This post is about Day 4 of our adventure, but Day 1 of the New York Sheep and Wool Festival. This was to be our last full day in New York and the second day of the festival. Even with spending all day Saturday at the festival I hadn’t seen it all.
I got in line right away to buy a t-shirt and the person behind me had a companion with her wearing his own Rhinebeck Sweater, knit by his friend. The t-shirt line was relatively short when I got there, and fortunately there was one 2023 t-shirt left and it fit me.
The camelid parade had turned into a goat parade on this day (with llamas in the back). They were announced by the trumpeter throughout the parade around the fairgrounds.
Back in the vendor halls there was no shortage of camelids, particularly alpacas. This booth had reproductions of several famous images and each included an alpaca.
Here was a stylish alpaca.
I had just sold four Jacob skulls at Lambtown, butfor a lot less than this one. However they weren’t nearly as clean, didn’t include the lower jawbone, and didn’t have a cool stand to hold them. You get what you pay for.
I considered these yarns to finish up the projects for my upcoming Handwoven article. As much as I liked them, I couldn’t see them in that project. That’s when I went back to the Harrisville Design yarn (yesterday’s post) and ended up with that yarn.
This booth had felted and needle-work embellished artwork.
I had seen blankets in other booths that were woven using singles yarn and I noticed the same in this booth. I was thinking was about how different they look than what I weave. I think that each weaver has a style and these blankets looked like I had seen in other booths.
I talked to Peggy Hart, the weaver here, and she said that she had probably woven all those other blankets that I saw. She custom weaves for sheep owners who market their fiber and yarn, but don’t weave it themselves. I saw that she had also written a book about weaving and wool in America, and I bought a copy.
I had seen all the vendors and wandered over to some of the other buildings on the fairgrounds. This is the Bentley one-room schoolhouse, built in 1881, and relocated to the fairgrounds in 2003.
Many of the furnishings are original.
Teacher Code of Conduct.
There is also a Century Museum, a large building filled with lots of displays of old equipment. There is a club that staffs this building during events at the fairgrounds and many were on hand to talk about their various areas of interest.
I talked to the weaver here about the action of the counter-balanced loom. I was amused to see a newer copy of the old Davison book that we all use.
The sign on that blue treadmill on the left says Dog Power. There was another with a huge stuffed dog in it. Notice several other looms and an old treadle sewing machine on this level.
Back “home” we shared the day’s purchases.
One day left to this adventure, but it was a travel day.
I was thinking that I’d been back from our New York trip for a couple of weeks and I still haven’t finished my blog posts. I just checked the calendar and it’s been just over a week, so maybe I’m not that behind. The last post I wrote is here. Now it’s time for the main event. We made this trip to attend the event that everyone in the fiber world just refers to as Rhinebeck. The location is Rhinebeck but the event is the New York Sheep and Wool Festival. According to a 2022 source cited in Wikipedia the festival draws 30,000 visitors and has 300 vendors.
We had heard about the long lines of people and of traffic. Wanting to avoid lines we got there over an hour early. We thought we would wait in the car but people were lining up. We got in line near the front.
Here are the four of us. While in line we started talking to the people just behind us. They were three friends who meet here every year from various states. One has been to my shop as she used to live in Winters, just ten minutes away. It’s a small fiber world, even with 30,000 people in attendance.
Look who we saw in the line as it started to loop around. It’s Siobhan, one of our Farm Club members. It wasn’t a total surprise because we knew she’d be here and we had lunch with her the day before.
Things were pretty well organized at this gate. The security people came along the line to check tickets, stamp hands, and check bags. Then once the gates opened there was no more waiting.
We entered at Gate 7 at the bottom of the map. The green blocks were full of vendors. There were a lot to see. In fact I was surprised that there wasn’t more livestock. I don’t know if there used to be, but you can see that a number of the barns are marked green indicating vendors. We first headed to Building E where Kathleen, Siobhan, and I had entered our woven pieces.
I entered six different classes and got first in four of them. My black and white pinwheel shawl was entered in a class that included all types of crafts but with the theme of Natural Color. The gold and red clasped warp scarf was entered in Handwoven, Small Item, Commercial yarn.
