Bariloche

I completely forget to show you some pretty things I saw during my vacation!

In August, I spent a week in Bariloche, Argentina. The place is wonderful, with lots to see and get to know, and for the first time I've seen snow! Here in Brazil snow is very rare, and only down the south, far from where I live. In Bariloche I finally could play with snow, admire while it fell down and the next day, when the world was white - and even the mess it leaves behind when it melts! I'd love to live somewhere where it snows...

But what I wanted to show you is the yarn I found there: the region has lots of merino sheep, and because of that there are lots of hand spun and dyed yarn. The price is the problem... to make a pullover, for example, I'd have to buy many skeins. Not to mention the luggage space to bring them home. So I just brought pictures! But look how gorgeous:

This was the corner of a real tourist shop - souvenirs, t-shirts - that had this treasure hidden in the back. Aren't the colors beautiful?

I found a skein of Bariloche among them - this yarn is also sold over here, by Aslan, and the girls from the knitting group have used it a lot this winter.

This is a close up of the first picture: many and many skeins hand spun! Each with 1450 grams, at 350 pesos (around 88 dollars). Remember what I said about the price? But I value the work of the artisans, and I think it's a fair price. It just doesn't fit my travel budget! :)

The natural colors are very pretty, and I noticed they use leaves, tree and onion peels to dye the yarn.

I was lucky (maybe my husband disagrees...) and there was a craft fair while we were at Bariloche. Most products for sale were finished, and few artisans were selling yarn. But of course I found some (you just need to know where to look, right?) and I bought a skein for my dear friend L. and some kind of brooch for shawls. Maybe my friend gets them both, we still couldn't arrange to meet!

I just took a picture of the skeing to post here at the blog. And I found that from August 22, when I came back from the trip, until today, October 7, the brooch for shawls is lost somewhere. This says two things about me:

1. when I come back from trips, or visits to craft/patchwork fairs, or anything like that, I simply hide the things I brought from myself. No matter how much I think about blogging about them. Who knows why.

2. I urgently need to organize my craft stuff. Again. Which probably means they won't fit back where they are. Physics does not apply to craft supplies, that's a proven fact. If I try to organize my stuff, they simply don't fit back where they were!

Very well, I guess I already have another task for tomorrow... wish me luck!