The Clay Purl
~ story and photos by Chrissy Alspaugh
Even knitters who claim to own more yarn than Nashville’ s“ lovely little yarn shop” can’ t walk away from The Clay Purl without at least a skein or two in hand.
They carry silky sock yarn, fluffy Alaskan yarn, yarn that stripes all by itself, hand-painted yarn, and more Hoosier yarns than one can count.
“ We are a tourist community, and visitors are always looking for something really special to remind them of their time in Brown County,” said owner Michele Hayes.“ What I didn’ t expect is that, to the local community, knitting shops are so much more than where you go to buy yarn.”
The Clay Purl opened in 2011 in Antique Alley, offering a wide variety of fiber art supplies, craft kits, pottery, shawl pins, spinning wheels for visitors to try, and an assortment of unique gifts. After moving for a few years to a building near the courthouse, Hayes and her yarn stash returned to the alley in 2018. She feels at home. That’ s important to the Valparaiso native. Hayes and her pastor and church-consultant husband, David, spent their honeymoon in Nashville and later inherited her parents’ Brown County cabin.“ I’ ve always loved it here,” she said.“ It’ s always felt like home.” The couple moved to town in the late’ 80s but left in 1992 to serve as missionaries in Ukraine after
22 Our Brown County • March / April 2019
the fall of the Soviet Union. Those were hard years— waiting in long lines to buy bread and unable to purchase green vegetables all winter. Family health needs returned them to the U. S., but their support for Ukraine never ceased. The couple still returns to help new churches launch or existing churches to update their operations.
Hayes often lends her marketing and graphics expertise on those trips. She studied business administration, marketing, and German at Olivet Nazarene University and has worked as an art teacher, office manager, marketing director, and graphics designer.
Laughing, Hayes said she planned to depart early from this winter’ s trip to Ukraine to be back in time for central-Indiana’ s annual Roving Indiana“ yarn crawl.” From March 1 to 10, The Clay Purl and nine other yarn stores will delight