These two pieces are also clasped warp, because that is what I have been focused on lately, preparing an article for publication. The one on the left is locally grown wool, but commercially spun, that I dyed with indigo from the garden, and the one on the right is handspun yarn. So these pieces were entered in two different classes. I just sold the handspun one and the other is listed on the brand new Soil to Soil Market. This website is so new that there only two of us there right now, but it will eventually include Fibershed producers from all over the country.
Building E not only housed the Fiber Arts competition, but had gourmet vendors. Mary wanted to start at the booth selling wooden utensils.
Next to him was a vendor with maple syrup and lots of other maple syrup products. So you think those bags are wool ready to spin? No. Maple sugar spun candy! It took me over an hour to move beyond these two vendors because I got talking to the maple syrup farmer and then a friend from Oregon showed up behind me and we chatted. There was a lot more to see and after I wandered through the other gourmet booths I went outside. I decided to be systematic so as to not miss anything. I was going to start at the far corner and work my way back, but I stalled out at some of these outside vendors.
Notice the license plate of this van. They had a shoe shop set up. Shoes were in the van and there was a fitting area where you could try shoes of various styles and sizes outside the van.
These are wool shoes and I bought a pair. They will be delivered soon.
I got side-tracked here. The Tempestry project is focused on using fiber art to portray climate change by making “tempestries” to indicate high temperatures. This is partly how I got the idea of weaving my Year to Remember blankets. I found a book here that shows these pieces at National Parks all around the country, including one by my friend Lisa! So in the first two hours I had purchased items at four booths. Only about 250 booths to go!
I found a Fibershed building. Our Northern California Fibershed was represented. I like to think of us as the Mothership. After all, this is where it started. There were also tables and displays from many east coast Fibersheds.
We had heard about lines, not just to get in, but to get popular items. That white tent in the middle of this photo is where the souvenir t-shirts and bags were and the line stretched even behind where I stood taking the photo. I didn’t try to get a t-shirt until the next day and almost all were sold out even early in the morning.
The used equipment auction was interesting. The auctioneer didn’t know what all the tools were, but the crowd helped him out.
I wandered through the barns.
Sheep were being prepped for the show. I’m so glad that Jacob sheep are shown without all the fitting that goes on with many of the breeds.
I think this sheep and the one above showed in the Natural Colored Wool division.
There were also some Angora goats at the show.
Now to wander the vendor halls. I have over 150 photos from these two days. I guess I won’t be able to share everything.
This is a print by Clare Margaret. She uses cut paper for her original artwork and then makes prints for the wall and cards. They are gorgeous.
Fiber in fascinating colors and combinations.
A similar idea but with yarn.
A blanket woven of Harrisville Designs Shetland yarn. I bought some of this and have woven a scarf. More to come later.
This booth sold the wooden pieces to make these yarn wrapped sheep and they also sold the sheep.
A chess set by a business called GoingGnome.com
Hilltop Farm Fiber Arts had naturally dyed yarn, dried dye plants like I’m selling on my website and on the new Soil to Soil site, but with more variety. I liked this sheep at their booth.
Seen at a grocery store on the way home that day. For you non-knitters, that stands for Knit 1, Purl 1, common language to fiber artists.
For not planning to buy anything I brought a lot home.
I talked about Day 2 here. Now that I’m numbering the days I see that I have it wrong. Day 1 was really a travel day. We left Sacramento on Tuesday at 11:45 and got to Albany well after dark. That’s why I didn’t count it. I’ll stick with the current numbering system that forgets the travel day.
Kathleen and I both entered handwoven items at the show and needed to deliver them on Friday. That was the first stop of the day.
After delivering our items we drove back to Hyde Park so we could tour the Vanderbilt Mansion. This family tree starts with Cornelius, born in 1794. At age 16 he bought a sailing barge using $100 borrowed from his parents. He started his own shipping business and eventually was involved in railroads. In 1871 he opened the largest strain station in North America, which would eventually be called Grand Central Station. The bulk of Cornelius’ estate went to the firstborn son, William. Wlliam doubled the Vanderbilt fortune and each of his 8 children built extravagant mansions, shown on the chart above. The estate on the far right is the one I toured last summer in Asheville, North Carolina, known as “America’s Largest Home”. Notice on the family tree there are no heirs for Frederick’s home, third from right.
