Catskills Fiber Fest

Last Saturday was the first annual Catskills Fiber Festival held at the Dancing Cat Saloon and Catskill Distillery. I met up with some long time friends and headed over to the festival with them. But first I stopped in my favorite cafe, Cafe Adella Dori, that I don't get to visit often enough. I started with a latte and finished with a bacony biscuit. I had some much needed knitting time to myself.The festival was fun. It was co-sponsored by two local alpaca farms, Rosehaven Alpacas and Buck Brook Alpacas. I've known the proprietors of Buck Brook for a few years and was happy to meet the proprietors of Rosehaven. It was a bit muddy that day but that was okay. We were there to squish some yummy yarn and equally squish some lovely animals (no animals were harmed in the squishing process, nor was any yarn harmed). We all brought home some yarn and notions. I discovered some new yarn companies, most of them small productions located in and around New York State.I bought three skeins of sock yarn. One skein was from Color Craze Fiber. It's the really pretty purple based skein in the pic above. The yarn is Superwash Merino, Cashmere, and Nylon blend. The color was is Crave. I just love it and can't wait to start using it. I've already wound the yarn into a ball so it's ready to go! The proprietor also gave us a free place marker. You can see it in the pic above with the yarn if you look very closely! How nice was that?? I also bought those 2 lovely pink skeins from Toad Hollow. These ladies were so lovely. Their yarn all has toad or frog themed names. I bought two skeins of 'sock toad' which is a superwash merino and nylon blend. I can't wait to start knitting with it either. The colors are so super yummy. And the possibilities of the socks that I can make are unlimited!!I also picked up that lovely Halloween themed project bag. For $5!!! Can you believe that? I bought it from Catie's Creation Shop. Once again, the ladies of Catie's Creation Shop were so super nice. I had a nice conversation about thrift store shopping. I think everyone in my group bought a bag, or bags, from them that day!We also saw a couple of people that we know who were peddling their wares. It was nice to see them again. Both are local to the area and have fantastic products. One was our friend Gail from Will-O-Wool. She has the yummiest yarn. I've been using it as the base for some of the hats I sell. I'm also making a poncho using her yarn. The other one was Annie from Fiber On Main. She is a master natural dyer and master weaver, among other things. Her products are so beautiful. And she offers classes on everything! It was so nice seeing Gail and Annie.I liked that the festival was on the smaller side. It was more manageable and easy to visit every booth. I love the NY State Sheep and Wool festival, but it is SO big. It's hard to meet up with friends and to see all the features. That's what was nice about this festival. And it was local. That's very nice. In a state that's as big as New York, it can take hours to travel somewhere.After all our shopping, looking, petting animals, and visiting, we headed to the local wine shop for lunch. But first we stopped off at Spruce Home Goods. This was my first visit to them. What a spectacular place! It is so well done. It's in the ground floor of an apartment building (old house) down a cozy alleyway. There's exposed bricks. There's local bread and pies. There's cheese. There's home goods. And, once again, the proprietors are super nice. I picked out a loaf of bread from Beach Lake Bakery, and some fancy French cheese.We ended the day at the Callicoon Wine Merchant, sitting outside, chatting, eating, and knitting. I had some very yummy goat cheese with squash marmalade and I tried the hay ice cream! You read that right. Hay ice cream! It was interesting. Not sure how I feel about it overall, but I'm glad I tried it. They also had Corn ice cream on the menu. I think I'll have to try that next. It gives me another reason to get out of the house. And soon!