My mother and I drove down to West Friendship, Maryland for the Sheep and Wool Festival. I found out that it is the largest festival in America. Wow. Driving there was pretty uneventful and we talked about various things from the upcoming construction changes for our apartment and my sister moving downstairs to what I've learned so far regarding knitting. We had a few problems outside of Baltimore, going the long way 'round 695. We had the same issue on the way back, drat, although this time we followed signs to I-95 North and it took us the long way 'round.
Once we got there, there didn't seem to be very many vehicles and I thought it wouldn't be very big. Boy, was I wrong! We arrived around 1 and took some time out to visit the restroom and eat some lamb. Mm.
I held remarkable restraint throughout the day while we visited all the vendors. We took the time out to poke our heads towards each one, although we only made stops where I spotted something really interesting or different. I joked about how many of the places I stopped in during my vacation to Asheville had booths: Springwater Fiber Workshop, Carodan Sheep Farm, and Earth Guild. We didn't stop to see any of the sheep, but we did look at all the other vendors and I took some time to look at the angoras and alpacas.
My mom did the major purchases of the day. It started once we reached the main vendor building and she spotted the sign for cashmere. We went in the booth and she immediately fell for a scarf made of qiviut. I told her that I'd be willing to make anything she wanted out of it and she pointed to a scarf that she wanted. Unfortunately, the pattern was all sold out, but she talked to the dealer who told my mom that the pattern and yarn would be sent free of charge to her address. She bought a grey skein and I'm sure sometime in May, I'll be starting her qiviut scarf. Qiviut is wonderful in texture and I'm looking forward to working with it.
We then ran into the Interweave Press table where I bought a year's subscription to "Interweave Knits", along with a free issue of the Spring 2004 "Interweave Knits" issue (something I've planned to pick up for quite some time already). The woman who took my order was the editor of "Spin-Off" and I told her that I would love to learn to spin in the future. In fact, I hope that by next year's festival, I will know how to spin so I can take advantage of the gorgeous rovings. Next door was a table selling Koigu ends rather cheaply (10 cents a gram, which is about 50% off normal prices) and my mother and I spent some time going through to pick some colorways.
My mother's green colorway is very lovely.
I think I shall make a shawl or scarf out of it.
I couldn't pick a colorway that I really loved, so I got three different color groupings, although I suspect I will buy more Koigu to fill them out or split them into better groupings. (Click to get a larger version.)
It's a combination of two photographs since I couldn't take a single one that could show off all the colors at once. The purple/grey colorway on the right will probably be for Kim, since I always associate her with executive greys and purples. The middle is mostly browns and oranges, my favorite colors. The one on the left is a white dappled colorway, which only came about because I couldn't find anything that matched my favorite skein from the lot:
It's so pretty with the sand and blue colors. It reminds me of the beach. The other skeins were an attempt to match, but I don't think they do. I'll probably use up those skeins in another way while I work to match my favorite skein.
We left the festival around 5:30, expecting to be back around 8:30 when, on I-195, we ran out of gas! Note, it was not me driving; my mother didn't notice the "out of gas" light until we, well, ran out of gas. We ended up getting home at around 10:30, two hours late. My mom cooked some dinner and I got back to the hotel around midnight. A long, exhausting but exciting day!
I can't wait until next year. Whoop!
