spitalfields sheep and wool fayre

What an incredible day!

I’d been struck with a heavy dose of panic the night before and was very close to not going to the fayre at all.  I mean, where do I get these crazy ideas from?  Then the train lines conspired against me with their engineering work, and it seemed that I really never would get there.  After fighting buses and trains, all the while carrying all my yarn and stall supplies in my trusty backpack, I arrived at Spitalfields City Farm Sheep and Wool Fayre.

As soon as I met my fellow stall-holders, I knew I was in for a fun day.

On one side of me was the wonderful tillyflop – her knitterly themed cards were a hit, although I think her son was somewhat surprised that people other than mum knew what the knitting abbreviations meant!  I couldn’t pass up one of her fantastic red ‘interactive’ teatowels; the interactiveness doesn’t relate to actually drying up, but rather to highlighting what you’d rather be doing instead:

To my left was Tess’s stall focusing on felted crafts.  She and her husband are such lovely lovely people with lots of felted goodies, and some particularly eye-catching hats!  Their squooshy felted sheep brooches were especially popular.  Tess was even doing some felting at the stall as a demo; perhaps I should have brought my niddy-noddy to do some re-skeining?

A couple of stalls to the left was Lauren of the Lollipop Stop, selling cute little pouches.  I already have numerous knitting bags but Lauren had this one in a sweet red robin print, so it had to come home with me:

I wasn’t the only yarnie there of course.  Further along was Martina of Yarn to Knit with a great display set up, and if you fancy some yarns in super-sheeny bamboo or tencel blends, you really won’t find anything lovelier.

As for my own stall, I can’t believe how much fun I had!

I’ve never met so many fantastic people in one afternoon.  Every single person who came past was friendly and chatty and interested in wool, and I got to hear about so many people’s crafty pursuits.   I got such great feedback on my yarns, and actually sold most of what I had brought.  Thank you so much to everyone who stopped by for a chat and to stroke the yarns!

I didn’t get much of a chance to wander the fayre taking photos, but Anna did a great roundup with pictures here, and for an aural treat, A Playful Day has a great podcast of the day here, including an interview with me.  It’s quite a strange experience hearing my voice over the internet – I’m sure  I wouldn’t have recognised myself.

Over the next couple of weeks I’ll be replenishing my yarn supplies and gradually stocking my little etsy shop.  I had so much fun as a stallholder though, I’ll definitely be planning some more market days.