3 Bags Full

Yes, the Wool Gathering in Yellow Springs, Ohio was this past weekend, and I came home with 3 bags of lovely, crimpy, greasy wool.

 My alpaca/wool blend yarn has sold better than the 100% alpaca yarns, so much so that I have only 1 skein of it left.  I plan to blend this 12# of cormo cross wool with about 12  to 15 pounds of alpaca for my next batch of yarn.  The wool is "in the grease" which means it will lose up to 25% (or more, but I hope not) of its weight in washing and I hope to have 20# of finished yarn.  

Here's a close up of the wool.  I washed a sample of it and believe it or not, it is quite white once washed.  I neglected to photograph my washed sample however. 

The Wool Gathering was great.  The weather was wonderful, though extremely blustery on Sunday.  It was overcast in the morning, but cleared off by noon and there were huge occasional gusts of wind that made the whole tent flap noisily.  Here are some scenes:

Mom took this with her camera of me next to my yarn.

My booth.  Looks pretty much the same as last year.

I even had entertainment on Sunday as there was a group doing fencing demos between my tent and the next one over and I had the side of the tent open to let in light.  

I think the festival was a success.  I know there was quite a crowd on Saturday and a bit less so on Sunday.  Lots of wonderful vendors with fun things.  I purchased a novelty:  A turkish drop spindle that was made on a 3-D printer!  I forgot to photograph that as well.  Next week, I promise.  The spindle was only $10 and is so cute and colorful and novel that I had to have it.  The maker is a shop called Turtle Made on Etsy.com, but they do not have any photos of their spindles on their site, or I would link it.

I stayed with Mom and she attended the festival with me on Saturday, but was getting ready for a trip, so did not go with me on Sunday.  I brought her dog, Luca home with me to stay while she is away.  The city dog gets to visit the country dogs.  He loves being here and gets lots of exercise.  He especially loves to swim which he does not get to do at home.  This is one of the dogs' favorite spots on one of our walks, a deep spot in the creek.

Fall has arrived and it seems that the colors and the light change daily now.  Our forecast this week is for fabulous weather through the weekend.  This lone sugar maple is already golden.  








And the golden rod is in full bloom in the fields that have not been mown, like this one on Wayne National Forest that we hike through several times a week.

 Grover and I are still having a great time at agility class.  Just before I started to write this post, I printed off the entry forms for a trial in Zanesville, Ohio in November, which I plan to enter as soon as I figure out what to enter.  Grover got his AKC/PAL registration a couple weeks ago, so he is ready to go.  We still have 2 months to prepare!  We will be entered in novice and I observed the novice class at the trial a couple weeks ago and it seemed like something we can do.  A couple of my classmates (who are experienced handlers with novice dogs) were in the class and did very well.  We shall see.



On the fiber front, I started a scarf that son Sam/Zac/Satchmo requested.  He asked for a grey scarf.  Not the most exciting knitting, but he will wear it, so he gets it.  He bikes to his job in Portland, so I hope to finish it in a couple of weeks and get it to him.  It has a kind of basket weave pattern, which makes it a little easier to work on, as there is stitch variety.  

And I have still been working on my sweater.  I need to get this finished in a month so I can wear it to the festival I am attending in Rhinebeck, NY.  Knitting a "Rhinebeck Sweater" seems to be a tradition among New York Sheep & Wool attendees.  This sweater has a lacy pattern on the back and a solid front.  Here is the back as it is now:

This is knit in some of my hand-dyed wool/alpaca blend yarn that I reserved for myself.

I sold a couple of rugs at the Wool Gathering, so I am contemplating the next warping of my loom and hope to start that soon.  Maybe today, if I have time.  We shall see.


Just south of Young's Dairy, which is where the Wool Gathering is held, there is a field just full of sunflowers.  I stopped early Sunday and took a few photos on my way to the festival.  Here is my favorite.