Llamafest and Threadbear

After bringing my shiny new car home, almost the whole family decided to tag along to Lamafest with Em and I. There were six of us, my car seats five. So we all piled into the bus as I bid goodbye to my new car (damn, I wanted to actually DRIVE it!). We had fun though. It was very cool to see all of those beautiful animals in one place.

camera loving llama

camera shy llama

awww, baby llama

I kept trying to convince Peter we could fool the neighbors with our new "dog" (standard poodle? afghan hound? Come on, honey, they walk on leashes, with the right name--Rover?--we could sooo pull this off!). He wasn't buying it...or me a llama (or an alpaca, which might be even easier to masquerade as a dog). *pout*

I brought home some alpaca/silk roving, and 2 pounds of gorgeous deep brown llama fleece (have absolutely no idea what we'll do with it since we have no fiber prep tools but it sure is purty!).

Em got some roving too but I'm sure she'll share that with you. She wanted some striping sock yarn for back-to-school knitting (in class) so we buzzed up to Threadbear today--in my new car (by the time we got home, Em's eyes were tired of rolling at every mention of my new car). I said I was going to put a "Mom's Car!" sticker on the dash or maybe one of those "ass, gas or grass, nobody rides for free" signs. She said, "Huh?" and then "You're OLD" with yet another eye roll. I said, "I was knitting in the 70's" She said, "I knit through the 70's unit in US history." Uh, I couldn't top that.

HOLY CRAP. Threadbear was impressive the few times we visited but it's REALLY impressive now. A whole new, right in front, section of spinning stuff--roving, spindles (clunky ones, but still), couple of wheels and OMG, silk hankies!!

And the yarn. OMG. The. Yarn. I think they may have actually doubled the amount of yarn they carry. Seriously. Em and I slowly walked around the store, touching everything. Then I walked around a few more times while she paced in front of the sock yarn, unable to make a choice between this yummy yarn and that lovely colorway. We were wandering around in there for a coupla hours. Wow.

I found this too (saw it at last year's Fiberfest and kicked myself for not buying it then)

I don't think I ever mentioned I collect hedgehogs.

Or showed you why I collect them...

meet Widget

All those needles--I swear, one day, I'm going to teach him to knit.

At least to needle felt.

And as we checked out, I threw in that I heard Carina has been talking up my spindles there. They/he (honestly, I have no idea whether it was Matt or Rob or someone else altogether, I'm not sure I was even breathing during the quick conversation) knew who I was. Er, about my spindles. It seems Carina isn't the only one who's been talking them up. Snooze was in there showing hers around too. He told me he wasn't the spinner (I'm pretty sure I talked to Rob--he was really nice and friendly--there may have been mention of "Dave"?) but please make an appointment to come in and show them my spindles because they would really love to see them...and consider carrying them.

*faint*