I want to take up knitting now that I have been to the Gaspereau Valley Fibres farm and shop. I’m not a knitter but I found the shop absolutely divine and I am now crazy for wool. I’m sure for someone who knits the experience would have been purely orgasmic!
The shop is located on a Cotswold sheep farm just outside of Wolfville. Wolfville is the place where Acadia University is located and is also in the heart of Acadien territory. Visiting a sheep farm to buy wool certainly adds a whole new twist to knitting, especially when you see some of the sheep that the wool came from; it’s like putting a face to your sweater.
The farm doesn’t only sell their own wool, they sell stuff from all over the world – I practically tripped over myself when I saw yak wool from Nepal.
Anyhow, this shop is divine and La Niña had a great time chasing the house doggie around and squealing every time he licked her hand. It’s a good thing I am ignorant about wool because I only bought a few items (all this wool is for Heather — she coached me on what to look for). A shop like this would be dangerous for a knitter who likes different fibres (if there is a fibre you are unfamiliar with they give you needles and let you knit with it to see if it is something you want to buy!).
Anyhow, Heather, this is what I picked out:
- Three 100% wool skeins (175m) of hand dyed country wool. This wool is from Nova Scotia. It is bulky weight and perfect for a baby sweater. It is variegated though mostly purple, burgundy and brown.
- One 100% wool skein (900m) of hand dyed lace weight yarn from Blueface Leicester sheep. This is also Nova Scotian.
- The last skein comes from the Gaspereau Cotswold flock. The wool is from the farm and is hand dyed and spun right in the shop. There wasn’t a lot of this which kind of surprised me. It must sell quickly.
Expect this delightful little treat in the mail!
OMG – what a treat to read about and see pics!!! 🙂 I’m so excited! That yarn is downright beautiful – can’t wait to get started on a jacket for Makennabean.
Cotswald sheep are pretty cool – the breed is thought to be about 2000 years old, although only about 75 breeding ewes are around today in Canada.
Thank you!!
PS – I’m so excited!!!!
(I scammed some of your pics for my blog – hope that’s okay)
came to your site via Heather’s post in the Utne Cafe…my eldest lives in Kentville and when I visit her one of the first places we go is to the Odd Book store.
I ventured here from CafeUtne, too. I’m not a knitter, but this blog entry makes me want to be one 🙂 Great looking blog, by the way, and I see a lot of my favorites in the OtherCoolBlogs section.
http://www.gaspereauvalleyfibres.ca/feedback