: a table runner quilt. The women “oh” and “ah” over the pattern of red, green and tan triangles. Some of the women are retired and come to the crafting group to work in the company of other crafters. Word spread by word of mouth. A few weeks ago, one of the librarians dropped in, and announced she was joining the
crafting hour. The crafting group began organically a few years ago, the women tell me, and every week anywhere between three and 13 crafters sit around the table. Over the last few years, the group held a holiday raffle, auctioning off items they made to benefit the Youth and Family Services department as it provides holiday assistance. The raffle has grown every year. This holiday season, the women put 36 items in the raffle and raised $700. Director of Public Works Art Simonian walks through. “Show and tell, eh?” he remarks. He stops to talk to me
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Then I ask him about the crafters. It’s a good thing, he said, because it cultivates relationships outside the structure of work. Come every Wednesday from 1 to 2 p.m., “We know this is their time to go over there,” he said gesturing to the table.
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about a story idea. We are cutting into the crafting hour. Simonian and I step outside to finish talking. Up b e a t w i l l re c e ive an award Dec. 17 from Connecticut Light & Power for its work with home energy audits, he tells me.
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By Daniel Jackson