Frederick and his wife, Louise, had no children. They left the estate to Louise’s niece but she didn’t need it, having plenty of her own money and a mansion, after marrying into another rich family. She tried to sell the property but there were no buyers. Her neighbor, President Franklin D. Roosevelt, suggested that she donate the estate to the National Park Service, and the Vanderbilt Mansion National Historic Site opened in 1940.
The entrance hall was used for seating and conversation as well as having doorways into all the other first floor rooms. The green marble pilasters were imported from Italy. (From Wikipedia: “In classical architecture, a pilaster is an architectural element used to give the appearance of a supporting column and to articulate an extent of wall, with only an ornamental function.“) We were told that many of the home’s features and furniture were imported from Europe.
Reception Room. The National Historic Site website says: “Eighteenth-century-style French salons were a typical feature of Gilded Age mansions. Though infrequently occupied or used, they nonetheless were essential in the display of wealth and worldliness.“
I took this photo of the ceiling in one of the rooms. I think it was the Reception Room.
This is on the second floor where you can look down to the first …
…or up to the skylight.
Mrs. Vanderbilt’s bedroom modeled after those of 18th century French royalty. The railing around the bed was typical of royal bed chambers. I don’t remember if this was determined to be true, but the tour guide told us one theory that there may be observers when a Queen gives birth so there is no question about who is the true heir. I just found this on the National Historic Site website: “The railing around Mrs. Vanderbilt’s bed is an architectural convention borrowed from many European royal palaces. In the 17th and 18th centuries, it served both practical and symbolic purposes related to royal births and ceremonies that occured daily when the king or queen woke up. At Hyde Park, the railing serves no purpose other than to reference the architecture of Europe’s finest royal houses.”
I don’t remember what this room is but looking at the map I think it is probably the Boudoir.
We took the stairway to the Servant’s Basement.
This is the view from below. There are four floors (including the basement), 54 rooms and 21 fireplaces. The third floor is closed to visitors and we were told that it is not as it originally was, being used to house Secret Service agents at some point in the history of Hyde Park. There is much more information to be found on the referenced website.
Change of scene… We stopped at the Eveready Diner in Hyde Park for lunch and met up with California friend, Siobhan, here. I didn’t drive during this whole trip and kept losing track of which town we were near. We stayed outside Tivoli, New York and drove to Rhinebeck, only 11 miles south. Hyde Park is only another 10 miles south of Rhinebeck. So we were back and forth on that same corridor for the whole trip.
On the way home (to our AirB&B) we took a side road to see some of the countryside.
I thought that It would be great to come home all caught up with my blog posts. That didn’t happen–partly because it’s not as easy to work on the iPad as on my computer and partly because I spent time with my friends every evening and didn’t focus on other things.
On the second day in New York we drove to Hyde Park where there are three National Historic Sites we intended to visit. We started at this one.
We signed up for a tour of FDR’s house. This is the stable where we gathered.
FDR was born in this house in 1882. After he was married and the family grew there were additions to the house There are also adaptations for wheelchair access since he was unable to walk unaided after contracting polio in 1921. I was surprised to learn the extent to which that fact was hidden from the public throughout his life.
There is a ramp to this room, but when Roosevelt was alive the ramp would be concealed once he was in the room and awaiting his guests.
I took this photo because that desk is almost identical to the one that I used while I was a kid and through high school. It belonged to my grandmother who had lived in New York. I always liked the “secret” cubbyholes that were those fancy columns on either side of the door at the center of the upright part. My granddaughter has this desk now.
We had started at the FDR Presidential Library but had only a half hour before our tour of the house. There was so much to see here that we came back. I thought that a Presidential LIbrary would be full of books, but this is a museum. It is very well presented and there is an overwhelming amount of information here. This is the first Presidential Library and I assume that maybe others are modeled after this one. This one opened in 1941, and of course it would have been very different than what it is today.
I knew the bare basics of this era but this exhibit pulls it all together in a very informative and organized way. The exhibits are all set up in order so that you move through Roosevelt’s story from before he became President to his death during his fourth term.
