The sign in the window reads “Thimbleberry Yarn and Craft.”
Those white block letters tell passersby what the store on the corner of Main and Berwick streets in White Haven sells, but it’s the red script lettering just below that describes what the shop is all about. It reads “Crafting Community.”
That’s what the yarn shop owner Lisa Stuart set about creating when she opened Thimbleberry Yarn Shop two years ago.
“The sign on window says yarn and craft and then below it says community,” Stuart said of her shop’s sign. “That’s very intentional. It is very important to me that I’m part of a community.”
Stuart first opened Thimbleberry Yarn in 2021 on the opposite corner of Main and Berwick streets after retiring from Boeing Corporation where she worked as an engineer helping to build helicopters. When COVID hit and she and her husband began working remotely, they decided to relocate from their home in Delaware County to their vacation home in White Haven. After a short time, she decided they needed more space to work, so she rented the vacant storefront at 322 Main Street.
“I made it my work from home space,” Stuart related.
While working in the storefront, she was able to observe movement on Main Street in White Haven.
“When I was ready to retire, I had built a plan on what my shop would look like,” she said.
Stuart is a lifelong knitter, learning from a neighbor when she was about 8 or 10 years old.
“I started with some zeal in the 1990s and early 2000s,” she noted. “I’ve been passionate about it ever since. I have a thing for fiber, whether it’s yarn or fabric. I’m also a quilter. To me, it’s all about texture and fiber and color. It’s so much fun to play with.”
Stuart said that throughout her professional career, doing engineering work and helping to build helicopters, she always wanted to own her own yarn shop.
“I’ve visited many yard shops up and down East Coast,” she noted. “Each shop I visited had a different personality, and I just wanted a shop that reflected my personality.”
She also realized that shops like hers often are a center point for a community.
“Crafters are a community,” she said. “They like to socialize. They like to share what they know with one another.”
A friend who owns a yarn store in Delaware County helped her get started.
“She showed me the ropes. She was a fantastic mentor,” Stuart related. “My business has just grown from that 400-square-foot spot with yarn that friends loaned me to sell, which is phenomenal.”
A year ago, Stuart moved her store about 200 feet up Main Street to its current location at 400 Main St. She pointed out that moving to a larger shop helped her connect with and bring in a much larger community of people. She reached out to a yarn and craft group that meets at the White Haven Library twice a month.
“It drew a huge community which I’m thrilled to be part of,” she offered.
She also connected with yarn groups that meet in Freeland, Conyngham and Danville.
The shop owner pointed out her outreach to those groups helped them “cross pollinate.” Knitters from the various groups meet at Thimbleberry Yarn once a month before the shop opens. In the shop’s cozy back room, they stitch, compare projects, enjoy coffee and pastries and talk about new yarns.
The group also has taken on various projects. They’ve created a basket of “knitted knockers” for Candy’s Place Cancer & Wellness Center; hats and scarves for veterans; and most recently “preemie caps” for premature babies.
She has hosted a day-long retreat for knitters in her shop with a catered breakfast and lunch. The group also held a day-long retreat at the Victorian Connection, a Victorian home in White Have where they celebrated Christmas in July.
She recently co-hosted a program with an educator at the Hickory Run State Park visitors center. While the educator taught the group about animal fibers, plant fibers and synthetic fibers, the group was sitting around in the fresh air knitting and crocheting. Stuart will soon teach her third learn to knit course at the Crestwood Adult Continuing Education (CACE) program at Crestwood High School.
Visitors to Thimbleberry Yarn will find its shelves hold hundreds of skeins of colorful yarns of various textures. Stuart pointed out most of the yarn is from local and mostly women-owned businesses.
”I have quite a bit of yarn that comes locally and I’m very proud of that,” she commented.
As far as the shop’s interesting name goes, Stuart explained that one of her most cherished possessions is her grandmother’s thimble.
“I wanted to incorporate that connection to my family and craft in the name of the store,” she explained. “A lot of nice things came together.”
