In addition to dyeing with the Sanguine Gryphon last weekend, we also visited the Maryland Sheep & Wool Festival on Saturday, May 2.
Here are a few of us entering the fairgrounds – me, Laura and Linda. Nikki took the picture.
The weather was really so, so. It was overcast, and rained for part of the day, but for us northerners it was fairly warm.
I spent most of the day just walking around the festival looking at all the yarn and other knitting related items. But the most fun part was meeting so many people.
I wore my Mystic Roses shawl, which made me relatively easy to spot in a crowd. The shawl is really large, and the colour is such a vibrant red that it’s hard to miss. 
Here are some of the people from the Wollmeise group on Ravelry. A few of the people I already knew from the Gryphon retreat, but there were a number of others whom I had only met online before, and it was really nice to meet you in person.
Mary Ann brought real NY bagels from New York city, and they were just as delicious as I remember.
I also met a number of people from the Mystic knitalongs, and that was really fun. It was nice to put some faces to the names and email addresses I’ve gotten to know over the years.
Finally, of course I did some shopping. The one thing I was really looking for was a jumbo ball-winder, to wind all my neverending skeins of lace. Winding 1,200 m of lace, or (even worse) 1,600 m by hand is just not fun. And while I had a knitpicks-winder, it just didn’t do the large laceskeins for me, so I thought it was a good investment. I ended up purchasing a Strauch jumbo ball-winder. It’s amazing. I’ve already tried it with a number of different yarns, and it works great.
I also bought some yarn – two different lace weights – but mainly I just looked at all the things and all the people. It was a lot of fun.
