Friends & Fiber - Part 2

Although the fiber retreat was in Candor, just south of Asheville, we actually stayed in Burnsville, just north of Asheville because Roxie has a very kind friend Maryann that has a house there she lets us use on occasion.  Not having to pay for a hotel room really helps out and we REALLY appreciate her letting us stay (I don't think she even knows about this blog, so I'm not saying that just to suck up either).

Silk scarf dyed by Roxie

Roxie had a class Saturday morning to learn how to do another kind of dyeing, so we headed back down to the retreat for the morning.   The plan was to spend the morning at the retreat, have some lunch somewhere and then head back to the house to spend the afternoon crafting.  But the great thing about traveling with Michiele and Roxie is that plans can change and we all go with the flow.

The retreat was actually held at a middle school just up the road from the Friends & Fiberworks store, so after we left there we stopped by the actual store to browse around (and maybe make a couple of purchases).  While there we found out about yet another yarn shop just north of Asheville on our way back to Burnsville, so we had to stop there as well.  That store, The Knitting Diva, is relatively new, but it is an awesome store.  They dealt oh so well with our particular brand of crazy while we were there & we will definitely visit it again when we're back in the area.  I may have spent a little money in that one. (Have you been keeping count?  That's five yarns stores in the general Asheville area.)

Cute sheep outside Yummi Yarns

There's also a yarn shop in Burnsville called Yummi Yarns.  We had been there before, but they've moved to a new location since our last visit, so we had to check it out as well.  I did buy a skein of sock yarn there to make Rob another pair of socks.

By the time we got back to the house around dinner time, our massive crafting plans had dwindled a bit, but that doesn't mean we did nothing.  Michiele had brought her drum carder so I spent a little time turning some fiber I had dyed at Carolina Fiber Frolic, but wasn't really thrilled with into something that I may actually want to spin.

This, which was muddy and kind of compacted

Turned into these, which are light and airy and hopefully will be nice to spin

I also used the drum carder to blend two different colored fibers together into batts.

This became....

This

We took our time heading out Sunday.  We stopped by to see a former coworker of Roxie's who has recently moved to the area and then had a wonderful brunch at Kirkwood's Cafe before finally getting on the road.

Overall, a great time, and I can't wait to do it again!