It's That Time Of Year

The weekend before our Canadian Thanksgiving is a big one in Meaford.
It is the annual Scarecrow Invasion.

Parade, bar b q by the harbour, and a home-coming of sorts for Meafordites. But the biggest event of the weekend has to be the two-day craft sale.

200 vendors from far and wide fill the arena and the curling rink, enticing the likes of me to part with my money.

All the local fruit stands will be well stocked with their apples and produce. Try the ones on the back roads. The  ones on the highway are so incredibly busy that the comings and goings are an accident waiting to happen.

All in all it is a BIG weekend in my neck of the woods. A good weekend for a visit if your time allows.

Thursdays Are For Knit Group

What a treat we had today.  Sandy B brought her sister Sue - Bag Lady Sue.  She who gives us all her cast off yarns.  Sue is very creative.  She designs on the fly and makes beautiful pieces.  Today she showed us her latest design. A two sided infinity scarf. It has a winter side and a summer side.

Here she is with the scarf.  Note the colour work.  Fingering weight yarns.

Here is the winter side.  Darker colours,  colour work that showcases trees and leaves.

And now the spring side.  Flowers. Bright colours.  

So how did she do this? She cast on many stitches, and worked the scarf in the round  First she did the winter side, using charts from other patterns.  When she had finished that, she worked a row of purl stitches then carried on to work the second half in different colours and using different charts.  All loose ends are buried between two layers of fabric. I didn't ask and forgot to look closely enough to know how she finished off.  Was it a  three needle bind off, or a crocheted edge? Either would work.   Beautiful and very inspirational, Sue.

Sandy's cowls are quite different These are the bulky cowls with 5 strands of DK yarn.  Look how many she has knit so far. 

Here she shows us the needle size. 

15mm.  Not in every knitter's needle stash.  And according to Sandy, painful to use for  extended periods of time.  She said she had to take many breaks to save her wrists.  Thanks for the tip Sandy.

What great fun it was to see Sue's creative work again.  Thanks for coming Sue.

A Road Trip

The Ladies With Balls and I took a road trip today. There was fog and wet drizzle as we left Collingwood but the weather did nothing to dampen our spirits as we set off for Camilla Valley Farms, our first stop this morning.
North of Orangeville - which we now know is only an hour south of Collingwood - this store  did not disappoint.

Set in a barn-like building, across the yard from the red brick, farm house, at the end of a tree lined  drive, it was the perfect setting for a autumn outing.  And there was yarn!  Such quantities, so neatly displayed.  That is a wall of Cascade 220 on the left.  Some of the Ladies came for cotton, some came for wool.  They had their patterns and their plans.  But there was a bit of a derailment when they saw the  Fleece Artist!  Some credit cards were harmed on this outing.

Yarn acquired, we were off to lunch in Orangeville.  What a picture-perfect little town.  Pias On Broadway was our choice for lunch and the servers managed to  handle our crowd of ten boisterous knitters quite nicely I'd say.

There was fog, rain and lots of road construction.  BUT , there was yarn and food,  laughter and fun.  A great road trip.