Estes Park Wool Festival

Saturday dawned with a break in the monsoonal flow so I headed out to Estes Park Wool Festival. I stopped in Denver to pick up CatWithCats and she directed me out the scenic back way to Boulder.

Everyone was out taking advantage of the fair weather on their bicycles and with the their kayaks strapped to the top of their cars on the way to the Outdoor Sport event in Lyons.

We found animals everywhere at the Estes Park Fairgrounds. These little guys looked almost content to be photoed. They are Paco Vicunas and have wonderful fleece for yarn. There were several displays of hand knit items made from their fleece. So lovely for lace items.

And other animals being judged on how beautiful they were, then getting a long awaited "haircut". Some look so funny when they are shorn.

We shopped the vendors' barn and found people that we knew from other knitting events and knitters. We found Plain and Fancy Yarns from Texas, where Cat showed off her finished Taos Shawl that she had bought her yarn and pattern from them in Taos last October. It is lovely, check out her blog for the pictures.

We found the sheep artist, Conni Togel. She is amazing and you must go to her website here and check out her sense of humor, color and style.

We also found yak folks from Bijou Basin Ranch and think a field trip to their place in a possible thing to do this summer, as well as the cashmere goat folks from Guffey, Colorado. Their yarn has specks of shiny stuff in that gives it that little somepun, somepun.

After touring all the vendors we headed out to find lunch in downtown Estes. Then we went to the only yarn shop in Estes Park.

I finally had the opportunity to get into The Stitchin' Den in downtown Estes Park. We were greeted by the owner's two Westies. They lay at the door and greet everyone that comes in. The shop is on four levels. It has a little bit of everything for fiberholics and needleworkers alike. I especially liked the tree outside that was decorated with socks. What a great way to advertise a knitting shop.

All in all it was a wonderful day. We headed home just as the sky started getting darker and the rumbling was becoming more insistent. Ah, the weather in Colorado, wait one minute and it will change. I hope everyone had a great weekend!

Weekend Update

I had a great turn out for the Ooh La La scarf class. I think everyone had a great time learning yarnovers, and the modified bind off. We discussed the difficulty of remembering cast ons and bind offs when you only do them once a project. There are classes coming up soon that are devoted to just those components of knitting.

The rest of my weekend was spent working on the kid cardis as the deadline for mailing them draws nearer. They are going to be really cute. I can hardly wait to see them modeled by their recipients...hint to the parents to remember to take and send me pics. :-)

I also worked in my stash to set up a list of projects I want to work on next. With a list I can prioritize what comes next and do I have everything I need to start. My next project is the Plain and Fancy scarf with the yarn I purchased from Brooks Farm Yarn at the Taos Wool Festival. I discovered while reading the pattern that it does not specify a needle size. The instruction reads "Appropriate knitting needles for the yarn you use." This does not help me.


So I went to Ravelry to see if I could find someone else who was working with this yarn and pattern. Not much luck as I found the same yarn, however in sport weight instead of fingering. And the pattern does not discuss gauge, just the following: "Gauge is not important." That is all well and good except I would like the scarf to look something like a scarf, not a doll blanket.

So I am still on the hunt for someone with information since Plain & Fancy does not have a website and only attend two festivals a year, Estes Park and Taos. I hope to have this knit and wear it to Estes Park in June.

While writing this I emailed the question to the designer. My guess is size 3 needles, will see if I am close. I hope you all have fun projects to spend time creating!