And A Good Time Was Had By All

Lyn brought info about a holiday fiber and yarn sale at a woolen mill in Valders about an hour away from Green Bay to Friday Night Knitting Circle a few weeks ago. She and I and Dusty decided to go last Friday, and we had a blast. We stopped for lunch at Luigi's outside of Manitowoc for a fabulous Italian lunch. (Thanks again, Tanya!) Then we drove to the Hidden Valley Farm & Woolen Mill where the sale was held. It was a lot smaller than we had anticipated but I managed to find some yummy yarn to bring home.



First, though, a few pictures from the sale. As soon as we went in Dusty found the baskets. She loves baskets. Upstairs was all the yarn, roving, and other vendors.










There were balls of roving made from sheep living right across the yard, and baskets of hand spun, hand dyed yarn in a rainbow of colors, and a man weaving rugs on a loom.

















There were knitted and felted fish for sale.








Here's the yarn that I snapped up and brought home.



I plan to convert the gray marl 50/50 merino and alpaca (buy 4 skeins, get 1 free--what a deal!) into hats and mittens with the creamy white 50/50 Shetland lamb and mohair as the brim and cuff edge. I don't know what I'll do with the 100% Coopworth black sheep wool but I have the feeling that this will all be used in "selfish" knitting. It's just too dreamy to let it get away.



And here are the sheep that grew the walnut brown "black" sheep wool I bought, with a whole flock of their paler pals. I had to laugh at them. As I walked toward the barnyard to take their picture, they all turned and started into the barn. I yelled, "Hey, you guys" and they all turned and looked at me as if to say, "what?" and I got their picture. Sheep.




Oh, one more thing... on the drive home I mentioned that I had always wanted to try snowshoeing. (I don't remember how that came up.) Dusty and Lyn want to try it too. We brought it up at FNKC and it turns out that everyone wants to try it. So, if we have enough snow this winter, there will come a day when four middle aged women (old enough to know better), one 30-something woman, and one 20-something woman will be lying in the snow tangled in snowshoes and poles, laughing their asses off, and scaring wildlife in three counties. Don't you think we'd get smarter as we got older? Maybe we can get adjoining suites at the rehab center...