On OFFF

I was doing so well, posting three whole times in one week! then, Bam! I caught some stomach bug that has been floating over the Seattle area. Blech.

I guess it's been quite a few weeks since OFFF (Oregon Flock and Fiber Festival) now, but I'll still post, since I do have a few pictures and they've already been loaded onto the computer! Naomi and I left my house bright and early (6:30am) Saturday morning to head down to the city of Canby, Oregon. I really like the areas outside of Portland - the small sleepy towns and all - even though Portland is so close to Seattle, it's just a totally different feel. So we arrived at the fairgrounds a bit before 10 am. We had talked all the way down about our stashes, and limiting spending because just how much yarn do we really need???? We did plan out how we would hit the vendors - first the vendors we "knew" - Lisa Souza, Tina at Blue Moon, Michael and Sheila Ernst, Klaus at Crown Mountain, and Michelle at Toots LeBlanc.

At Lisa Souza's, I purchased this - 16 oz. of a lovely Merino Top in the South Pacific colorway. back in February at Madrona, Jen had a very lovely Wool Peddler's Shawl. I did buy some roving to spin/knit myself one at Madrona, but I wasn't in love with the yarn after spinning it. I think this will do the ticket!

Next stop was to visit Tina at Blue Moon. Naomi and I got to know Tina a bit in February at Madrona, so we wanted to say hi and also show off our Body Hugger Raglan Sweaters that we both recently knit out of the medium weight sock yarn. Get this - she remember us! Anyway, the best thing about buying from Blue Moon at a show is that they have roving! There is stuff there that isn't on the website, so besides the group of them being so nice, there are great things to be had.

I came away with these:

Yarn and a pattern for the Baby Mine baby sweater (baby gift solved!) and some yummy, yummy silk/wool roving (5.5 oz) in "Jabberwocky" Oooo, pretty...... I did pick up some roving for Amy too (just no picture!)

After that fun, we strolled around a bit, looking for the Dicentra Booth. We did finally find it along with her two bins marked 50% and 75% off! I purchased just two things - the only superwash merino I could find was in these sale bins. I ended up with 4 oz. of superwash merino in Margaritaville and another regular merino in some color I can't recall right now.

More booths, more shopping! Crown Mountain Farms was in this same building, so we strolled over and talked with Klaus for a bit. I bought 8 oz. of Corriedale in the Stonehenge colorway. One more friend stop was to be made, and that was to visit Michelle (and her brother Carl) at Toots LeBlanc. I had purchased 500 yards of their fingering weight merino/pygora in February, and had on my list to get two more skeins of this to be able to make a substantial shawl. Apparently, they had discussed not even bringing this yarn to the show, I'm glad they did!

After a lunch break, we decided we would take a break from the booths and sit under the trees and spin for a bit. That's when I spun the majority of the Crown Mountain pictured above. We ran into many friends here and there - and even got to see Kim! I miss not working with her and seeing her more often.This made for a very peaceful, enjoyable afternoon - the weather was just so nice!

The next morning was the parking lot sale. Now I had heard of this before, and was one of the reasons we had decided to stay the night, so that we could attend. My goal was to get a grey Shetland fleece, but as soon as the sale opened up, I totally forgot that. I ended up beelining it to a Shetland farm and spied quite a few white and a few black fleeces. I ended up getting this white fleece from a sheep named "Tilly". It's pretty important to me to know whose coat I'll be wearing!

I had a cute picture of the couple whose sheep these are from, but now I'm not finding it. Anyway, they are Jeremy and Janet from Heron Ridge Ranch in Oregon.

What's up with the black fleece? Well, I had really only intended to get the one fleece and learn how to clean it, etc. As Naomi and I were walking back to the car later on Sunday, I said "Oh, look - they have that pretty black fleece all laid out" Next thing I knew, we were back at the same "booth" and discussing the merits of this black shetland fleece. Oh, it's so pretty and actually cleaner than the white fleece. And they had dropped the price to $15. Okay, I bought it. It came from Jemima. 'Nuf said. It's mine now.

See this cute lady? We were browsing some of the booths on the lawn and she asked if we'd had our hands massaged yet. Turns out, she was a shopper the day before, loved the product so much that she demo'd for them the whole next day! She was doing a great business for this couple. I ended up buying their Sweet Plumeria Salt Scrub and two lotion bars - honey almond and red clover tea. Oh - the company is Bar-Maids. Great stuff!

All in all a super fantastic weekend with lots of fun and sunshine! Can't wait for next year......