Two Threads Become One at Keep Me In Stitches

It was a moment of serendipity that brought two crafters together at Nesconset’s Keep Me In Stitches.

McDonald had been looking to expand her store, when a retail space at the Nesconset Plaza opened up. The problem though, was that it was a bit too large for her to take on alone. That’s when she walked into the needlepoint shop down the road and met Acard.

“I just introduced myself, and said, ‘Move in with me!’” McDonald said, enthusiastically. The rest is history. Acard left her store and the pair have been happy partners ever since at Keep Me In Stitches.

That partnership is what might have saved each of them when Superstorm Sandy hit last year, and business dwindled for weeks.

“If it weren’t for each other, I don’t know how we would have made it,” Acard, said.

There pair joke and laugh back and forth with each other and their customers who return for more supplies. It’s obvious to anyone who walks through the door that the two should be sewn together in business. 

The pairing is also a benefit to their customers, they said. Instead of knitters and needlepoint workers having to go to two different places to buy high-quality supplies, they can go to just one. Having both hobby supplies in the store also exposes hobby crafters to different mediums.

“I love to see what they come up with,” McDonald said of her customers’ work.

While being around these two funny, friendly women is reason enough to check out the store, Keep Me In Stitches is more than just a supplies shop – it’s a classroom too.

The thing that sets Keep Me In Stitches apart from the big box stores, is the owners’ attention to customers, and master-level knowledge of knitting and needlepoint.

“We live and breathe our craft,” McDonald said. “If you can knit and pearl, you can take over the world.”

The pair take continuing education classes on knitting and needle point regularly to keep up with the latest trends and techniques, they said.

Sitting in the shop for about an hour, one will see several customers come in to have yarn spun into a ball, get help with a certain stitch, or just coming in to talk to the owners over a box of cookies.  They say the shop is kind of like therapy for an hour, only more colorful and fun.

“Coming here is an outlet for people. It’s like a getaway to take an hour and decompress for a while. It’s a lot like therapy. While doing it, you’re relaxing, clearing your mind for a few minutes. You take a breath and say, ‘this is for me.’ And we all need that,” Acard said.

“Our customers tell us that it’s either needlepoint or a therapist and a therapist is more expensive,” she joked.

The welcoming atmosphere is what keeps customers coming back for more.

“Our repeat customers are our backbone,” Acard said. “They get the help and knowledge that they need and I think they just genuinely like it here,” McDonald added.

The social aspect of the business led the owners to create knit- and stitch-a-longs during Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights.

“Everybody comes for two hours, they get help with their projects, eat, meet new people and we do a raffle,” McDonald said. “Crafts are communal. It’s a place where you feel you belong.”

Of course, the satisfaction of having a finished project is the icing on the cake.

“The thing that’s so amazing about knitting or needlepoint is that these are things that you can pass down to your family members and that’s something they have from you until the end of time. We can’t live forever, but your family can have a piece of you forever,” McDonald said.

“There’s something really special about saying, ‘My grandma made this for me and now it’s yours,’” Acard added. “They have a life after us.”

Keep Me In stiches uses only high-quality materials from merino wools, silks, 100-percent cotton, velvet and many others. The needlepoint canvases are painted by hand, so each item is unique.

When a customer buys the materials from the store, the owners personally show him or her how to work with them to complete their project.

One thing that surprised the duo when they opened the store, was the number of men who are now becoming avid knitters and needlepoint craftsmen.

“I have husband and wife customers and he knits more than she does,” McDonald said.

“I had a customer who was a husband that knit and he was teaching his wife how to do it so she could have something to do while going through chemo, and I really loved that,” she said. 

McDonald, who also teaches a confirmation class at her church, said that when her class would knit pieces for charity, the best knitters were always the boys.

“I had a football player who would carry the football under his arm, along with his needles and yarn,” she said. “He was excellent.” 

Keep Me In Stiches is located at 127 Smithtown Blvd. in Nesconset. The store is open Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.; Friday from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m.; and Sunday from noon to 4 p.m.