Sheep and wolves...
5.01.2006
What a busy weekend! It seems like as soon as I start to relax it is already Monday and time to go back to work! Time flies when you're having fun I guess.
So Saturday after a stop to drop off a bassoon to one of his students, HWJF (that's right. The boyfriend came with me. Am I lucky or what?!) and I headed for the CT Sheep and Wool festival. I had been once before, but the weather was awful. This time it was a bright sunny day and the little festival parking area was packed when we arrived. While this is a very small festival, they sure do pack in a lot to see. There were alpacas in the first of the four barns and lots of yummy yarns. There was even someone making straw brooms! The second barn housed the sheep to shawl competition, sheep shearing demo and several vendors offering different roving and yarns. Out behind this barn was the sheep dog trial area. This is something that I always am completely amazed by, but can only watch for about 5 min. before I want to move on to the yarn. The dogs and the sheep REALLY move! I suppose if someone told me what exactly they are supposed to do I might be more interested. The third barn housed the Nutmeg Spinners and more yarn vendors. I ran into Chris here as I thought I might. For those of you who read her blog, you might be as shocked as I was to realize that little BB is already 3 months old and was about ready for her first harecut which we got to watch:
Later on in the day I got to hold her!
Isn't she just the sweetest thing?! And I even found out that cats and bunnies will get along. A new friend for Simba in the future perhaps? Hmmm...
The last barn featured the food (I'm always a little disturbed by the fact that they serve lamb. HWJF was disturbed by the taste) and several other vendors. I saw some really pretty soysilk yarn that I almost bought, but was a little pricey and the most beautiful spindles where the whorl was made of a metal circle and the center had these beautifully hand-carved Celtic knot patterns. I was a bad blogger and was too bashful to ask if I could take a picture, but trust me, they were beautiful (and a bit out of my price range).
After meeting up with Lauren and Joanne, we decided to have lunch at Reins which is always fun. It's a NY style deli that is set up to look like NYC where you can eat in Brooklyn like we did while watching the Statue of Liberty's torch burn and stopping at Grand Central Station to pay.
When lunch was done we headed back and I made my purchases:
Some new roving that will hopefully inspire me to play with my spindle some more. Slightly over 1000 of fingering weight alpaca that I'm not totally sure what I'll do with yet and this:
Opal sock yarn for HWJF for $9! I cast on in the car on the way to Hartford because the sock I was trying to make for myself just wasn't working out (more on that soon). Now I'll definitely have a SIP (sock in progress) for train knitting for a while.
Now I bet you're wondering about the wolves part... after running a few errands and getting a snack, it was off to a Wolfpack hockey game in Hartford! Ever since getting my job last fall, there hasn't been much time for live hockey. I got an e-mail on Friday that there was a game Saturday night, a play-off game at that and the series was tied 3-3. We decided to go for it and weren't disappointed. They won! (And the mojo must have been good for that other team we won't be talking about.) Definitely a great end to a fun day!
Sunday was mostly spent in frustration that I won't bore you with. What little knitting I did do at least got me to finish the first sleeve from hell (which I also don't seem to have a pic of right now).
FO pics next time. See you then!
So Saturday after a stop to drop off a bassoon to one of his students, HWJF (that's right. The boyfriend came with me. Am I lucky or what?!) and I headed for the CT Sheep and Wool festival. I had been once before, but the weather was awful. This time it was a bright sunny day and the little festival parking area was packed when we arrived. While this is a very small festival, they sure do pack in a lot to see. There were alpacas in the first of the four barns and lots of yummy yarns. There was even someone making straw brooms! The second barn housed the sheep to shawl competition, sheep shearing demo and several vendors offering different roving and yarns. Out behind this barn was the sheep dog trial area. This is something that I always am completely amazed by, but can only watch for about 5 min. before I want to move on to the yarn. The dogs and the sheep REALLY move! I suppose if someone told me what exactly they are supposed to do I might be more interested. The third barn housed the Nutmeg Spinners and more yarn vendors. I ran into Chris here as I thought I might. For those of you who read her blog, you might be as shocked as I was to realize that little BB is already 3 months old and was about ready for her first harecut which we got to watch:
Later on in the day I got to hold her!
Isn't she just the sweetest thing?! And I even found out that cats and bunnies will get along. A new friend for Simba in the future perhaps? Hmmm...
The last barn featured the food (I'm always a little disturbed by the fact that they serve lamb. HWJF was disturbed by the taste) and several other vendors. I saw some really pretty soysilk yarn that I almost bought, but was a little pricey and the most beautiful spindles where the whorl was made of a metal circle and the center had these beautifully hand-carved Celtic knot patterns. I was a bad blogger and was too bashful to ask if I could take a picture, but trust me, they were beautiful (and a bit out of my price range).
After meeting up with Lauren and Joanne, we decided to have lunch at Reins which is always fun. It's a NY style deli that is set up to look like NYC where you can eat in Brooklyn like we did while watching the Statue of Liberty's torch burn and stopping at Grand Central Station to pay.
When lunch was done we headed back and I made my purchases:
Some new roving that will hopefully inspire me to play with my spindle some more. Slightly over 1000 of fingering weight alpaca that I'm not totally sure what I'll do with yet and this:
Opal sock yarn for HWJF for $9! I cast on in the car on the way to Hartford because the sock I was trying to make for myself just wasn't working out (more on that soon). Now I'll definitely have a SIP (sock in progress) for train knitting for a while.
Now I bet you're wondering about the wolves part... after running a few errands and getting a snack, it was off to a Wolfpack hockey game in Hartford! Ever since getting my job last fall, there hasn't been much time for live hockey. I got an e-mail on Friday that there was a game Saturday night, a play-off game at that and the series was tied 3-3. We decided to go for it and weren't disappointed. They won! (And the mojo must have been good for that other team we won't be talking about.) Definitely a great end to a fun day!
Sunday was mostly spent in frustration that I won't bore you with. What little knitting I did do at least got me to finish the first sleeve from hell (which I also don't seem to have a pic of right now).
FO pics next time. See you then!
