Andddd we're back

Wheewwwwww, so glad that the last 3 weeks are finally over. My husband's grandmother did pass away. The funeral was very simple and touching with all the grandchildren saying a little something about her. It was a good way to remember her and I think she would have liked it.

So a lot has gone on since the last post, I finished socks, visited Maryland sheep and wool, bought lots of stuff, and fought with my loopy ewe swap project. The swap project shall remain a secret but let's just say the yarn wants to be something other than what I was knitting. Ripping out a couple inches of knitting sucks, but it had to be done.

Thought I'd talk a bit about Maryland Sheep and Wool since it was my first fiber festival. Signed up to take the Rosie's Yarn Cellar bus down there but I had no idea where that store is. Shamroxann from Ravelry was very generous, meeting me at the train station and leading us to our destination. The trip was fun, knitting on my sock and listening to the girls behind me talk about their kids. The bus driver was a bit slow getting the bus parked and all of us were almost shouting, "Park it already! We've got yarn to buy!" (I'm sure the drivers thought we were crazy but they were very nice) Some of the outdoor food stands were cool looking, and for some reason I though my husband would be impressed so I snapped a few pics. Here's a pic of the crazy long line to buy Socks that Rock from The Fold both. The line actually is longer than it appears wrapping around the front of a tent with a folk band in it. At least they got to listen to music while they waited. I swooped by The Fold booth at the end of the day and picked up one of the raven colorways with no waiting. That's going to turn into some blackish socks for my mother. Round about this time I found the green mountain spinnery booth and wanted to get a sweaters worth of yarn. The booth was packed and I was waiting for someone to vacate the area so I could get in. But that never happened and I learned the main rule of festival, "The meek shall not get any yarn." I put aside my manners and started pushing like the rest of the customers and walked out with 8 skeins of their balsam color, very tasty. So that's how most of the festival went, find the booth you wanted, squeeze into it with 30-40 other people and then grab what you could and get out of there. Much more sock yarn was bought even though it wasn't planned. It can't helped that it's my crack of choice. All that aggressiveness tired me out so I finished up my day with a visit to the show booth. These mittens make me want to knit mittens. Or steal these but someone probably would have noticed. :) My favorite animal was also a prize winner. Not as cute as my frog of course but he looks very zen. He's a special award winner so he is smiling about being chosen.

The only downer about the festival was that I totally missed getting any ravelry swag. When I made it to the rabbit building the meet up was pretty much over and everyone was packing up. One of the other girls on the bus told me that they had run out of buttons almost immediately so that made me feel better. Guess I'll have to wait for another event to snag a button.