By Holly Heller Enquirer Editor
    BREMEN — If you ask Kat Spencer how she makes doilies, sweaters, handbags and other creations from yarn, she will smile and shrug her shoulders.
    “It’s not really that hard,” she said.
    But if you ask the knitters and crocheters she knows from The Loft Art Studio, they will tell a different story.
    “She’s got such a talent for knitting and crocheting,” said Gayle Graverson, owner of The Loft Art Studio. “She knows it inside and out. She’s really    talented at what she does.”

    Kat learned the basics when she was 8 years old, from her grandmother in the Czech Republic. She knitted and crocheted “off an on” through the years, really getting into the craft in her 20s when she started making doilies for friends as gifts. But it was her pregnancy with her now 3-year-old daughter, Mikalah, that really inspired her to pick up the hook and needles again.
    “When I was pregnant with Mikalah, I watched a lot of TV,” she said. “I like doing something with my hands while I’m watching TV.”
    She likes how concentrating on knitting or crocheting can help ease her mind.
    “I relax while I’m doing it. I don’t think about anything else.”
    Now expecting her second child with husband, Brad Spencer, in June, she has taken up the hobby in full force once again. This time around, she is reaching out to others, to help teach the art of crochet at The Loft, 4122 S.R. 331 South, Bremen.
    “It will be fun,” she said. “It’s fun to try. It can relax you. And it’s not hard to do, really.”
    She will teach a beginning crochet class May 12 and 31, with an additional felted handbag class May 31. Contact The Loft at 574-546-2774 or visit www.loftartstudio.com to register.
    “She’s such an asset,” Graverson said. “She’s probably one of the best teachers I can imagine to teach. She really is very talented at what she does. And she’s a lot of fun.”
    Spencer recently repaired an antique doily for Graverson, for which she was eternally grateful.
    “It looked just like new. She had repaired it and did the same stitch in it. I couldn’t believe it,” Graverson said.    
    That wasn’t the only repair Spencer has done for her friends at The Loft.
    “They know to bring it over to me and I’ll fix it up,” she said.
    Spencer loves creating gifts for family and friends and points out plenty of opportunities to work on projects — while riding in the car, watching TV or, her favorite, while having coffee with friends.
    “Because you can still have a chat and do what you are doing,” she said. “That’s what we do at The Loft. Sit, talk and knit or crochet.”