Woodstock Fleece Festival Part 2

What a horrible week. I was going to rant about the fleece festival (rest assured, I still will), but I ended up with four assignments and a midterm due this week, severely cutting back on my internet time. I've hardly had ANY time to craft this week, it's super upsetting!

But on to better things.

That is what I bought at the fleece festival! I might have got a liiiittle overexcited, but it was my first fibre festival and I just couldn't contain myself. Plus, it was (almost) all really well priced! I haven't quite worked out what I spent yet, I've been avoiding thinking about it. I might have spent all my grocery money for November. Well, if I run out of food I'll just go to everything on campus with free food, that's the best way to deal with that problem, right?

Now I'm not going to go on (and on, and on) about everything I bought, but I have to share a few special things.

I WON this! I had my eye on it when I entered the raffle, and it was still there when I won! So so so so exciting. The price tag said $50, crazy eh?


This is really cool, it's two skeins of different fibre dyed to match by Fleece Artist. I don't have any fixed plans for this yet, but it was too nice to pass up! One skein is merino, the other is "angel hair" - 70% kid, 30% nylon.


These are also fleece artist, lovely laceweight purple! 66% Mohair, 24% Wool, 10% Nylon. I got one dyed straight purple, and one that was varicoloured with sections of the same purple, I'm planning on using them for a lace shawl, because I am sort of in the mood for a lace shawl.


4oz of border leicester locks. They have fantastic texture and colour variation!


This bag is a pound and was $10. For dyed wool! Oh man! They had all these bags with different colours and you got to pick your own, it was super exciting. I also got some bamboo-merino blend from here.


I got a new spindle! It has a really wide whorl, and it's pretty heavy. I really like the grain of the wood that's visible! I actually sanded it down a little because the varnish was a little bumpy in places, but for $22 I'm definitely not complaining!
The fibre is merino-viscose, and I am entirely in love with it. It drafts beautifully, is wonderfully soft, and I love how it's dyed! I'm going to spin it all into a lace/fingering weight single, and make something lacy with it.


This was my particularly indulgent purchase. I'd told myself NOT to buy any yarn that was more than $20/skein, but this was so EXACTLY my favourite colours, and it felt soooo nice, and the stall took credit cards....
I have no regrets. The fact I only bought one is a credit to my self-control.

Even apart from all the gorgeous fibre, the fleece festival was thoroughly enjoyable. After I'd spent all my money I wandered around with my new drop spindle and chatted to people. So many people who love fibre in one place! Wondrous. I'm going to start saving for next year RIGHT NOW. Well, maybe after I've saved enough for this one yarn I really want...

Fleece Festival Part 1

Oh man, I just got back from the Woodstock Fleece Festival, and I am completely exhausted and penniless but I just had to post about how WONDERFUL it was!!! *happy sigh*

More about it later.

What I did on my summer vacation

I just got back home after being away for about a month. Classes started today too, which was a little annoying; I'd have liked to have a bit of time to prepare, I had to use a shopping bag as a backpack today because my backpack was still full from camping. But at least there was only one class, and we didn't really do anything, so I'm not really sure what I'm complaining about.

I spun some yarn! I'm getting better at making it even-ish, which is nice, and I've also now made 3-ply:

From this top:

I made this yarn:

(The colour is more accurate in the second picture.) I split the top into three before I started spinning, but they didn't all end up the same length, so I made the single underneath with the leftovers. I quite like the way both bits turned out. No plans yet for what the yarn will be used for...ideas?

This yarn is made from recycled sari ends, which is my new favourite fibre! It's kind of tricky to spin since it isn't really prepared all that much, but you get a great texture from it, and I just love the colours! I ordered a bunch more sari ends off ebay, because I enjoyed making it so much!

I also finally got around to using my people stamps I got aaaaages ago. They're unmounted, so kind of annoying (I should really figure out mounting stamps), but I really like them!

I also finally used the silver pigment ink pad I've had for a while! It doesn't seem to like to dry, particularly since these two cards are coated in mod podge, so the ink had a tendency to rub off a little. But I really like how they turned out, so like whatevs, right?

In other news, Harvest was amazing! The property (which was huge) had all this really neat art, and they had made fantastic deco! It was spread out all over the place, so you could wander around and find random things in the middle of the woods. My favourite thing was the hammerhead sharks they made out of chicken wire and clingfilm. There were 3 stages, which all had really good music. I blew so many bubbles, decided I was part of a circus, wandering around, somehow ended up serving soup off a truck, and was eventually found by friends cuddling with people in the woods a couple hours later. It was wicked fun, but I burned out pretty fast, so I've decided that next year I will actually try to sleep more and eat regular meals instead of just when I remember. Everyone there was really friendly, there was a real sense of community. Oh, and I want to learn to hula hoop properly, because there were people with light up hula hoops and it was SO AWESOME! I can hoop around my waist, knees, and arms, and I can toss it from arm to arm, but that is it and I am UNSATISFIED.

Discoveries

I've found out that Harvest Festival and the Knitter's Fair are on the same weekend!

VS.



THIS IS SO UPSETTING.

It makes me wonder if anyone else has this dilemma, though. I'm going to Harvest since I haven't been to a festival ALL SUMMER, plus I shouldn't be spending all my money on yarn (which I totally would).

Plus, I really want unspun fiber more than yarn at this point (though a nice large batch of white wool would not go amiss...) and apparently the vendors have been told to focus on knitting, not spinning (so sad).

PLUS, I found two more yarn/fiber/etc fairs coming up soon that DON'T conflict! The Woodstock Fleece Festival is in October, and the KW Weavers' and Spinners' Guild Show & Sale in November. So exciting!!!

I also found this wonderful site today, it maps yarn stores and has reviews of them. You can also save "crawls," mapping a set of stores you want to go visit. I've made one of the yarn stores in Ottawa, since I'm visiting there soon! I found a yarn store RIGHT around the corner from where I used to live. Such a waste, I didn't knit then! Heh.

I navajo plied my remade yarn: