Sunday, September 04, 2011

Wooly Saturday!


I had the most amazing Saturday! This weekend has been the time for Östgötadagarna here in Östergötland (the cuounty where I live in). Östgötadagarna are two days where lots of farms and local shops have extra opening hours and you can go around visiting animals and buying from farm shops and stuff like that. Me and Anna went to a place called Brink Hantverk, about 30 minutes from here. The link goes to their swedish site, but it's an alpaca farm! They have about ten alpacas that they use for wool , they have two angora goats (you know, where mohair comes from), and angora rabbits. Oh, and some merino sheep as well! They spin their own yarn, which they sell, and they also sell a lot of knitted stuff. It was such a wonderful place!





 

 


The woman who owns the place was so friendly and nice, and told us lots about the farm and the animals. We didn't get to pet the actual alpacas, since they were a bit shy of strangers and didn't enjoy being touched, but we fed some goats and bought some yarn! Anna bought some lovely angora yarn, made from the very cute rabbit named Celine:


The yarn is 100 % rabbit wool, and OH SO SOFT! It didn't end up in any photo, but it is a very soft grey colour. I brought a lovely skein of alpaca yarn with me home, made from the very pretty lady Geisha:




It's 60 g/195 m, and the loveliest chocolate brown you can imagine. It was so cool to get to see the actual animal that the wool came from! I know I wasn't supposed to buy any more yarn, but I see this as more of a souvenire (thank you Maria for that idea!)!

We then went on to Vadstena, where we visited a yarn shop that was located smack in the middle of nowhere! It's called Vadstena Ull & Garn (yet another swedish site, sorry), and it was a lot bigger than the yarn shops in town. It was located on a farm as well, and I guess the locale costs are pretty low if you have a shop in one of your own out-houses. It was really lovely and there was a lot of yarn! 


I didn't get any photos here (we were just too busy looking at yarn), but I borrowed this one off their website. I hope they don't mind the free advertisement! The women who run the business didn't spin their own yarn, but they dyed a lot instead, and they also had a lot of commersial yarns. I didn't buy any yarn here, but a shawl needle got to come home with me instead:


We then went on to the last crafts place that we had planned, Hantverksboden Drottning Omma at Omberg (this shop doesn't have a website). It's a pretty small crafts shop that sells yarn and lots of other locally produced crafts, like pottery, some woodcrafts and stuff like that. The woman who owns the shop has angora rabbits as well, and the yarn they sold were mixes of angora and lambs wool or merino wool. Apparently, she shears the rabbits and sends the wool off to Östergötlands Ullspinneri, which spins the wool into yarn for the shop. Very nice! I bought three skeins of a 50 % angora/50 % lams wool that seems to be about sport weight (there is no length stated on the label, so I can't be completely sure, but needles 3-5 mm sounds about right for heavy fingering/sport, right?):


It's amazingly soft, and the colour is very pretty and natural as well. This was also a souvenire, right?! Anna also brouht home three of these skeins, in a lovely off-white colour that will become a winter shawl for her.

After this intense yarn crawl, me and Anna went back to my place and made dinner, and after that Alexandra and Maria showed up for a real girls-night/knit-night! I served apple pie (that Anna helped to make) and chocolate cake, and we just sat here and chatted about all sorts of stuff, and knitted our hearts out. 


It was so much fun, and it's been way too long! I very rarely get to go to the knitting cafés any more, since I commute so much and am not back in town until late in the afternoon/evening, so this was a real treat for me. We definitely need to plan more of these weekend meetings!

Today I'm spending my day on the couch, possibly not knitting very much as my arm is bothering me a bit. I think I've figured out what movements at work has been bothering me, and I'm trying to correct those so that should help. I don't think that the knitting is actually the cause of the pain, as I tend to move my left elbow joint or wrist very little when I knit (I pick, that's continental knitting right?), but I'm guessing that it doesn't help either. I've cut down pretty much on the knitting in general though, so I think I'm doing ok. I've almost finished with the first of the Spring socks (from my 10 models collection), but Thomas has brought the camera with him to Austria this weekend so you'll have to wait to see photos of it!

/ Jenny

4 comments:

Virginia G said...

It looks like you had an amazing Saturday! I'm a little jealous!

I've had issues off and on with my arms and wrists, and have never been able to figure it out.

Sarah {The Student Knitter} said...

man I'm SO jealous! Looks like you had great time! :D

Gracey is not my name.... said...

Looks like you had great day out! I love farm visits....alpacas can be shy, but they are oh so soft to touch...

Anonymous said...

It sound you had a day to remember. Those little alpacas are cuter than I imagined them. It must be strange (but in a good way) to meet the animal that gave the yarn that will keep you warm and cozy, I would love to experience that.