Web-Letter, Issue 110 – Rhinebeck Review Greetings! This past weekend, on two raw October days, thousands of people gathered to view sheep, shop yarn, and renew friendships with fellow knitters at the Rhinebeck Sheep and Wool Festival in upstate New York. Today, Cecily Glowik MacDonald gives us a rundown of her experience at the show. Note the warm, KNITTED gear seen in her pictures—the show is a great place to show off projects to an appreciative audience. Creative Director

The Story: The New York Sheep and Wool Festival takes place every October in Rhinebeck, NY. To those that have gone before, it is affectionately known simply as RHINEBECK! Knitters, designers and spinners come from all over to take part in classes, sheep viewing, the pleasures of an amazing selection of food, designer spotting, author signings, and, of course, shopping. One of my favorite parts is getting to see everyone wearing their beautiful handknits—lovely knitted items are everywhere.

The festival takes place on the Duchess County Fairgrounds and you can see the excitement on the faces of  Melissa G (the pattern for the hood-scarf she is sporting is available through Patternfish) and Melissa LaBarre as we wait in line to enter.

After we entered we ran into Bob (well, Ysolda in her amazing handknit Bob suit), Hannah Fettig, and Jessica (co-founder of Ravelry). Hannah is wearing her lovely Lightweight Pullover (knit in CEY's Fresco yarn) and Jess is wearing Gundrun Johnston’s Vaila from Twist Collective's Winter '08 issue. Also in that issue of Twist is Pam Allen's cozy cowl worked in CEY's Ariosa yarn.

We then wandered over to see the sheep breed featured this year, the Leicester Longwool, and to watch a sheep shearing demonstration.

Here we ran into amazing knitwear designers Gudrun Johnston and Melissa Wehrle wearing some of their lovely handknits.

It was time to check out some of the fantastic fair food.  No, I am not eating fleece, it is maple cotton candy, made and spun right there from genuine maple sugar. The other big hits this year were the fried artichokes and home made chicken potpie. I’m wearing my new sweater knit in my current favorite yarn, CEY's Kumara.

Fueled up on sugar, it was time do some shopping. Not only were there wonderful yarns from small mills, there was a wine and cheese tent and many other handmade items for sale. I got a lovely necklace!

As we wandered on, we came upon a table set up where knitters could help knit the world’s largest hand-knitted sock and a circle of knitters competing in a speed knitting competition. Then it was time to battle the traffic and go back to the hotel to get ready for the Ravelry party.

Classic Elite Yarns and St. Denis were two of the generous sponsors for the Ravelry party this year. It was packed when we first arrived! I also got to see the wonderful women in my Lowell knitting group at the party. The New York Sheep and Wool Festival is a very fun and friendly experience. I know that I will be back next year.

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