Wisconsin Sheep and Wool

What a relaxing evening. I am so blessed to have this little festival in the backyard of my workplace. I knew all day that I would be rolling out about 5pm to go see yarn - ah. On Friday nights the "country store" is open for free admission - so I have made a point of going on Friday night the past two years - and then if I have to go back, it'll cost me, so it makes me think twice:)

I enjoyed a leisurely stroll among the booths. I wasn't looking for anything, just browsing. Well, maybe I was looking for any new sock needles - always in search of "that" set that I won't break with my ridiculously tight tension. I picked up a set of addi bamboo dpn to try and a addi turbo lace for my cast on candle flame shawl. So, practical.

Then I wandered over to the booth of Wool and Company - a shop that originates in Geneva, Illinois. I lost my head briefly and grabbed to skeins of Shibuiknits in Orchid - colors very reminiscent of my profile picture jaywalkers - though varigated. There is always more room in my stash for pink and green. The yarn looked like Koigu at first glance so it seems very worthy of a try. I had to move along before I grabbed some Malabrigo lace - they had some gorgeous colors - run, Stacey, run. I did pick up a couple of gift items and headed on to the next aisle.

I stopped short of buying Cat Bordhi's new book, New Pathways for Sock Knitters. Paging through the it just further convinced me that I will need to buy this at some point. I was listening to the Socks in the City podcast and Dharmafey was raving about the book too. It's a matter of time. But today wasn't the day.

I was hoping for a skein of handspun to commemorate the gathering but nothing jumped out at me, at least nothing I could afford - bearing in mind I fell down the Wollmeise hole again recently...So I moved onto the sheep barns.

omg, I think I am in love with sheep. They were lowing at me, which I took as a sweet greeting. It was dinner time, so it was hard to get a good picture - though I did have a couple of posers.


I was curious about these guys - made me think of the Ku Klux Klan (which I realize is not a positive association). I'm going to have to check into why they are wearing these costumes, surely there must be a good reason to dress sheep up like this. Probably some very obvious reason that was lost on me...

I think my favorite sheep was the small shetland - it looked like a giant version of my fat cat. I love the orange hue.

I just felt so good, wandering, admiring these guys, so thankful for the wool they provide. Gosh, it felt ethereal somehow. I would have hugged them if I could have managed to figure out how to do that, you know, in a casual way. There really is no nonchalant way to hug sheep, I was thinking creatively. I just tried to send them subliminal thoughts - "Thank you sheep, you are my heros".

It was also kind of neat to think some of you bloggers might have been trolling for goodies right there with me and I wouldn't even know it. I heard one woman say she was meeting her husband there and I wondered if that was the woman at ravelry who had commented something like that - kind of fun to be secretly guessing who is in blogland. I almost wanted to don my Cosmopolitan Jaywalkers and mary janes just to see if someone might recognize my feet. Simple pleasures.