It's spring!  Although the weather service promises heavy snow tonight, it's mud season in New England.  In addition to mud, one sure fire sign of spring is the annual Gore Place Sheepshearing Day in Waltham, Massachusetts on April 24. It's certainly one my daughters and I enjoy immensely. It's a micro-event in terms of the bigger sheep/wool festivals, but this small, local event is great fun.

The site is very hilly, but manageable even with small children in tow. Light strollers should have no problem unless it's very wet. Wheelchairs might have a greater problem given the hill and the soft ground common in Massachusetts in the spring.

There are usually about fifty general handcrafts vendors; a sheepdog demo; sheepshearing, spinning, dyeing, knitting and weaving demos;live music and dance performances; a barnyard animal zoo, and food vendors. There are also usually between three and ten small, local yarn and fleece sellers, and a couple of vendors selling spinning equipment.

Pack a picnic, dress in warm wools, and (with luck) enjoy a post-winter day outside.

My T-shirt in Berroco Suede progresses.  I have gotten used to knitting with the Suede, but am not loving it.  But I do like the look and the Shapely T pattern.  Here's document of my progress:

The Shapely T pattern starts off with some garter stitch, and then includes some short-row shaping to make a rounded shirt-tail style bottom edge.  I've increased the depth of the border below the shaping.  I used a row of Indian Cross Stitch (Walker, Vol 1, p. 112), framed by garter stitch ridges and a row of elongated knit stitch (wrap yarn twice per stitch on Row 1; k1, drop extra loop on Row 2):

Because my bottom edge will be deeper than the original pattern, I cast on more stitches than the pattern called for, and hid some evenly spaced decreases in the garter stitch ridges.  With luck, my extra width will compensate for wrapping a wider bottom edge around the shirttail shaping on the hem, and I'll end up with (mostly) straight side seams.