Wisconsin Sheep and Wool Festival

Today we are vendors at the Wisconsin Sheep and Wool Festival. This is the first year for us and it appears to be a wonderful show. Our big seller for today is the Conversion Kits that adapt the Featherweights into felting machines that we call "Feather Felters". The adaptors make the machine transition from a sewing machine into a felting machine. I sold out of all I had brought for the entire 3 days before noon today. Who knew?

One fun happening was that I reconnected with two of my former students. Clare Thornley, who was one of my students at Midwest Folk and Fiber in Crystal Lake, IL, brought in her finished landscape to show me and then minutes later, a student from my landscape class last October at Amado Territories (south of Tuscon) appeared. It's it a small world, is't it? I was amazed.

My big deal of the day was finding a copy of "Feltmaking: The Why's and Wherefores" by Sheila Smith and Freda Walker. It's out of print and I have been trying to find it, and today I did! It was at Susan's Fiber Shop booth and I was thrilled to find it. I have Sheila's other books, but had been looking for this one for months to add to my personal collection. Yippee! If you don't yet know, Susan McFarland is the brains behind the Midwest Felting Symposium, where I had a positively fabulous time in late July.

More later on this show...

World Sheep Show

I taught "Sunrise, Sunset" at the World Sheep Fest in Missouri this weekend. Here are two photos of one of my students, Robin, creating her needle felted sunset from a photo she had taken. If you look carefully, you can see her inspiration photo in the first photo here in the lower right corner. Robin also was awarded first place in the needle felted category for her cat, which was marvelous!

I had a vendor booth as well and the big sellers at this fest were my purses. The "Mermaid Bag" sold first so it is now gone, in case you were thinking of it. Not to worry, tho, I have more felted purses.

We're in Bethel, MO This Weekend

This weekend I taught the Sunrise, Sunset needle felted landscape class. Here is one of my students from Illinois who got up at 4:00 AM to drive to Missouri to attend the class. It was a fun but rainy weekend. I was lucky that my class was early on the first day because it literally poured the next morning and the tents and tables were soaked. My traveling partner Terry brought home a Great White Pyrr puppy from the festival.

Arriving at the World Sheep Show

We have arrived in Bethel, Misssouri, for the World Sheep Show. It is a historical old German community that bursts with "sheep and show" on Labor Day weekend. I'm told it's been happening for 30 years now. There are even open-air church services on Sunday. The red brick building is a Bed and Breakfast.

Notice the sign?