West for the Weekend ("Boston" trip, part 3/?)

(Part 2 here.)

I knew from the time I started planning this trip that I wanted to visit one of my friends (Friend 4) at her house in western Mass, because on my last few trips, she had come east to see me instead, and I wanted to see her house! In a very propitious turn of events, though, it turned out that the weekend I was coming was also the Mass Sheep and Wool Festival. Knitters ho! This is our idea of a good time.

So, on Saturday morning, I got myself up and on the road in short order, and listened to my audiobook as I drove. Most of the way was the route I used to take going to college, out Route 2, since I went to UMass Amherst, back in the day. The weather was decent, the views very green, and the drive boring in the best possible way. 

Upon arrival, I got to see her (very cute) house briefly, and say hi to her husband as he was setting off to visit some family, before we took off again. (These are the friends who visited me in February, and we had so much fun.) The drive seemed short as we were catching up, and before long, here we were.

I'd never been to this festival, which is like a much smaller version of Rhinebeck. Which was kind of nice, as it was good and enjoyable and not overwhelming. For some reason, this year was announced as the last, which is sad: it was so good! But I'm sure they had their reasons.

This was at one vendor's booth, and wow.

There were sheep! The first row of buildings had vendors, and then there was the bard with all the sheep.

Beyond that was food, and of course once I saw them taking potatoes and making them into fries, I had to get some, yum.

More booths and more sheep.

More sheep!

Such cute sheep sweaters!

On our way out, there were more sheep, "mowing."

We stopped at a place on the drive back and were amused by these outside it.

...then got closer....

Cowch! Oh, what an awesomely bad pun.

I photographed my haul when we got back to the house.

I especially love the leather project bag. It folds up so nicely, then opens wide...

...and holds a lot!

We got lucky with the rain not starting while we were out; it did start when we were out to dinner, but we only got damp, not drenched. Had a good meal and then relaxed on couches for the rest of the evening.

And that concludes Saturday! More to come, there's a whole week left.