Maryland Sheep & Wool Festival

The first weekend of May is always the weekend of Maryland Sheep & Wool Festival. I have gone the past three years and have enjoyed every minute of it! The first year, it was sunny, windy and a bit cold. Last year it was sunny and hot. This year, it rained and rained and rained some more. The good part about that was that the festival was less crowded. Don't get me wrong, there were still loads of people there! (Who knew people LIKE to be out in the rain???)

Since there were not many people there, we (Angela, Pat and I) decided that we would stand in the t-shirt line (which is usually a mile long and not worth standing in), but this year's artwork was amazing-a ewe with a beehive hairdo (Hey, Hon!) knitting! I bought a t-shirt and some note cards. Once we finished with our purchases there, we went to the main barn to get out of the rain. We saw lots of spinning wheels (I really, really, really want one, but need to learn how to spin first!), spindles, fiber, yarn and a variety of other crafty things. I even got to try my hand at hooking...a rug! It's not the latch hook of the '70s and '80s with the yarny fringe, but pulling bits of fiber through a canvas to create one of those rugs with tight loops that cost $$$$$$$. I did not purchase a hooking kit...even though I was tempted. I wanted to save my money to purchase yarn!

I purchased two skeins of Blue Moon Fibers' Socks That Rock Lightweight mill ends,
(one is more of a Christmasy colorway and the other reminds me of seaweed-dark greens and blues to almost black),





a skein of Lucky sock yarn from the Serendipitous Ewe in colorway Waterlily,



a skein of one of my new favorite indie dyers, Creatively Dyed, in her Calypso base, Mabalo-from white to green to almost black (there seems to be a theme here). I have two other skeins in the Tradewinds base and am attempting to get through some other projects so that I can start in on all my new sock yarn!




I also purchased a skein of yarn that goes well with the Creatively Dyed skein-I do not remember which stand it came from, but it is a blend of bamboo and merino (sooooo soft!). Part of me wants to make a pair of crazy socks where I use two different skeins of yarn, knit the heel and toe in the opposite colorway. We shall see...

I also bought some fiber. I hope to get my spindle out and spin a bit now that grad school is finished and graduation is coming up Memorial Day weekend. The fiber is merino (easiest to spin for a beginner) in the colorway Forest (main color is brown with some red, blue and yellow).

Now, I hope I have enough yarn to make it to next Maryland Sheep and Wool!!!