As junior Marissa Olin sits beside her grandmother surrounded by a knitting group, she listens to her grandmother’s friends complain about technology while struggling to learn how to knit.

This is a typical occurrence for Olin, who began going to a knitting group with her grandmother as a freshman.

When she first began attending the group, the members attempted to teach Olin, but to no avail.

“They were all trying to teach me, but none of them were too great, so I ended up learning by googling it,” Olin said. “But I was participating, so it counted.”

When she first started out knitting, Olin made simple squares and the occasional hat. Over the years, however, Olin’s skill level has drastically improved, with her most recent project being a sweater with a pattern featuring dinosaurs, eggs, palm trees and bones.    

Not only does knitting allow Olin to express herself, but it also helps her concentrate during class and other activities.

“If I don’t have knitting, I’ll end up playing with a hair tie or doing origami or doodling,” Olin said, “and usually that’s something that’s more distracting for me because that takes conscious thought.”

Olin also donates many of the hats she knits to charities like the Christmas tree gift donation at her church and even Relay for Life.

When she’s not knitting, Olin enjoys teaching her friends how to knit, and has recently been helping junior Tyler Orbin learn how to finger knit.

“Marissa is crazy talented when it comes to knitting,” Orbin said. “This year during downtime in the musical, she’s taught me how to finger knit and I’ve been working on some things with that. [Her work] is just overall super impressive.”

Like Orbin, many people’s reaction to Olin’s work has been very positive, and many people even ask to take photographs.

“Generally people are impressed, a little bit scared because honestly it makes me look a little bit crazy,” Olin said. “But overall, I’m super proud of it.”