We won at the ABR Fall Fest!

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We won again!

You know, I really like entering fiber competitions. I wouldn't have predicted it, as I'm not an overly competitive person, but really, I do like fiber competitions. I like the "grade sheet" that you get back from the judge - telling you where you can improve.

Grace and I entered items in the latest ABR Fall Festival (that's Alpaca Breeders of the Rockies), and we won 3 first place ribbons, and I also won "People's Choice" for one of my entries! Wha Hoo! The award for People's Choice is a ribbon *and* this - ... but, I get ahead of myself.

Grace entered her three ply alpaca skein, you saw it here, and you read about it here, and here. She won first place again! Way to go, Grace!

I entered this tiny skein - I spun this out of an alpaca-silk mix which is sooooooooo delightful that it practically spins itself! In order to enter, the skein has to be 50 yards - this skein measures 55 yards, believe it or not. It's so tiny! I can't wait to spin the rest!

I used a teeny, jewel spindle -
and I used my favorite method of spinning, Tammy Rizzo's Navajo Ply on the Fly.

As an aside - the case for this product makes a perfect spindle case! I have plenty enough room for an ounce or more of fiber and spindles. I can drop it into my knitting bag without getting fluff all over everything. I wish that we could just buy these cases without having to damage our knees, first. Have you ever wanted to put a sticky note on such a product which reads, "So sorry about your knee. If you have no interest in re-using the case, then please call me because I'd like to have it." Imagine all of the cool packages we could obtain in this way? Sorry - I digress.

Back to the topic, heh heh heh. I won first place *and* people's choice for this little skein. I'm really happy to win people's choice, as it comes with a real prize - a gift subscription to any Interweave magazine. Last year, I won two people's choice awards, so I asked for Spin-Off and Knitter's. This year - which to ask for? Decisions... maybe I'll get Piecework?

I also entered my big honkin' alpaca doiley, and it won first place, too. It was my "summer project" and every time I look at it, I have so many nice memories. It took me practically the whole summer to complete, and I dragged it around with me to so many places.

Mostly, I knitted it here, on the bench that my darling husband built for me. This was such a nice way to start the day - with my coffee, on my bench, listening to the birds, knitting and knitting.

I also knitted at the HARP - and at the Fourth of July fireworks celebration - Just *thinking* about this doiley triggers a particular memory - oh, this was just TOO CUTE. See, my darling daughters are also jugglers, and as we were waiting for dark, and the fireworks to begin, I knitted and they juggled.

This little boy was entranced. He couldn't stop staring! After a while, he showed us HIS tricks!
Look! No Hands! What a cutie! My daughters insist that it was their juggling which threw him into a fit of showing off, but you and I both know that it was the knitting.

Here is the doiley, pinned out to block. You might look at it and say, "doiley" but I look at it and say, Summer Memories...
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