Middle Tennessee Fiber Festival

What a fun time we had yesterday!!!! A very small fiber festival in comparison to say the Wisconsin or Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival, but fun just the same. I met some knitsibs there and we perused all the vendors, watched a sheep shearing, petted some angora rabbits, learned all about harvesting their fiber (french and english), ate a bite of lunch and of course, came home with some fiber.

Angora rabbits:

Sheep before and after shearing:

I had purchased some silk caps at Stitches South and decided to pick up a few more yesterday.
Because of their long fibers, you can knit directly from the cap, all you have to do is draft first. You don't need to spin it, although you can do that too. To learn how, go here. There are many more sites, just go to Google and type in silk caps.

In addition to the silk caps, I purchased a kit (I know, I don't normally do that) from Coloraturayarns.com. This is a simple garter stitch scarf but a silk scarf was also dyed in the same colorway and you weave the scarf through it once it's knitted. I should have taken a picture of their finished item, but I didn't so you'll have to wait for my finished product.

I also came home with some Merino/Tussah Silk in a blue colorway

and some needle felting items and some alpaca fiber for needle felting


In the last post I mentioned that the LYS did a knit-a-long for the EZ Baby Surprise Jacket. We used Katia Bombay. A lovely, lovely self-striping yarn and an ingenious pattern! I'm done with it other than finding the right buttons.

You follow Ms. Zimmerman's destructions........and you get this pile of mess.

Fold it the right way....and you get this. Just 2 seams at the top of the sleeves and you're done. Buttonholes are placed on either side of the jacket, so you can knit it in advance in a neutral color, and once the baby's gender is known, cover the other buttonhole with a button, and presto, an already handmade baby gift.

Yep, she's a genius!

This Memorial Day weekend will be spent getting the bedroom ready for the external closet we are having installed. It's going to be all shelves and enclosed with doors. We have chest of drawers but they don't work well for sweat clothes, long johns, turtlenecks...stuff you need for the farm in winter. Our MB closet has shelving, but it's at the top (where I can't reach) and I have to put laundry away. Plus, what's in the MB closet now, isn't enough. Our MB is plenty big enough to add an external closet. We've been using stackers but they aren't dust-free as a closet would be. Unfortunately, I've already gotten rid of the stackers and moved the chests, so I don't have a before picture. But I will be posting an after picture. Closet guy comes next weekend.

I need to do something similar for my yarn stash too.