2008 Sedalia Spring Fiber Festival

took place last Saturday in Big Island, Virginia, at the Sedalia Center, which used to be an elementary school, was bought by the county, and now hosts various events. Not a large festival, very cozy and friendly. Look at this setting! at the foot of a few gorgeous peaks in the Blue Ridge Mountains.

My friend Denise and I drove up on a last minute whim, and had a wonderful fibery day. I’m still upset that I didn’t win the drawing for the Kromski 16″ Harp loom, but look at this loot!

Furthest left there is honest to goodness combed Cormo top from Overlook Manor Farm, so wonderfully soft, most likely spins like butter, though that sounds very messy, doesn’t it? Spins like a dream? Better. Then a pattern for a swirly shawl, and jojoland melody yarn to knit it in. Then the Holiday 2007 issue of IK, which is sold out everywhere, what a find! A beautiful skein of potential socks in colorway “cherry blossom” from rock creek yarns. A tool for making braid, and a book to learn how, from Lacis, by way of I See Spots Farm. Last, no photograph could do it justice, because you really have to stroke your face with it to appreciate it fully, and the colors are complex and beautifully blended, but that roving is 50% Polwarth, 50% angora from Woolybuns by way of Greenberry House, in Meadows of Dan, Virginia. What a glorious Stash Enhancement eXpedition (that’s yarn SEX to you). I’m so proud of my self-restraint in coming home without a new spinning wheel or drum carder. When I go to SAFF in the fall, an intervention may be in order.

Today’s flowers for you include:

The first hydrangea mopheads of the year. This is an endless summer original, which bloomed pink it’s first year, and a beautiful light red-violet since, and:

white clematis henryi with flowers the size of dinner plates, and:

this lovely blue clematis on my front lamp post which might be variety rhapsody, but I never can remember. It has a profuse habit, and a long blooming season too.

I think I may have just topped my personal record for most links per post.

ooooh, pretty . . . . . . vivid!

My first bobbin of the polwarth/silk roving:

I had no idea the magenta would so dominate it.  I’m adjusting.  I’m getting much smoother at doing this, which is a good thing, because DH would like me to do other things from time to time.