51st Annual Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival
Fiber Arts Seminars

Howard County Fairgrounds, West Friendship, MD: May 1 - 4, 2024

Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival Logo

Registration Information & Festival Policies

For information on registration access and closure, the new policy on materials fees, class cancellations, refund policy & more, please visit the Registration Information page.


Dyeing

Dyeing Classes


One Day Classes

 

Felting

 

Felting Classes


Two Day Class


Half Day Classes

Fiber Prep

Fiber Prep Classes


One Day Classes

 

Knitting

 

Knitting Classes


Half Day Classes

Spinning

Spinning Classes


Two Day Class


One Day Classes


Half Day Classes

 

Crochet

 

Crochet Classes

Half Day Class

Weaving

 

 

 

About the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival

The Maryland Sheep & Wool Festival is one of the largest festivals of its kind celebrating all things sheep, from hoof to handwoven. Registration, cancellation, refund, lunch, and more policies can be viewed here.

Meet Lessonface, PBC

Lessonface's mission is to help students achieve their goals while treating teachers equitably. Since 2012, we've hosted more than 30,000 students and 2,000 teachers for live music, language, and arts lessons and classes online. We are thrilled to be working with the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival for the registration of these classes.

  • More about Lessonface here.

MSWF 2024 Class Calendar

Beginner Sculpting with Wool: Needle Felted Sheep with Elizabeth Whitton

  • • With: Elizabeth Whitton
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 1, 9am-12pm

Learn how to "sculpt with wool" in this beginner needle felting workshop. We will use a felting needle and wool fiber to create a cute little sheep. These techniques can be applied to other 3D needle felting projects. In this workshop...

View More Details and Enroll

Corespinning Plus with Charan Sachar

  • • With: Charan Sachar
  • • Price: $160
  • • When: May 1, 9am-4pm

Want to do more with corespinning? This class will cover core spinning with art batts. Students will explore the ways of core spinning to make thick, airy, puffy yarns and also how to make neater and smoother yarns. We will look into enhancing your core spun with auto wrap thread...

View More Details and Enroll

Exploring the Drum Carder with Henry Clemes

  • • With: Henry Clemes
  • • Price: $160
  • • When: May 1, 9am-4pm

Drum carders are a mystery to the average fiber artist: fiber is fed into the carder, ends up on the big drum, and something magical happens in between. In our ‘Exploring the Drum Carder’ class, students begin the day by learning the history of drum carders, how they work, and why...

View More Details and Enroll

Fabulous Felt and Nuno Felt Hats with Dawn Edwards

  • • With: Dawn Edwards
  • • Price: $320
  • • When: May 1, 9am-4pm and May 2, 9am-4pm

I love making hats and can’t wait to share my passion with you. I like to think of hats as wearable works of art, small felt sculptures in fact. During our felt exploration, there will be time for experimentation, as well as inspiration, as we create fabulous felt and nuno-felt hats...

View More Details and Enroll

Introduction to Multi-shaft Weaving with Beth Truesdale (first offering)

  • • With: Beth Truesdale
  • • Price: $160
  • • When: May 1, 9am-4pm

Students in this class will experience every aspect of multi-shaft weaving: planning a project, winding warp chains, threading a loom, weaving and finishing. Students will work in a “round robin” format on a variety of four-shaft table and floor looms, weaving mug rugs and hot pads....

View More Details and Enroll

Knitting with Handspun yarn with Jill Duarte

  • • With: Jill Duarte
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 1, 9am-12pm

Turning handspun yarn into a finished knitted object can be intimidating. How do you pick a pattern when your yarn is one of a kind? In this workshop, We’ll go over how to classify your handspun yarn in terms of yarn weight, yarn structure, and grist and then how to pick a pattern...