It starts with the Depression when Hoover was President.
When Roosevelt was elected he jumped right in and tackled the major problems facing the country.
I am of course familiar with all of these programs now because they are part of our way of life, but I have never thought about the time when they were developed.
Eleanor is included in this museum as well. There is another National Historic Site at her home but we didn’t have time to go there. This letter is of interest to me because she recognized, way back in 1939, that California’s redwood forests were worthy of protection (second paragraph). There was a lot here about Eleanor’s influence and political activist. The FBI had quite a large file on her activities!
This is a working office used by Roosevelt during his presidency as is told in the photo below.
There was so much to see at this library that I could easily go back if I ever get to this part of the country again.
We drove to the Vanderbilt home only a few miles away. We would have had to wait a couple of hours for space in a tour so we decided to come back the next day.
We wandered through the gardens before we left to go “home”.
I don’t have many photos of the AirB&B where we stayed. This is from the driveway.
I stayed in this bedroom.
The bathroom that was shared by two bedrooms. The third upstairs bedroom had it’s own bathroom in a totally different style. We figured out with Google and other clues in the home that the owner is an architect with an office in Brooklyn.
This living room and the kitchen are where we spent most of the time. As much as we looked forward to exploring this part of the country and going to the fiber show, some of the most enjoyable time was spent sitting here and around the kitchen table.
For now I’m skipping over the time between Lambtown and the current adventure, but I may backtrack later.
Do you remember in 2019 when I had a major accident? This is the BlogPost about that. (I just reread that post and see all the typos—that was because my hand still wasn’t working very well and I didn’t catch all the mistakes.) In 2019 a group of friends and I had planned to go to the New York Sheep and Wool Festival in Rhinebeck, New York. Until I talked to these friends a couple of days ago I didn’t realize that the accident was only two days before our planned trip. My skull was repaired in February 2020 but that was just before the pandemic started. So now in 2023 we resurrected that trip we missed in 2019. It’s the same group minus one.
Landing in Chicago where we changed planes.
Kathleen and Mary and me in the airport waiting for the next flight. We were going to meet up with Chris who had already been exploring NY for a week with her husband and other friends.
We landed in Albany around 10 p.m., picked up a rental car, and found the nearby hotel we had booked. The next morning we had breakfast with Chris and got on the road. Kathleen wanted to find an apple cider donut and an apple farm was our first stop.
This farm was near Vischer Ferry and had you-pick apples as well as a fully stocked gift shop and bakery. There were apples of all varieties.
We each chose apples of different varieties. I like that this one says “Very firm with a loud crunch”.
How about this one that says “monster crunch, two-napkin juicy”?
We continued on towards our AirBnB near the small town of Tivoli, but wanted to explore some of the country. We saw the Erie Canal on the map and decided to stop at the Erie Canalway Trail near Vischer Ferry Nature and Historic Preserve. According to signs the canal opened in 1825 to facilitate transportation between Buffalo and Albany and was enlarged in the 1840s. It was abandoned in 1917.
This is the canal today.
There was parking near this bridge which was originally over another part of the canal. It had been moved in 1917 to a private farm and in 1997 was brought to the canal where there had been a similar bridge.
Kathleen and I chose to walk the trail for awhile.
Kathleen was looking for birds while I kept getting sidetracked by all the plants that are different from what I’m used to. White berries on this one.
Yellow berries here.
Red berries here. I loaded this photo into a plant ID app on my phone and it was identified as winterberry holly.
Berries are the fruit of the tree or bush and contain the seeds. We saw lots of other interesting mechanisms of seed dispersal, but I don’t have ID on any of these plants.
Another unknown.
Gorgeous colors.
We could see the other side of the canal from the trail. I assume that this is the original rock wall. But I don’t really know enough about it.
It’s larger here—maybe part of an old bridge or where there was a lock??
We drove on to explore Cohoes Falls on the Mohawk River.
It was fascinating to see the original cotton mill buildings in the town and to read about how they were powered by the river water. Many of the old mill buildings are still here but have been converted into apartments.
Here is how it looks today.
This is the outlet of the fish transport pipe as described in the sign below.
Meridian Jacobs' Blog 