Category: Spinning

I like to go to Rhinebeck with wide-open eyes. There are possibilities around every corner, and even though I’m sure I missed seeing or touching something great that I would have brought home with me, I’m so happy with what did find its way into the back of the car. I had a short list of a few things I needed (spinning wheel oil) and some things I wanted (qiviuk and lavender sachets), but the rest was left up to my intuition.

• The top one is natural-dyed Coopworth roving from Botanical Shades. I’ve already begun spinning it; it’s not super-soft, but the colors make me feel like I’m diving into a flower garden.
  
• On the left is some “Nasturtiums” roving, which is 45% kid mohair, 45% wool, and 10% silk, from Steam Valley Fiber Farm. Again, the flowers; this looks just like nasturtiums, and it’s very soft.
  
• On the right is a beautiful batt of dyed Moorit wool and kid mohair from Hidden Spring Farm. If I have any regrets about the weekend it’s that I didn’t purchase all three bags of this; in person, it’s a stunning deep raspberry red.

These were my first purchases of the day on Saturday. They are beautiful sachets — dupioni silk, hand-embroidered, and filled with lavender — made by Susan Borger. In addition to sachets, Susan makes the most beautiful wool-embroidered buttons I’ve ever seen. Her Etsy shop Lavender Trifles will be up and running soon.

I can’t go to Rhinebeck without getting a couple of skeins of Morehouse Farm yarn. This is 3-Strand Merino in Fern Glen.

Another booth I can’t pass by is Brooks Farm. This is Solo, their newest wool yarn. It’s a soft but sturdy singles, and each skein has 400 yards. Three of them ought to be enough for something, I think.

This little ball of yarn, all 1 ounce and 218 yards of it, just might be the most precious yarn or fiber I’ve ever had. It comes from Windy Valley Muskox. All it needs now is the right little lace scarf pattern. I decided that I craved it, and that I would need just one ball to satisfy the craving. Done.

I don’t have any photos of the beautiful yarn and fiber that Judy chose — Brooks Farm Four Play in a deep scarlet, some Morehouse like mine only in Autumn shades that go with the scarlet, a bag of wool and mohair fiber in a rich rusty orange blend. She also brought home a special gift for herself, one that she has been contemplating for several years — a felted vessel by Heather Kerner of SpiralWorks.

The R’s dove in, too. PhotoStylist R chose yarn from Spirit Trail and Brooks Farm, and SockModel R sought and found needle felting supplies, fiber and a great kit to share with her sister at Black Sheep Designs.

We had a grand time, even though the crowds made me slightly cranky. We came home with so much to inspire and delight us that we’re planning a fibery Sunday in a week or so. We want to get together to spin and knit and felt, to keep this momentum going.

I’m so happy that for the four of us Rhinebeck hasn’t become a mad frenzy of acquisition and burnout and stress. We love our traditions, our time together, and the re-energized creativity that it fills us with. We have some grand plans, some little ideas, and a few germinating desires for new or better skills to keep us going until next October!