This weekend was the Maryland Sheep & Wool Festival, and, as I mentioned earlier, because Rudi needed to go to Pennsylvania on Saturday for a ski coaching meeting, we got a rental car for the weekend. Rudi had a party to go to, so I hit the festival on my own.

While yesterday was remarkably pleasant, rain moved in last night and stayed all day, which gave the grassy areas of the festival grounds the consistency of chocolate pudding. But I and some intrepid few turned up today to take in both sheep and wool.

Here are some of the sheep I ran into:

A really cool new thing I discovered this year, was a hands-on display of 70 different breeds of sheep, which included a lock of wool and then a swatch made from the yarn. It really gave you a sense of which are the scratchy wools and which are sproingy. Very informative.

In addition to two trays of pepper and tomato plants, this is what came home with me:

The Toad Hollow yarn (colorway Tonks) was from a first-time vendor from New Jersey. The rest is all from Marigoldjen and Hobbledyhoy Yarns. They’re daughter and mom, and both are retiring from the yarn-dyeing business this fall. Pictures from Ravelry suggest that I was not the only one to make them a priority stop. I didn’t realize until I got home that my subconscious clearly had a color agenda for the day. But either way, looking at it makes me happy and I assume knitting with it will, too.