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10/09/2013

Let the music do the talking

On Sunday I had gone to the Harrogate British Wool Weekend helping on the Rare Breeds Trust stall. Well, I say helping, once I'd helped walk in (be dragged by) the 8 rare breeds sheep, all I really did was knit Himself's final sleeve (yessssss FINAL sleeve!!) and chat about the North Ronaldsay wool I was using to any one willing to listen.

For some of the time I wandered around chatting with stall holders, one of which was the Jamieson & Smith stall. I'd originally found out about this company when reading Kate Davies' blog - Needled. So I went over and chatted about their wools (gorgeous) about Kate herself (they adore her too!) and about needle felting (still not something I fancy - looks a bit too like self mutilation with the rather vicious looking tools!)

Any hoo - Jamieson & Smith buy their wool from Shetland crofters and farmers which helps support not only them but also the rare sheep that supplies the fleece.  They were such lovely folk, happy to chat and not try and push you into purchasing anything. They were more interested in 'selling' information and encouraging crafting - my kind of 'hard sell' :)


The Rare Breeds stall was diagonally opposite the 'Sheep Roadshow' stand, which for most of the day was quiet but would sporadically erupt into a noisy demo. A loud fanfare followed by music would alert visitors that a demonstration was about to start. A loud and cheerful farmery type came out and his patter would be relayed through over-loud reverberating speakers.....it went something like this.....

Tra la la (the final count down music) la la doo dit doo doo, trall a a a .....blah blah blah whoomwa hummmummubblah blah ha ha ha ha ha!
Then a large ram would come out to more fanfare followed by applause then the shearer boomed happily away explaining in a loud but completely unintelligible waffle about this particular animal. This continued until four rams were in place and then he would get a 5th animal - a female and chat away as he demonstrated shearing.

The rams, so used to all this activity, would just ignore this and cud away until it was their turn to shine.  Each ram then had a trick that it performed to music. One nodded his head in time with the beat, another would paw in time with the music, a third swayed from side to side and lifted each front leg and the final would do a sort of 'moon walk' - all to much applause and appreciation. On the second demonstration an hour later, I watched the shearer rather than the sheep and he was guiding their actions by either swinging a bucket of sheep nuts or by tapping his own feet then rewarding the animal with a treat. Clever.

Yes, these really are real sheep -
From L - R: Lying down - Lincoln Longwool (he nodded his head to the music), Norfolk Horn (he swayed and tapped), Scottish Blackface (he 'counted' with his feet) and the Suffolk who did the moon walk and finally Sean the Shearer!

The Scottish Blackface was so laid back - I just had to photo him!

More woolly happenings will follow, once again, it is late and I am off to bed!

Have a lovely day hawthorn xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx



6 comments:

  1. Clever sheep - got their shearer trained to move his bucket and feet in time to their dancing!!

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  2. Hello Hawthorn

    Ha! Ha! I've thoroughly enjoyed this post and your vivid description of the "show". I think this performance would go very well hand in hand here with the goat and the gypsy playing an accordion in the street as the goat jumps over obstacles and climbs onto a box and then perches on the top of a wooden skittle which looks like a large sawn off table leg....as if it was the most difficult thing in the world for a goat!! Once his performance finishes he then shouts up to the people in the apartments to throw down money. I swear most people throw down money for him to go away!!!

    At least your "show" is a little more educational as the shearer shows you how he shears a sheep!!! :-)

    keep well

    Amanda :-)

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  3. How marvellous - and we've always been told that sheep are silly critters! I thoroughly enjoyed reading your very-well-put-together post Hawthorn - almost like I was there enjoying it all personally! Thank you for such great entertainment!
    Joy x

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  4. So there is a moon-walking sheep to rival that Shetland pony. Perhaps they could get a show together... Hilarious post too.

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  5. Dancing sheep, one for Britian's got Talent?
    I've got some North Ronaldsay yarn in my stash, from my holiday last year in the Orkneys. It's waiting patiently, keen to be knitted into a hat! Another thing on my tick list of "to do's".

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  6. I was so sorry to have missed this event but I was at a wedding ... why do the brides in my family always have to pick the woolly event weekends. It's lovely though to catch up with what I missed via blog reports like this one, so thank you ;)

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Hi there...

Thank you ever so much for stopping by today - I'm really glad that you did. If you would like to leave me a comment then I would be delighted to hear from you, any one signing as anonymous or writing anything unkind, political, any form of hate or computer generated will be acknowledged as spam and deleted.

Hawthorn x

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