View More Details and Enroll

Shetland Wools: A Breed for All Reasons with Deborah Robson

  • • With: Deb Robson
  • • Price: $160
  • • When: May 1, 9am-4pm

The stuff of lace shawls that can be drawn through a wedding ring and of Fair Isle colorwork and more, Shetland wool represents many stories of humans in relationship with sheep through thousands of years. Shetland wool has been described as “a wool of uncommon softness and fineness”...

View More Details and Enroll

Size & Fit: Why the “Medium” Never Fits Quite Right with Kate Atherley

  • • With: Kate Atherley
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 1, 9am-12pm

The biggest challenge for many knitters when choosing a pattern is knowing which size to make. This class will show you how to decide - and set you well along the way to a successful and flattering sweater project. We’ll explain how to read sizing tables and schematics to understand...

View More Details and Enroll

Spin the Yarn You Need: Understanding Wheel Adjustments with Meagan Condon

  • • With: Meagan Condon
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 1, 9am-12pm

Your very first yarn was thick and uneven. Shortly after, you mastered spinning the finest lace… and couldn’t quite get that thick yarn again. Now you want something in the middle. There are a number of different factors you can control to get the yarn thickness you want, from what...

View More Details and Enroll

Start Spinning with Maggie Casey

  • • With: Maggie Casey
  • • Price: $320
  • • When: May 1, 9am-4pm and May 2, 9am-4pm

START SPINNING: LEARN TO SPIN OR REFRESH YOUR SKILLS Spider Woman taught the Navajo to spin with spindles of lightning and turquoise. Gandhi encouraged the people of India to spin every day for meditation and economic freedom. Rumpelstiltskin spun straw into gold and Sleeping Beauty...

View More Details and Enroll

Stranded Colorwork & Latvian Braids 101 with Tanis Gray

  • • With: Tanis Gray
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 1, 9am-12pm

Freaked over Fair Isle? Curious about stranded colorwork techniques? Intimidated by multiple strands of yarn in multiple colors? Not sure how gauge works or how to trap those floats? This is the workshop for you! In my most popular workshop, we’ll cover basic Fair Isle knitting...

View More Details and Enroll

The Finer Points of Combing! with Kimberly Radcliffe

  • • With: Kimberly Radcliffe
  • • Price: $160
  • • When: May 1, 9am-4pm

Combs are amazing the way they can transform even the worst looking fleece into beautifully prepared fiber for spinning. It’s like magic! Combing may seem intimidating, but is fairly easy to learn with a little practice and a patient instructor. You will be working with several different...

View More Details and Enroll

Triad Dyeing with Peggy Doney

  • • With: Peggy Doney
  • • Price: $160
  • • When: May 1, 9am-4pm

Join us as we explore, hands-on, a method for building a systematic collection of 66 colors from three hues. After covering some basic safety, equipment, and dye stock mixing, you will measure out amounts for new colors using the formulas provided. The class will apply those colors...

View More Details and Enroll

Fiber Speed Dating with Jill Duarte

  • • With: Jill Duarte
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 1, 1pm-4pm

Explore nine different fiber blends while discussing approaches to spinning different fibers - which drafting methods pair well with particular fiber preps or blends? Should you judge a fiber by your first impression? We will discuss worsted and woolen drafting methods and how...

View More Details and Enroll

Math for Knitters: Solving the Knitters’ Number Puzzles with Kate Atherley

  • • With: Kate Atherley
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 1, 1pm-4pm

We will talk about everything you need to know to figure out all those tricky numbers issues you encounter in your knitting. We’ll focus on how mathematics fits into pattern reading – counting and working and keeping track. We’ll cover how to understand and work challenging instructions...

View More Details and Enroll

Needle Felted Landscape Painting: Cherry Blossoms with Elizabeth Whitton

  • • With: Elizabeth Whitton
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 1, 1pm-4pm

Learn how to "paint with wool" in this beginner needle felting workshop. Students will learn how to layer and attach wool to a linen fabric backing to make this "cherry blossoms" landscape. These techniques can be applied to other flat need felting projects. Workshop includes...

