Maryland Sheep & Wool 2009

We had a great time at a rainy MS&W this year; it's becoming an annual family tradition for my sister and I to visit our other sister who lives in Baltimore for MS&W weekend. We saw lots of cute animals and fibery goodness at the Festival, and were amazed by crowds that showed up despite the drizzly weekend. I was remarkably restrained when it came to stash building; I only bought 4 skeins of yarn (I know!): 2 skeins of Tess Baby Bunny in Robins Egg Blue to knit Whisper, 1 skein of Interlacements Toasty Toes, and 1 skein of Creatively Dyed sock yarn in Harvest. I was so excited to see Creatively Dyed there, she wasn't on the vendor list but due to a last minute opening was able to make it! She is such a sweet lady and her colors are beautiful!

So besides MS&W, want to know what else we did? Friday night we started out with some sushi and shopping: I bought 2 cute tops at South Moon Under, this one and this one and then we went to happy hour at Ra Sushi (drinks and sushi half off!) When my sister got home from work, we did a pub crawl in Fell's Point, unfortunately nobody in my family can drink more than one or two beers, so the pub crawl was cut short and we ended up eating dinner at One Eyed Mike's. I read about this joint in the WSJ a year or so ago, they are obsessed with Grand Marnier and for $100 you can purchase your own private bottle which will sit on the shelf waiting for you. But unexpectedly, for a grungy looking bar, they have great food, I highly recommend the crab stuffed portabello mushroom cap.

Next day, after fortifying ourselves with croissants and lattes at Bonaparte Breads (the owner looks exactly like Napolean) we headed off to MS&W. We hit it early (look at the crowds at 9:30 am) and left about 1:30 where we had lunch at nearby Great Sage, a fabulous vegetarian restaurant only 10 minutes from the festival. No lamburgers for us! Nothing against meat, but as my sister put it (regarding the lamburgers and lamb kebabs at the festival) "Isn't that like going to a Pediatrics Convention and frying up some babies?"

We had a laid back afternoon knitting and napping, then headed over to my sister's boyfriend's house in Federal Hill where we grilled some salmon and asparagus and made some sangria, yum!

Next day it poured rain all day, so we mostly did indoor activities: Cafe Hon for brunch (I recommend the mimosas and carrot cake) and then the American Visionary Art Museum. We spent a couple of hours here; it's all outsider art so art by people with no formal training (and some crazy people), kids would love this place. There was a model of the Lusitania made out of 193,000 toothpicks and 5 gallons of glue. Have you ever seen one of those rubber band balls? They had the same thing but 12 feet in diameter and made out of bras! Lots of whirligigs and toys with moving parts, hundreds of cool portraits made out of (what looked to me like) spirographs! Tiny sculptures carved in the end of a pencil lead! Murals drawn by a 112 year old man (similar drawing style to my 9 year old)!