Rhinebeck

Rhinebeck was great — I got to see some old friends, meet some people in person I've only known online, admire the animals, eat a lot of lamb, buy hot cider from the adorable kids at the 4-H stand, see a lot of fantastic (and appalling, but mostly fantastic) knitwear...

Man, I love the luster longwools.

And goats!

There was only one thing that I really wanted to get while I was there and I did:
Sheepskin slippers from Shepherd's Flock. The slippers themselves are fantastic and I get to feel all smug about putting my money where my values are and buying goods directly from the person who made them. Bring it on, unheated bedroom!

I was also keeping an eye out for a sweater's worth of what I described to Marcy as "messy fiber" — a multicolor, multi-fiber blend to spin up into cozy, tweedy yarn for a very warm, casual sweater. I found this, which I adore, and bought two pounds of it. It wasn't labeled, but is definitely wool and silk, with maybe a bit of alpaca.
I couldn't resist spinning some up this morning and am happy that it's pretty much exactly what I was looking for. Virtually effortless spinning, very soft but still with good body (spinning fine wool bores me senseless), enough variation colorwise to be interesting while remaining wearable and reasonably subtle: yay!