View More Details and Enroll

Steeking 4 Ways with Tanis Gray

  • • With: Tanis Gray
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 1, 1pm-4pm

Interested in steeking but the thought of taking scissors to your knitting sends shivers down your spine? We’ll learn how to secure and cut our knitting 4 different ways with ease on swatches before you tackle that sweater pattern you’ve had your eye on! You’ll learn the single crochet...

View More Details and Enroll

Why Does Wool Do That? with Meagan Condon

  • • With: Meagan Condon
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 1, 1pm-4pm

Some fiber is stretchy and some is drapey. Some wool feels prickly and some doesn’t. Most wool felts… but some doesn’t. Why? We’ll explore the microscopy of fiber and what that means to the hand spinner. We’ll have something squishy for you to spin while we zoom in on the world of

View More Details and Enroll

Beginner Painting with Wool: Needle Felted Coastal Waters Painting with Elizabeth Whitton

  • • With: Elizabeth Whitton
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 2, 9am-12pm

Learn how to "paint with wool" in this beginner needle felting workshop. We will use a felting needle to layer and attach wool fiber to a linen fabric backing to make this landscape. These techniques can be applied to other flat needle felting projects. In this workshop, we’ll cover...

View More Details and Enroll

Beyond Thick and Thin with Charan Sachar

  • • With: Charan Sachar
  • • Price: $160
  • • When: May 2, 9am-4pm

Thick and thin yarns are great when it comes to creating textured yarns and are one of my favorites to spin. In this full day class, you will learn to spin thick and thin yarns with the intention of plying them into something magical. Using the thick and thin singles we will explore...

View More Details and Enroll

Carding for Color: Fractals with Henry Clemes

  • • With: Henry Clemes
  • • Price: $160
  • • When: May 2, 9am-4pm

Have you marveled at the eye-popping colors of the increasingly popular fractal yarns? Fractals can be spun from dyed braids, but the repeating patterns that comprise a fractal can be prepared on a drum carder as well. In this class, students learn how to start with fleece to create...

View More Details and Enroll

Drape or Disaster with Meagan Condon

  • • With: Meagan Condon
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 2, 9am-12pm

Drape, that elusive quality of how fabric hangs and moves. Merino won’t get you there. How yarn is constructed has a lot to do with how it lays in a finished project. In this class we’ll explore what elements contribute to drape in handspun yarn and how to avoid some pitfalls, like...

View More Details and Enroll

Estonian Inlay with Tanis Gray

  • • With: Tanis Gray
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 2, 9am-12pm

Learn the art of Estonian Inlay, or Roosimine in this hat workshop! Originating from the western Estonian island Muhu, this stranding technique has been used for centuries to embellish knitting. Sharing similar characteristics of stranded colorwork, intarsia, and embroidery, this...

View More Details and Enroll

Gardening and Foraging Natural Pigments for Dyes & Paint with Pat Brodowski

  • • With: Pat Brodowski
  • • Price: $160
  • • When: May 2, 9am-4pm

Hundreds of plants can be made into dyes for natural fibers. Which ones should you grow, which ones should you collect in the field? This workshop will provide you with living plants for your own dye garden. From living plant material we will identify dye plants and make dye from...

View More Details and Enroll

Introduction to Garment Alterations with Kate Atherley

  • • With: Kate Atherley
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 2, 9am-12pm

Found the perfect pattern but can't find a yarn that matches gauge? Want to change the size of a pattern? Need shorter sleeves, or a longer body, or a different neckline? In addition to sharing methods for changing aspects of garments, we’ll delve deep into strategies for approaching...

View More Details and Enroll

Introduction to Multi-shaft Weaving with Beth Truesdale (second offering)

  • • With: Beth Truesdale
  • • Price: $160
  • • When: May 2, 9am-4pm

Students in this class will experience every aspect of multi-shaft weaving: planning a project, winding warp chains, threading a loom, weaving and finishing. Students will work in a “round robin” format on a variety of four-shaft table and floor looms, weaving mug rugs and hot pads....

