The Lopez Lamb, Wool and Goat Festival is ba-a-a-ck!

The date is Saturday, May 9, 10 a.m.  to 3 p.m., and the location is the Lopez Center for Community and the Arts in “downtown” Lopez Island.

Started in 2011 as a celebration of island agriculture, the festival will feature various sheep and goat breeds, cheese-making and meat-cutting  demonstrations, sheep dogs, sheep-shearing, spinning, weaving, felting and dyeing, and info from Lopez Community Land Trust, Lopez Locavores, the Lopez Farm-to-School Program and the San Juan County Textile Guild. Local vendors will offer island-made goat cheese, textiles, yarn, fleece, meat and other related products.  Daytime events are free of charge.

In the evening, Vita’s Wildly Delicious will serve a festive meal of local lamb and island-grown produce.  Doors to the Lopez Center will open at 5:30 for appetizers and a no-host bar, and dinner will be served at 6:30. Dinner seating is limited; tickets are available ($44 apiece) by contacting vitas@rockisland.com.

Robert Herrmann will host an auction during the dinner, with all proceeds to benefit the Lopez Farm-to-School Program.   Among the items in the auction are boat cruises, lamb and a shawl of Lopez wool woven during the day’s events.

The Lopez Lamb, Wool and Goat Festival is sponsored by Island Fibers and the San Juan County Agricultural Resources Committee.  For more information, contact Island Fibers at  468-2467 or email fibers@islandfibers.com.