TdF2025 Update

We’re pretty much half-way through the TdF now – and this is my first post. Sorry about that. I promise I’ve been spinning an (almost) all the TdF days so far.

Firstly, as I said in the last post, the TdF started while I was still up on Shetland with only my EEW 6.0 and some commercially spun merino/silk top. this was the remainder of some top that I had bought a year or two ago and spun half of. Of course I didn’t take with me the yarn that I had previously spun so I could compare how I had spun it and at what size – that would have been way too sensible. So I just picked up the fibre and did what came most naturally – a sort of easy long draw, not too fine – aiming for a 2 ply yarn that’s somewhere between DK and aran weight.

By the time I’d got back home, I’d spun enough of it that I was committed now to this style of spinning.

(I was also in agony – I somehow strained a glute muscle on the last day in Shetland -when bending over to pick something off the floor!! – then had to get on the ferry, sleep(ish) on the ferry, and then drive from Aberdeen down to Edinburgh – so possibly not thinking too clearly.)

Anyway – that Monday that I arrived home was a washout – that’s the one day of the Tour that I did not spin. But Tuesday, I got up and got back to my EEW 6.0 and got back on with the spinning. And then I started the general tidy up that should have been prep for the Tour de Fleece . First things first – reorganising the furniture in my living room so that I could get my “big” loom – the Ashford Kiwi 3 – out in the living room in front of the TV so I could watch the other TdF while spinning. After that was done, it was time for clearing off the Kiwi’s bobbins, which included finding singles that were still waiting to be plied, and then digging out what I really wanted to focus on during this TdF – the shetland fleece that I had brought home from Fair Isle. I also dug out the skeins of the previously spun green merino/silk.

2 full bobbins of singles of the green merino/silk later (possibly Thursday by this point) I plied them together on my Ashford Kiwi 3, let them sit overnight (just because), wound them into skeins, gave them a little bath, and let them dry.

The two skeins on the left – the ones from a year or two ago. The two on the right – the newly spun ones. OK, maybe the new ones have a little more twist in them – the old ones actually look a bit underspun to me – but otherwise, I’d call them similar enough they can be used in the same project.

I haven’t quite decided what that project will be yet. When I was plying the new ones I realised this yarn is not super-consistent in diameter – at some points it’s kinda like slub yarn. I started thinking it might look nicer in a weave – maybe a simple plain weave would showcase the irregularity in a good way. I know the ones on the left look snappable, but the rigid heddle loom is super-forgiving for warp so I think it might work fine… Anyway – the “what to do with the green merino/silk skeins” project is on hold until the Tour de Fleece is complete.

With that side project out the way – I could finally start on my real goal for this year’s TdF – to finish spinning the Shetland fleece I brought home from Fair Isle. This isn’t just a spinning project – it’s a true fleece to skein project.

This particular fleece came from a “wild” shetland sheep that lived on the North side of Fair Isle. One of the ones that we brought in for dipping and clipping on Sheep Hill day, when I was with Marie Brouhat learning how to do fair isle on the knitting machine. Marie selected a particularly nice sheep and roo’d the fleece for me. All (!!!!) that was left for me to do was to process it.

Washed and dried fleece, ready to card into rolags and finally spin.

I washed it soon after I returned home from Fair Isle – but that’s pretty much where it stopped until now. Finally, I’m moving on with the carding and spinning.

I had tended to spin my singles on the EEW 6.0 electric spinner and then ply on my Ashford Kiwi – but I was intrigued when doing a spinning course with Elizabeth Johnston she mentioned that she tends to work the other way round – spin on her “real” wheel, ply on her electric – intrigued enough by why she preferred to do the opposite that I thought this time I would try to spin my singles on my Kiwi. She also says she normally spins “in the grease” – doesn’t wash the fleece before carding and spinning. But this particular fleece from Fair Isle did have a lot of mud and stone dust in it, I don’t think I could have skipped the washing stage. I did buy another fleece on that Shetland trip after talking with Elizabeth though (from the Wool Brokers) and if I ever get through this first fleece, I’m going to try the second one in the grease.

Anyway, that’s where I am now. One full bobbin spun, quite a lot of fleece still to card, and another week and a half of the Tour de Fleece to get it all done. Wish me luck!