View More Details and Enroll

Mixed-breed Wools: Unpredictable and... Fun! With Deborah Robson

  • • With: Deb Robson
  • • Price: $160
  • • When: May 2, 9am-4pm

Studying and working with breed-specific wools is invaluable: it provides a baseline for understanding the world of fleeces and grounds for comparison. But what happens when you find your hands being drawn to a mixed-breed fleece? How do you evaluate or approach it? Might there be...

View More Details and Enroll

Spinning for Consistency with Jill Duarte

  • • With: Jill Duarte
  • • Price: $160
  • • When: May 2, 9am-4pm

An introduction to measuring wraps per inch (WPI), angle of twist and grist to take control of your spinning for more consistent results. Participants will learn how to measure wraps per inch for singles and plied yarns; the relationship between WPI of singles and plied yarn; how...

View More Details and Enroll

"Tints, Tones, And Shades, Oh My! With Peggy Doney"

  • • With: Peggy Doney
  • • Price: $160
  • • When: May 2, 9am-4pm

As you follow the Yellow Brick Road on your Dyeing Adventure, you don’t need to be afraid of Tints, Toners, and Shades! Learn hands-on about adding “white,” grey, and black to your colors and the role that additives play in helping you to achieve uniform results with immersion dyeing,...

View More Details and Enroll

2-Color Cables with Tanis Gray

  • • With: Tanis Gray
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 2, 1pm-4pm

Take your cable game to the next level by knitting 2-colored cables! The Palace in Wonderland Cowl is packed with technique. Learn the provisional cast-on with two colors, 2-colored cables, chart reading, Kitchener stitch with two colors, cabling without a cable needle, and blocking....

View More Details and Enroll

Beginner Sculpting with Wool: Needle Felted Forest Toadstools with Elizabeth Whitton

  • • With: Elizabeth Whitton
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 2, 1pm-4pm

Learn how to "sculpt with wool" in this beginner needle felting workshop. Students will learn how to make different types of small shapes and attach them together to make this mushroom scene. These techniques can be applied to other 3D needle felting projects. Workshop includes...

View More Details and Enroll

Socks 101: Top Down Socks with Kate Atherley

  • • With: Kate Atherley
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 2, 1pm-4pm

Learn how to make top-down socks. Starting with a mini “training sock”, we teach you everything you need to know to knit socks - from working in the round to turning the heel to shaping the toe. Once you’ve mastered the mini, we get you started on your first full-size sock. Along...

View More Details and Enroll

What the Fluff? All About Loft with Meagan Condon

  • • With: Meagan Condon
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 2, 1pm-4pm

We know lofty yarn is warm, fuzzy, and light yarn, but how do we get there? We’ll explore the fiber qualities, preparations, drafting style, and ply structures that make a yarn lofty and where these yarns best perform. To get into the right headspace to really understand loft, we...

View More Details and Enroll

Add Ins with Charan Sachar

  • • With: Charan Sachar
  • • Price: $160
  • • When: May 3, 9am-4pm

Want to push your art yarn to new levels with textures and unique items added to your yarn? Then this is the class for you. We will look into ways of adding items like scrap yarns, novelty yarns, sequins, buttons, and beads with core-spinning and plying to make stable yarns. Be...

View More Details and Enroll

Carding for Color: Tints and Shades with Henry Clemes

  • • With: Henry Clemes
  • • Price: $160
  • • When: May 3, 9am-4pm

Pick a color, any color! Students begin this class by choosing a color, then blending primaries to create the color with fiber. Next, they blend in additional fiber to create tints and shades. Finally, they work backwards to create a tint or shade from scratch. All carding and blending...

