Woolfest 2012

I was unexpectedly offered the opportunity to attend Woolfest, held at Cockermouth in Cumbria today.   I jumped at the chance since it not only involved wool, and  a day off work, but also a whole day spent with my closest friend,  talking about knitting, and having a really good catch up with each other's lives.   The journey took two hours each way so we had plenty of time to chat and then had four hours at the show (which felt like about two hours as the time just flew by).  We had a truly fabulous time wandering about petting the yarns and deciding what we would bring home with us.  I seem to have infected her with my desire to dye anything that stands still long enough and we are planning a dying day later in the year.  She has bought some acid dyes with built in fixatives (so much easier than messing around with soda and salt)  and I have both the Kool Aid and the Wiltons cake dyes so we can have a truly fabulous time when we get chance to have a play. 

Somehow the purchase of the dyes seemed to set a tone for the day and we both came back with mainly naked sheep products.  So I now have lots and lots of yarn available for my dying activities.
Two 500 gram hanks of blue faced leicester (BFL) aran and two 500 gram hanks of BFL double knitting (between us we bought the stall's entire stock of BFL in both weights!!!).  These will become sweaters and there will be left overs for smaller projects.

Three skeins of 75% merino/25% silk sock weight, we went halves on a five skein pack and for some reason I ended up with the third skein. 

At Bluefaced they were selling off skeins that weren't labelled at three for £10. When we got back to the stall ready to purchase (having gone round the entire show first to ensure we chose just the right things), it was quite quiet so the owner helped us work out what the yarns were.   I got two skeins of merino aran  and four skeins of sock weight superwash merino.  The aran will be dyed and used as a contrast colour with some black merino aran left from a previous project.  The sock weight will become a cardigan or sweater since its superwash so can be machine washed.  The fourth skein is for socks, which I will wash in the machine BEFORE I trust the cardigan to the machine. 
My dear friend, with very patient digging, unearthed six matched skeins of alpaca and silk double knit.  A truly fabulous bargain for £20.   

And here is the scale of the undyed mountain. 

But I didn't stop there:  I got some undyed alpaca in a divine dark brown.   This is a 100 gram skein of 4 ply weight and it is about the softest yarn I have ever felt in my life, with a wonderful sheen to it.  This will probably become a shawl because I cannot imagine a better mood enhancer than to have this fabulously soft cloud of scrumptiousness around my neck. 

Finally, one skein of coloured sock yarn came home with me. (Even though I do have the mountain of sock yarn already mentioned above and a few others in stash).  This is Araucania Ranco Multy which reminds me of Monet's paintings and will probably become socks. 

 My friend fell in love with two skeins of laceweight and a stole pattern.  I have been commissioned to knit up the stole in one skein and two shawlettes in the other since despite being the most accomplished knitter I know, possessing the gift of perfect tension AND being as fast as lightning, charts and lace yarns aren't her thing though she loves the end results.  Both skeins are seriously gorgeous so its not exactly going to be a hardship to knit these up and in any case I'd do anything for her.   No photos of these yarns, but I'll post the items as I make them.  I am planning to cast on for the stole as soon as my current project is cast off and hopefully will get the yarns wound into cakes this weekend.