Sunday, May 04, 2008

My weekend......

The ladies of Montreal........ (and my mom)

Oh man- what a weekend! It was incredible fun! Hello Shirley, Cathy, Barbie, Barb, Ruby of the Montreal Knitting Guild! In these shots, we are at the Wilton Road Motel, where they have a small, but very efficient, spinning operation (that's Paul, one of the owners, at work). They take mostly local fleeces, and spin them into whatever the owner's specifications, and then they return the farmer's own fleeces back to them. They are very careful about that part-a farmer is proud of his/her own product, and would not be pleased to have another person's wool returned to them. So, there is wool, and alpaca, and chiengora (there was a huge pile of Samoyed fur that had been brushed out of the dogs waiting to be mixed with merino and spun) and angora, as well as sea cell and silk and bamboo. Then we went into the store that they have-great fun!!! (I should have taken a picture of all the things they have!) Tracy, who works at the mill, was a living doll-great tour guide.
Yesterday, we went to a local store, WoolTyme, for coffee and muffins and spending. Later, after lunch, we went on a trip to the Wool Room, owned and operated by Mabel, who has been around the sheepdog trials and the wool business for quite some time (she is doing her retreats again-this time in November)(ugh-report card writing time for me). Then the group went off to other things, and I went off homeward to go and make sure my family recognized me when I came into the house. (They did!)
The ladies were just great- told many stories, listened to others-I certainly had a great time!
Off to grocery shopping, making supper, and then marking papers-(Blech-I'd rather be knitting)
Cheers!



5 comments:

Carol said...

fun fun fun! one day I too shall make the pilgrimmage to the Wilton Road store...Once I have some cash!

Diane said...

Oops, I made a tactical error...I told DH that there is a motel, near all these nice things to see and that it had a fiber mill attached. Should've left the fiber mill part out. Oh well, he'll probably forget that part!

It sure sounds like you all had such a great time! Some day we'll get in that area to visit and you can show me all the goodies.

Bea said...

Wow this sounds like such fun. I'd love to go see a little mill in action. I'm especially intrigued by the dog fur idea. They shed a lot but its too bad that Gus and Abby have such short hair...

Anonymous said...

It was an absolute blast of a weekend made even better by your company (and your Mum's). We're thinking of setting up another mini-trip (arrive Saturday, leave Sunday) and just head straight to the mill/motel---shop, knit (they even have a room for that!) and eat at the local restaurant that Paul referred us to for "refuelling" before heading back to Montreal! And by staying at the motel we have a ready supply of wool right at our door!!! Might wander into Kingston to check out the sights we had to skip due to lack of time on this trip but then again, maybe not. Hard to step away from so much fibery goodness.

Look forward to visiting your neck of the woods sometime soon for more of your wild and wooly stories and your very effective stash building skills (your skills, my stash!)

Cheers, Barbie O. in Montreal

Anonymous said...

you forgot to mention Lisa in your blog, we really had a good time eh ruby