Fiber Festival

 It's taken a while, but I am finally getting up photos from the fiber festival I went to at the beginning of the month. The whole family came along, which meant that while we saw everything, it all went pretty fast. For some crazy reason it was 85 that day, and my wonderful trying-to-be-indepedent 4 year old decided that she was going to wear sweats before we left home and didn't want to change, so we tried to make the day as quick as possible for her sake.

Now on to the photos. Above are some adorable Angora rabbits, I didn't catch what kind, but I was able to get some Angora/Wool roving and it is so soft. I love rabbits of any kind. I love that surreal sense when you know your touching their fur but you can't actually feel anything because they are so soft! I am waiting for the day that the husband lets me get one, but he insists that won't happen until our cats are gone, which will be a while.

 Here are the alpacas they had. I was surprised at how small they were. I had read they were about 100-150 pounds smaller than llamas, but I guess the llamas I had known were really big. These guys were only about three and a half feet or so at the shoulders.
Now technically, we do have enough of a yard for one alpaca, but as they are herd animals, and we live within city limits, I don't think that will happen anytime soon.

There were also sheep dog trials going on throughout the day. We watched two dogs do their stuff. it was amusing enough. The little one liked it enough, but by this time the husband had had enough of the heat, trying to keep our daughter entertained while I looked around, and probably just being outside, so we didn't hang around too long.

There were all sorts of sheep breeds there. It was nice to see some up close and interesting to see the different sizes and varieties. The Merinos they had there were huge compared to these little guys.

Unfortunately, the tent where the sheep were was pretty packed and we walked through pretty quickly, so while I got a few shots, I wasn't able to make notes of the breeds.

I love the sheep with speckled faces!

 This amazing spinner was doing a live demonstration, and no that's not a ball of wool in her lap, it's a rabbit. She was pulling tufts of fur directly off the rabbit, spinning them, and talking to the other people around her all at the same time...I want a rabbit.

Here are the big guys. We managed to get a peek at them before we headed out, and they were pretty neat. One of them, I thing the brownish one on the far right, was "humming." It was fun to hear what noise llamas make, although it's not a happy noise and one of them kicked the fence while we were there. I think the heat and people where getting to them.

Not this guy though. He just ate and did his thing.
I just love his color too.







All in all, I would love to go to another festival. There were so many great vendors with great fibers and yarns. There were several demonstrations going on about knitting, crochet, spinning, and weaving. There were classes, and kids activities. It's too bad it was so warm, hopefully next time will be a more laid back experience.