View More Details and Enroll

Divide and Conquer - Deconstructing Double-Coated Fleece with Meagan Condon

  • • With: Meagan Condon
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 3, 9am-12pm

Double-coated fleeces have everything; a different fiber for every occasion! They’re the holy grail of spinning, if you can unlock the secret of how to separate them. In this class, we will look at how to efficiently separate the softer undercoat from the coarser outer coat. We’ll...

View More Details and Enroll

Drop Spindle with Maggie Casey

  • • With: Maggie Casey
  • • Price: $160
  • • When: May 3, 9am-4pm

DROP SPINDLE SPINNING - For much of history the world’s cloth was spun on a spindle. Learn how to use this simple tool and continue the tradition. Discover some tricks to make spinning on a spindle easy. Spin singles in the morning and ply in the afternoon.

View More Details and Enroll

Exploring the Japanese Knitting Stitch Bible with Gayle Roehm

  • • With: Gayle Roehm
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 3, 9am-12pm

From easy to brain-bending! The Japanese Knitting Stitch Bible (JKSB) includes a wide range of stitches and techniques to create lovely sculptured knitting. We'll start with a stitch pattern that gives you a lot of “bang for the buck”: it’s lovely and relatively easy to knit. Then...

View More Details and Enroll

Fabulous Felt Flowers with Dawn Edwards

  • • With: Dawn Edwards
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 3, 9am-12pm

In this fun hands-on workshop, we will transform beautiful Merino wool top into lovely felt flowers using just our hands, imagination, and a little soap and water. This magical process is called wet felting. We will add beading and a pin back so that you may choose to wear your beautiful...

View More Details and Enroll

Get Started on a Supported Spindle with Jill Duarte

  • • With: Jill Duarte
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 3, 9am-12pm

A hands-on introduction to the world of spinning on supported spindles. We will go over the different types of supported spindles and their traditional uses - tahkli, Pu-Yok Tibetan styles, Russian, and more. We will discuss how to pair spindles to a particular fiber type, and...

View More Details and Enroll

Grand and Glorious Gradients with Peggy Doney

  • • With: Peggy Doney
  • • Price: $160
  • • When: May 3, 9am-3pm

We've all drooled over gradient yarns and items made from their gorgeous colors. Learn a method for doing two-color dye gradients to create your own drool-worthy colorways. Learn how to mix dye stock, prep yarn and fiber for dyeing, and use the recipes we create in class. Put your...

View More Details and Enroll

Long-Lasting Socks with Kate Atherley

  • • With: Kate Atherley
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 3, 9am-12pm

Make your handknit socks last longer. This session is all about practical solutions for making the most of these precious items. We’ll talk about how to start with longevity in mind: a discussion of yarn type, fabric and fit. I’ll share a variety of reinforcement strategies: other...

View More Details and Enroll

Needle Felted Landscape Painting: Grazing Sheep with Elizabeth Whitton

  • • With: Elizabeth Whitton
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 3, 9am-12pm

Learn how to "paint with wool" in this beginner needle felting workshop. We will use a felting needle to layer and attach wool fiber to a linen fabric backing to make this landscape. These techniques can be applied to other flat needle felting projects. In this workshop, we’ll cover...

View More Details and Enroll

"Same Breed, Different Mills with Deborah Robson"

  • • With: Deb Robson
  • • Price: $160
  • • When: May 3, 9am-4pm

Whether you want to send some wool to be processed at a mill or are simply purchasing fiber that someone else is offering for sale, understanding how wool goes through mechanical systems can increase your appreciation for sheep, shepherds, and services. This is an unusual opportunity...

View More Details and Enroll

Tablet Weaving Through History with Diana Buck

  • • With: Diana Buck
  • • Price: $160
  • • When: May 3, 9am-4pm

Tablet woven bands have been used throughout history to accessorize and decorate clothing using a variety of fibers. This seminar will cover the historic and world use of tablet weaving, including differing regional techniques and examples. In addition, there will be time to provide...

