First Annual Fiber Field Trip to Findlay!

Alrighty folks - here it is! The long awaited pictures from our trip! Our ever-industrious Tuesday night knitting group decided we needed to go on a field trip! So off to Findlay, Ohio - Flag City, USA we went! First up we have our first stop of the day: The Crooked Needle. We pulled into the parking lot right behind the employee who was opening up the store for business that day! (We're nothing if not a prompt goup!)

The store was a little bit disappointing - being more of a quilting shop than a knitting shop. But they did have some yarn! And books!

Elaine and I oohed and ahhhed over this pretty shiny yarn called Impression by Louisa Harding. They had a sample hat made up in it which we all modeled and which caused us to promptly buy some! Here is Elaine modeling the soft and shiny hat:



Despite us all stating that the store didn't offer much yarn, look closely at how many of us are clutching packages as we leave the store! lol




The next stop on our little tour of Hancock county didn't open til 11:00 am. And it was now....9:45 am. SO....what's a group of knitters to do? Why, find the nearest coffee shop
and invade them for a bit of caffeine, sugar, and knitting! Here we are at George House:



They have a great selection of locally-grown herbs as well as good coffee and GINORMOUS cinnamon rolls! The walls are lined with artwork and books for sale and there's lots and lots of seating! It was a neat little place!

After "breakfast", we drove out into the country a little ways and found...

THE YARN FARM

The Yarn Farm is exactly what the name implies. It is run by this lovely woman,
Sue Child.

She is a true animal lover and has barns full of various animals, many of whose fiber is available in the shop as roving or yarn. She also has dogs. A LOT of dogs. A lot of REALLY BIG dogs. And all but one cranky oldster are total sweethearts. Most have free run of the shop and love to shamelessly nudge your hand for some pettin's. This was my favorite:
CLYDE THE BIG WHITE DOG

Yes, he is truly white, despite what the flash did in this picture.

Sue also took delivery of a young donkey the same day we were there. Being the insane animal addict I am (not to mention official trip photographer), I tromped off over frozen clods of dirt to the barn to meet..

WEBSTER


Oh, yes - there was YARN in the shop as well! Lots and lots of yarn!

And even more yarn! And comfy places to sit! And more yarn!

Yes, we probably all wanted to stay all day, but we got hungry. Several of us spent a serious chunk of change in this store! We all wanna go back soon! It was by far EVERYONE's favorite stop on the whole trip! Thanks, Sue!

After that, we headed back into town for lunch at:


Apparently, it used to be called...



ELAINE'S ON MAIN

(Which was funny to us because there was an Elaine in our group.)

They had really cool hand-painted ceiling tiles - mostly advertising for local businesses:


And, yes - they had decent food - here we are enjoying it!

(Or, as I like to call this picture - "Everyone CLOSE your EYES!")

After lunch, we were craving CHOCOLATE! So off to, where else?

DIETSCH'S!!!!!

They had LOTS of yummy handmade chocolates! And ice cream!

After pigging out on sweets, we swung by our last scheduled stop of the day, Alpaca Jack's:


We'd heard it was an actual alpaca farm! (true) And that they had lots of yarn! (SO not true.) It was lovely, but sad. They had a few skeins of really really expensive (but oh-so-soft) Alpaca wool and a lot of Alpaca sweaters, toys, and blankets. I bought a small toy Alpaca (made from Alpaca) to be a friend for my woolen sheep toy. Nobody else bought anything. Elaine, however, did try on a really cool hat:



We made a stop at Hobby Lobby on our way out of town, and returned home exhausted. But we all had a lot of fun! Can't wait for our next adventure! (We're already planning a knitting retreat in Lakeside, OH for the first weekend in May!)