If you didn’t make it to Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival this weekend, you missed beautiful weather, the usual exciting fair type food and of course, the fiber. I started my morning off by pushing my into a very small booth that contained a frightening amount of Socks that Rock. The line started inside the barn and extended outside and down the road, causing a lot of folks to wonder what in the world was so special that we would stand in line for 45 minutes just to pay for it. Well…its the colors. While Randy and Amanda waited in line, I went back in for more shopping at least three times with folks standing in the line around me. And then there was the line trading…that saved me from one other color that I had picked out but gave to the woman behind me in line who had taken a liking to it. I finally ended up with Thraven (that’s the dark one with the slight hint of turquoise), Monsoon, and Mossay (awesome green one on the right) and another hank for Michelle, whose allergies prevented her form coming out to the festival. Yes, thats four hanks of $21 sock yarn. And this photo was taken at 9:30 a.m!
Then it was off to The Fiber Company, who had posted on ravelry that they would be selling mill ends and other goodness at less than half of retail prices. I am a stone cold Fiber Co addict, so this was pretty exciting. I picked up the most amazing fiber ever created: Road to China, which is a blend of baby alpaca, cashmere, camel and yak. And because it is so soft and amazing, I had to get enough for a snuggly sweater…at an amazingly reduced yet still quite expensive price. At the left is the color, malachite and my “blob” of yarn, which filled my bag…and its only 10 a.m. at this point. I have no idea what I am going to do with it, but it will certainly be something snuggly and warm for the winter..maybe a pullover.
Well I didn’t just stop at Road to China. Having once had the pleasure of using the Fiber Company’s yarn “Terra,” for this sweater, I had to get some more for some unknown / unplanned sweater in the near future. Who can resist half price?! Terra is a merino, baby alpaca and silk blend that takes color in an amazing way and is a joy to knit with (JOY!). So I bought every hank they had, with the exception of one lonely one which appeared to be from the top of the dye pot and much darker than the others. (Karida later scolded me about this because she saw it and wanted it but then realized that it was the only one left.) The color is “beet” and I am looking for a 
cropped jacket pattern for it…if anyone has any ideas.
At this point, it is only 11:30 a.m. and I haven’t been in more
than two buildings yet have spent hundreds of dollars. My partner in crime and I had both seemed to have dipped into our savings, spare credit cards and rent checks so we decided to pet some animals and get some food and stay away from the fiber! The cute fellas to the left are angora goats. Despite the name, they aren’t the source of angora fiber, which comes from this adorable bunny. The angora goat is the source of mohair fiber.
We saw these fluffy cute things, whose names I can’t remember and of course, there was lots of opportunity to see sheep shearing.
Oh, I almost forgot! We did a lot of eating…if you aren’t aware, I can eat quite a bit of food for being such a tiny person. And despite my day job, I do enjoy some grilled lamb. My food intake for the day consisted of this massive blob of meat, also known as “lamb ribs” (although I couldn’t find a lot of actual ribs in there); a fresh squeezed lemonade; and fried dough. By 2:00 p.m. we were tired, full and couldn’t physically carry anymore fiber so we decided to go home.
