Festival Fun Days

The party hasn't stopped since last Friday, when Birdsong arrived, and won't really stop until after the Yarn Harlot event at Black Sheep this Friday.

The GBFAF was a blast, with great classes, fiber galore, good friends and just a general atmosphere of good cheer. For a first year event you can say SUCCESS!  Hopefully it will grow and become an annual event for the whole Mountain West.  The venue was Wheeler Farm in the center of the SL Valley (and about 2 miles from my house).  The vendors were outdoors and the classes were under a pavilion. It was a bit hot as the day went on, but overall very nice.

The classes were super fun and very informative. Kate, who dyes under the name Snake River Fiber, taught the dyeing class and we had a very good time watching her and then trying to dye up good results of our own.  Here's Kate:

Adding fiber to pot, measuring color and then adding it to the pot.

Colored fiber after removal from pot and a second 'helping' of red fiber dyeing.

Susan worked hard to create her colorways:

Taking her hot roving from pot, painting another roving and laying out the fiber in the sun.  My dyed roving is the red/orange, yellow snake in the grass behind Susan's. You can see we have very different ideas about color.

The dyeing class was all day and it was fun to see all the different results from the students.

Sunday Birdsong, Susan and I took Elizabeth's Advanced Spinning class.  She gave us a bag of luscious fibers to try and we could use any of her many spindle designs.  We learned so much about which type or weight of spindle to use with which fiber and had good results with most.  Elizabeth is a font of information on spinning and fiber.  Hopefully I'll be able to learn more from her as she lives here in Utah.

The spindles were all so beautiful and it was such a pleasure to meet Elizabeth, her husband Bart, and daughter McKenna Lee.

The Fair had other wonderful happenings. Ann Carroll Gilmour had several helpers 'waulk' her handwoven fabric. A ring of people sat at a table and thumped her tartan while passing it along to the next participant. Ann sang Scottish folk tunes all the while. It was a fun event to see!

And look at this! Susan won a Blue Ribbon for her own design the Mountain Stream Scarf. She spun the fiber (Snake River alpaca/silk/merino) and hand knit it, of course.

It will be nice to relax for a couple of nights as I am tired to the bone from all the fun. The rest won't be long however, as there is more fun coming Friday.  Thank goodness a restful weekend is coming up soon.

Comments

[Dianna]

You are bringing back memories - Wheeler's Farm, Ann Carroll Gilmour.... the dyeing looks like it was fun! Looks like the Salt Lake Valley has the beginnings of an awesome fiber fest!

[Laurie]

Sounds like it ws a great day all around. And TWO MILES from your house.

[Vera]

Everything looks like so much fun. Susan's scarf is gorgeous. Party on!

[Kelly]

I really like the colors you chose for you fiber! It sounds like you had a great time!

[Beth]

What a perfect weekend - I'm thoroughly jealous.

[hillary]

That all looks like so much fun. Your dyed roving is beautiful.

[Kathleen]

Falling back to earth...Looks like an absolutely fabulous time.

[Kim]

OOohhh.....what a wonderful dyeing class!! How fun! Aren't fiber fairs the BEST?

[Cara]

Sounds like your week will be like my week last week. ;-) Don't forget to get some rest!

[Marcia]

The dyeing sounds like such fun! Hubby's away this weekend and that's ALL I plan to do: I have lots of KP yarn for dyeing and a brand new dye kit from my visit to Pine Tree Yarns (Elaine Eskesen, "Dyeing to Knit") in Maine.

[Stitch-n-Snitch]

Woo-hoo for Susan! Keep me in the loop on what's going on with the Harlot's visit. ;)

[Lucia]

You are giving me Rhinebeck lust of the worst description.

[Scout]

Wow....looks like an amazing time!

[Jennifer]

Ah, so much fun! Congrats go out to Susan for her winning design!

[PumpkinMama]

Looks like so much fun!

[Carole]

I love that the fiber you and Susan dyed is so completely different. Yet they are both beautiful!

[Norma]

Sounds like such a HUGE success, and I gasped out loud when I saw Susan's scarf -- especially when you said she spun it, too! Amazing!

[Kristi aka Fiber Fool]

Oh, that sounds wonderful like a wonderful weekend and great learning!

[wool winder]

What a great time you had! Love the part about the Scottish folk songs.

[Kim]

This sounds like such fun! So, is the lady who sings the Scottish folk songs actually scottish, or does she just know the songs?How did Laurie do with her soap? So exciting that Susan won, too!

Can't wait to hear your report on the Harlot this weekend!

[Lark]

Yesterday, nothing but Katie Couric takiing over the evening newscast...but that's only because CBS doesn't know about Margene's skill with the real news!!!

Great recap, Margene. As I was there, I can attest to the great energy. Kudos to the organizers.

[Anne]

Great pictures - the roving came out great! It'll be fun to spin up too; I would bet on it.

[Shannon]

It looks like you had a great time in your classes! It's such a bummer that I'm missing the YH signing, but I'm sure you'll give a full report. It was nice to see you again over the weekend.

[Necia]

The roving you dyed is gorgeous. Reminds me of pink lemonade. I'm going to try a new dying technique, hopefully this weekend. I hope I get pretty colors like yours.

Necia

[Beth S.]

Snake in the grass.. hee! :-)

Seriously though, what an incredible time you're having these days. And with more to come, too! (I have yet to make it to one of Stephanie's readings myself, but maybe the next book?...)