Special Friends Week - Interview with Karen Grassi Vogel

Karen Anna Grassi Vogel is the author of the Amish Knitting Circle Series and Knit Together: An Amish Knitting Novel.

I met Karen when our agent, Joyce Hart, fell and broke her hip. Karen sent an email out to all Joyce’s clients telling them of an e-card service to shower Joyce with cards. Karen is a member of the  ACFW Mid-Atlantic Group, of which I am the Zone Director, and has become our Pittsburgh Area Coordinator. Karen is a Compassion International Representative and we sponsor a boy in Colombia and contribute to a village in Africa through this wonderful ministry, also.  So I am happy to claim Karen as a special friend that we are featuring this week on Overcoming Through Time- With God's Help!

Karen, welcome to Overcoming Through Time.  Would you share either the most difficult thing in your life you have had to overcome, with God’s help, or the most tragic situation or circumstance one of your character’s has had to get past?

Thank you so much for having me on Overcoming Through Time. I wrote my novel Knit Together: An Amish Knitting Novel after losing my mom and two cousins in 13 months. My mom was 83 and in a four year decline, but my cousin Stacy, age 40, was quickly taken by cancer, and her sister, Renea, age 48, a year later…cancer also. I remember crying, feeling numb and shaking my fist at God.

I visited my Amish friend, Lydia, in Smicksburg, PA. She’d just lost her sister-in-law due to a heart attack, leaving eight children. We talked about grief and loss and I felt she accepted things much better than I did. I wanted to know why my loved ones died. Plain and simple….Lord….why did this happen? But the Amish don’t ask why. They have a profound sense of the sovereignty of God. When a buggy accident happens, or other tragedies, they seem to know they’re in the palm of God’s hand and everything is going to be alright. They shed lots of tears like we do, but they have an inner knowing that God is in control. So, I’m Ginny in my book Knit Together, and Lydia is Katie Byler. We live across the street from each other and I learn about grief the Amish way.

I also learn to knit in the book, and I’ve come to see knitting is a gift from God because it’s really good for your mental health!  The idea to do my Amish Knitting Circle series came to me when I was doing research on Amish spirituality. I had a long chat with an eighty year old Amish woman who helped start the Smicksburg Amish settlement. When I said I had to leave to go to knitting class, her eyes glowed; she told me she was a yarn spinner in her younger days. I asked if she could knit, and she said, “Oh, yes.” I didn’t know the Amish knit, but found they do and find great comfort in all the fabric arts: crochet, knitting, embroidery, needlepoint, and sewing. They do many crafts to relax, just like us English women do.

 What is your favorite bible verse and why?

      The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is upon me, for the Lord has anointed me

      to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to comfort the brokenhearted

      and to proclaim that captives will be released and prisoners will be freed. Isaiah 61:1 (NLT2)

This verse is just full of hope. I first started meditating on it when my dad passed away, on Christmas Day, sixteen years ago. I was brokenhearted and clung to this scripture. At first I focused on He came to comfort the brokenhearted and then I started to see how Christ wants to set captives free. So, my husband and I started getting involved with poverty ministry. We’ve been volunteer advocates for Compassion International for thirteen years now. Third world poverty is cruel, especially to children, and we hope to make a difference…to see these children set free through knowing Christ’s love and meeting their basic needs.  

Disability friendliness: My books are on kindle and Nook or any electronic device. I have a kindle and can make it large print and it’s also voice activated. Really love my kindle.

What has been the most important thing you hope your readers will get from your books and why?

My greatest hope for my book though is people will realize you don’t have to be Amish to be happy. I have a town full of people, half Amish and half English, similar to the town I lived in in Upstate NY. We saw people wanting to turn Amish, and Amish wanting to be English. 


I came to realize that peace is found in Christ alone. But lately, the Amish have been bombarded by folks who ask, “How can I become Amish?” Here’s advice one Amish man put in the Budget, an Amish newspaper:

“If you admire our faith, strengthen yours. If you admire our sense of commitment, deepen yours. If you admire our community spirit, build your own. If you admire the simple life, cut back. If you admire deep character and enduring values, live them yourself."

I put this quote in Knit Together, and show how Ginny and James Rowland change their life radically after following this advice. So I show a family who doesn’t turn Amish, but gleans a lot from them. I hope readers can do the same. 

As you researched your books, did you learn anything that particularly touched your heart?

The Amish view shunning as a loving act. I was told that if a shunned person came back to the community, and repented of their sin, even after being away for a decade or more, they would forgive and forget. The person would be reinstated into fellowship immediately. They also never stop praying for shunned people.  

Also, after knowing Amish families for twenty years, I didn’t know how much faith it took to live in community. They have to trust God daily to be content to live in their “Colonial” lifestyle. They see the modern conveniences and are always trying to figure out which ones to adopt and which ones will make their lives too fast paced. I was shocked that church members voted annually on matters such as allowing gas stoves, indoor plumbing etc. They don’t take a final vote until everyone is in agreement, or at least not upset about the decision.

I have to really watch what I say in front of the Amish, because I don’t want to make them feel the grass is green in English pastures. For example, when getting peaches from my Amish friend, she talked about how long it took to put up all her fruits and vegetables. I said I got a FoodSaver and all I did was slice, dice, throw stuff in a bag, push a button, and viola, I am done. As soon as I said this I saw her teenage daughters gawk at me. They just couldn’t believe it, and once again, I felt like I had to apologize for bringing discontent into their home.

In this latest work, do you have any topics useful for bibliotherapy, or therapeutic influence through reading about a disorder or situation?

Well, my characters have many problems. Joseph has Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, since he was in NYC during 9/11. He’s also a former drug addict who went through Celebrate Recovery. Ginny’s in grief and going through the empty nest syndrome, and learns the whole Serenity Prayer used in Twelve Step Programs. I have an Amish man, Judah, who is shunned but comes back to the community and lives with the Baptist preacher who counsels him; Judah’s an ACA; adult children of alcoholics. Eli Hershberger, is actually my first Amish friend, Harry Hershberger. His buggy was hit and he became a paraplegic. I tried my hardest to portray Harry accurately because to me, he is as inspirational as Joni Erickson Tada.  Also, Christmas deals with holiday depression, since I feel qualified to write about that.

Thank you Karen for agreeing to answer these questions.  Have a blessed day and keep on writing!!


GIVEAWAY:  This week we are giving away Christmas books every day.  It will be a secret until each night but the books are Christian fiction releases from within the past two years.  Leave a comment for a chance to win!