View More Details and Enroll

Beginner Sculpting with Wool: Needle Felted Succulent with Elizabeth Whitton

  • • With: Elizabeth Whitton
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 3, 1pm-4pm

Learn how to "sculpt with wool" in this beginner needle felting workshop. We will use a felting needle to create little leaves with wool batting and then put them together to make a cute plant. These techniques can be applied to other 3D needle felting projects. In this workshop,...

View More Details and Enroll

Fun and Fabulous Felt Bag with Dawn Edwards

  • • With: Dawn Edwards
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 3, 1pm-4pm

In this fast-paced half-day class, we will create a small wet-felted bag. This bag is the perfect size to tuck your cell phone, a credit card and a lip balm, for a night at the theater or a concert, and those outings where you don’t want to carry a large bag. This class is a great...

View More Details and Enroll

"Introduction to Colorwork: Fair Isle, Intarsia and Slip-Stitch Knitting with Kate Atherley"

  • • With: Kate Atherley
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 3, 1pm-4pm

Learn how to work with multiple colors in your knitting, in multiple ways. We’ll start with stripes, then progress to Fair Isle, showing you how read the patterns and charts, and how to handle two yarns, whether you work English or Continental, one-handed or two. I’ll demonstrate...

View More Details and Enroll

Japanese Fingerless Mitts by Hitomi Shida with Gayle Roehm

  • • With: Gayle Roehm
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 3, 1pm-4pm

Join the translator of the Japanese Knitting Stitch Bible: 260 Exquisite Designs by Hitomi Shida, published in English in 2017, to knit the fingerless mitts project from this book, and gain experience and insight into the complex charts and symbols. These mitts are a good introductory...

View More Details and Enroll

Spinning Short Stapled Fibers with Jill Duarte

  • • With: Jill Duarte
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 3, 1pm-4pm

Ever wanted to spin short stapled fibers? Fibers like luxury down fibers such as Cashmere, or short stapled wools. In this workshop, we will address the needs of short stapled fibers when hand spinning, how to setup your spinning wheel for spinning short stapled fibers, a variety...

View More Details and Enroll

What to Do with that Braid You Just Bought with Meagan Condon

  • • With: Meagan Condon
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 3, 1pm-4pm

You just impulse bought a beautiful braid of indie dyed fiber in the vendor hall. It matches nothing else in your stash. You don’t just want to ply it against itself. Now what? In this class, we’ll explore color handling methods, including fractal plying, chain plying, and creating...

View More Details and Enroll

British vs American Longdraw with Maggie Casey

  • • With: Maggie Casey
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 4, 9:30am-12:30pm

ENGLISH LONGDRAW VS AMERICAN LONGDRAW - What is the difference between English longdraw (double drafting) and American longdraw? It depends. We will spin wool and cotton both ways and you can see the difference yourself and add another drafting method to your spinning reperto

View More Details and Enroll

Getting Started with Japanese Crochet with Gayle Roehm

  • • With: Gayle Roehm
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 4, 9:30am-12:30pm

Japanese designers are creating some of the most beautiful crochet garments around, and many designs combine knitting with crochet. Crocheters are lucky, too, because Japanese crochet symbols have been adopted around the world as the standard for representing crochet stitches. In...

View More Details and Enroll

Sheep Breeds Walkabout with Deborah Robson

  • • With: Deb Robson
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 4, 10am-12pm

With Deborah Robson as your guide, take a walking tour of the sheep barns at the Festival. Deb will highlight a number of sheep breeds, will help you learn to identify them by pointing out physical characteristics, and will discuss the properties of their fiber.

View More Details and Enroll

A Japanese Hat with Cables and Lace with Gayle Roehm

  • • With: Gayle Roehm
  • • Price: $80
  • • When: May 4, 1:30pm-4:30pm

Knitters who love beautiful stitch patterns have been delighted with the Japanese Knitting Stitch Bible: 260 Exquisite Designs by Hitomi Shida, recently published in English. Join the translator to knit the lacy cabled hat from this book, and gain experience and insight into the...

View More Details and Enroll