Fiber and Folk 09 - The Report

It's hard to believe I've been back from the Fiber and Folk Festival for a week. I'm always a bit wiped out when I come back from an all weekend show. So after a few days to recover, take inventory, do paperwork, I'm ready to blog about it.

I absolutely love this show! I love the vendor mix and the folk music. I couldn't believe my good fortune to catch the music of Peter and Lou Barryman. I used to go see them at the Club de Wash (are they still in business?) when I was a student in Madison many moons ago. It brought back old memories and made me feel young, although most of the songs they sang were about growing old. I'm right there with them! Sigh!

My friend Rosa accompanied me on this trip. A shout out to Rosa for her energy, enthusiasm and easy going personality! What can I say about someone who doesn't complain when I insist that I have to drive back to Milwaukee upon arrival in Crystal Lake when I discover that I forgot to pack my display baskets? She is up for sainthood. AND, I must say, that woman is a knitting machine! She knit 5 kits while manning the booth without batting an eye!

Thanks to Rosa helping me, I was able to teach a class on Friday. I had 8 students, and they were all very enthusiastic about the class. They loved the fact that they walked away with a finished bracelet. Here are pictures of their finished work.
I'm very proud of all of them.

These pictures come courtesy of one of my students. They are the only pictures I have from this year's Fiber and Folk because I packed my camera, but the battery was dead and the charger was at home. Memo to self: make check list before packing for shows, include display baskets and charger for the camera.

Fiber and Folk Kick Off

I'm just about set to leave for the Midwest Fiber and Folk Festival in Crystal Lake, IL. The Fair lasts Friday through Sunday, but there is a preview evening for students on Thursday night. I enjoyed this fair last year, but I worked it alone and didn't get to see anything besides my booth and the bathroom. This year I will be taking my friend Rosa with me to help in my booth. I couldn't do it without her because I will be teaching a class on Friday afternoon. I packed lots of additional kits, probably too many, but I can't help myself. I keep buying beads and yarn, and I have to sell it so I can buy more beads and yarn. I'm excited that I have a spot in the gym this year. Last year I was in the tent outside and hot sticky weather with thunderstorms in the afternoon kept the crowds down. Air conditioning is one of those niceties that we tend not to appreciate until its not there. Well, better run. I have 100 or so kits to label before I pack the car.

Welcome Uncle Sam

I finally wrote up the Patriotic Baby Hat pattern that I blogged about in November. It is available through my Etsy shop, here. What, you say it's too late to knit a hat for the 4th? Hah! Get ye to a yarn shop and start knitting! Seriously, it makes a great gift for any American baby when you don't know the gender of the unborn child. Or, especially, for military moms and dads. I really do like this hat. I may need to go back to the computer to work up big kid and adult sizes.

P.S. Thanks to my colleague at work for allowing her daughter to be my model. Desperate for a model, I went to the school Daycare and looked for any awake babies, and she was the only one. Fortunately, her mom agreed that I could use her likeness. Even more fortunately, she is cute as a button!

Dust Bunny

 

Here it is--Stardust in black angora . . . I've decided to rename it Dust Bunny, since it was collecting dust as a UFO for a while there. I began this little cutie in January of '08 but lost my enthusiasm quickly and set it aside a number of times. I finally finished it last week. What made me set it aside was that I was worried that it would be too small, not that I wasn't getting gauge, but you know how you have a pattern with set dimensions and you have to decide to make it either too big or too small? Well, I decided this style would be better too small rather than too big so I made the smaller size, but then the really worrying part was that I gained more than a few pounds between the time I started and the time I finished. I need not have worried. It fits beautifully and it is so soft, I feel like I'm being hugged by a bunny when I wear it. This was an intermediate difficulty pattern but the sewing was difficult, mostly because I knit it in a very fluffy black angora. That, combined with old eyes and not so great lighting makes the finishing tough. The seams are respectable though.

Bridal Jewelry

I joined Etsy recently, (you would think I would have done this ages ago!) and the Etsy Knitters Group is organizing a "knitted wedding" album. Both my "Chain, Chain, Chain" necklace and "Chips and Stones" bracelet in quartz crystal and pearls would be perfect. I just donated the finished items shown in these pictures to the fundraising auction at the school where I work, and they sold for an overbid price. I have kits available to make more, but I'll have to get busy making another set. Now that June is upon us, I think the finished items may sell better than the kits.

I have to admit, I prefer to sell my kits over the finished jewelry because I always want to create something new and different and don't want to make the same thing twice. However, this bracelet is so pretty, I don't mind doing it again and again.

Journey into the Past

I had a wonderful rendezvous the other day with my college roommates. The three of us haven't been together in at least 25 years. (Oops I guess I just gave a clue to how old I am.) Linda and I have kept in touch, but neither of us knew where Bonnie was after she moved, married, divorced, and moved again. Thanks to Facebook, we have found each other again. While Linda lives across the country, Bonnie is still here in the Midwest, just 20 miles from me. We had a loooooooooong lunch (from 1 p.m. to 7 p.m.!) catching up with each other and just enjoying each other's company.
This is my second reconnection to the past within the last year (I saw my college beau in March last year) and it somehow makes me feel connected and affirmed. I keep singing the Brownie song in my head, "Make new friends, but keep the old. One is silver and the other gold."

Camp Minikani Encore

It's Camp Minikani time again! This year I taught the gemstone flower pin craft that we did for Mother's Day last year. Since Moms or Dads are at camp with the students we couldn't exactly call it a Mother's day surprise, which took a bit of the excitement out of the project for some students. The girls loved the project because they wanted to claim the pins for themselves, but most of the boys weren't convinced to make a pin for Mom when she was right there helping them with the pin. Oh, well. They seemed to have fun, and no one found it too difficult. I wish I had some pictures of some of the finished products--some of them could have been sold on Etsy or Ebay. Here you can see me in the process of making a pin and leading the group through the steps. They worked hard and almost everyone finished in the short time we had to complete our projects. I'm proud.