Tour de Fleece Roundup

Here's my haul for the Tour. I had lofty plans that were totally derailed by my unexpected love affair with the charkha. :) Still, I did spin quite a bit of yarn, and I'm in love with all of it.

Left to right:

Enchanted Knoll Farm "Pass The Pie, Please" - 6 oz, chain-ply, 310 yards worsted weight
Enchanted Knoll Farm "Treasure Chest" - 4 oz, 2-ply, 220 yards, worsted weight
Southern Cross Fibre "Deep Thoughts" and "Irises" combo, 8 oz, 2-ply, worsted weight
Cotton - 2.5 oz, 2-ply, 800 yards, 10/2 cotton weight (laceweight)
Southern Cross Fibre "Rocky Coast" - 3.9 oz, 2-ply, 150 yards, worsted weight
Hello Yarn "Red Velvet" - 4 oz, chain-ply, 390 yards, sockweight
Hello Yarn "Throwing Stones" on bobbin - 4 oz, yardage unknown


Total: 2370+ yards, 2 pounds.

Charkha-spun

I switched gears on my Tour de Fleece bike and decided to spin cotton on the charkha. I've wanted to gain more charkha proficiency, so my friend David (of Southern Cross Fibre) and I challenged ourselves to spin enough cotton 2-ply weft for a set of 4 handwoven napkins. We'll need 650-700 yards of 2-ply yarn, ~4800ypp, and we'll use commercial cottolin (that David has dyed in yummy colors for us) as the warp.

Here's my progress so far - 500 yards of 2-ply:

I love charkha-spinning. I'm going to spin another 200 yards of cotton, and then I'll explore spinning some animal fibers like cashmere and yak, along with some recycled denim fibers. FUN!

Tour de Fleece progress

So far so good - I've spun 3 braids of fiber, 4 oz each.

I spun up two different Southern Cross Fibre braids (Irises shetland and Deep Thoughts oatmeal BFL) and plied them together. I really like the result. I got 500 yards of sportweight squishy 2-ply yarn.

And I've spun up a braid of Hello Yarn 'Red Velvet' shetland:

I'll chain-ply it tomorrow.

Having great fun spinning away!

Tour de Fleece 2012

Here we go again - the spinning world gears up to ride along with the cyclists as they push themselves to the limit in the Tour de France. The Tour de FLEECE (Ravelry link) lasts for the same duration as the cycling race - Saturday June 30th through Sunday July 22nd. We spinners challenge ourselves, and race against no one but the calendar and our creativity. We make outrageous plans and try to complete as much as we can before the clock runs out.

My plans are skewed a bit this year by the fact that the Tour coincides with two weaving workshops - Rep Weave this weekend and a Saori workshop next weekend. Still, I'll have mornings and evenings free (and the weekdays in between) and I plan to make the most of them.

I have a big pile of fiber that I'm spinning on commission, and that will continue (I do my commission spinning in the mornings). I'll show you that giant pile of yarns soon, when it's finished. That doesn't count (in my mind, which is the only place that matters) toward my TdF spinning.

Here's the fiber I plan to spin up during the Tour. I dug deep into the Southern Cross Fibre, Hello Yarn, and Enchanted Knoll Farm bins - the teams I'm spinning for this year. I belong to all three clubs, and have squirreled away their fiber lovingly for years. I pulled out some golden oldies - well-marinated and loved colourways whose time has come to shine.

Southern Cross Fibre “Equinox”, australian merino, Club, October 2009

Southern Cross Fibre “Funhouse”, falkland, Club, December 2009

Southern Cross Fibre COMBO:
“Irises”, shetland, Club, June 2009
“Deep Thought”, oatmeal bfl, Club, November 2009

HelloYarn “Patchwork”, merino, Club, August 2009

HelloYarn “Red Velvet”, shetland, Club, March 2008

HelloYarn COMBO:
 “Throwing Stones”, rambouillet, update fibre, August 2010
“Pallid”, rambouillet, Club, November 2009

Enchanted Knoll Farm “Treasure Chest”, Hooves Batt Club September 2008

Enchanted Knoll Farm “Harvest”, Hooves Batt Club October 2008

Enchanted Knoll Farm “Pass The Pie”, Hooves Batt Club November 2009

 

 

Look for some of the resulting SCF and HY skeins to show up in my Etsy shop in August. Not sure of the yarn construction plans of these, though I know the Enchanted Knoll batts will all become sock yarn for me (which I'll then madly knit into socks during the Ravellenics following the TdF.) Wish me luck!

Hello!

Here I am! Thanks to the dear friends who have emailed and asked for an update. Time passes much too quickly!
The summer is 2/3 gone, and that's a GOOD thing here in the South. It's too hot and humid to enjoy the outdoors - in fact, we rush from house to car to store to car to house, trying to limit our exposure to the heat index and get back into A/C as soon as possible. My family spends the summer longing for October. :)

Garden: Catastrophic failure. The plants COOKED inside the containers. When we watered (daily) we could feel the water coming out the bottom of the container was HOT, hotter than comfortable bathwater. The heat was built up and concentrated in the containers, and cooked the roots of our poor plants. Everything died without giving us more than a few measly peppers. We are planning a fall garden bed IN THE GROUND so it can maintain a constant dirt temperature. No pictures... too sad. :(

Knitting: I finished the Socktopus socks. They were a fun knit, with the sparkles and softness of the wool.

Spinning: Oh, goodness - I can't show it all to you, we don't have time or bandwidth for that. Since last I posted, I've participated once again in the Tour de Fleece and spun 18 skeins of yarn in 3 weeks, a total of 5100 yards of plied yarn (much of it thin 3-ply yarns) in 21 days. That was a concentrated spinning effort, but I still spin/ply an average of a,000 yards a week. This morning I plied a 730 yard skein of 2-ply laceweight polwarth/bamboo. Monday I navajo/chain plied a 440 yard commissioned skein of sock yarn. Spinning is one of the great joys of my life. :)

Weaving: I've woven several scarves in rayon boucle and tencel (one is in the Etsy shop right now), an Overshot runner, and a set of placemats in twill and huck lace for an exchange with some dear friends in Canada.

Personal: After nearly 8 months of retirement, I still love it. :) Today is my dear husband's birthday - he is the joy of my life and my best friend. And our move to Montana grows ever closer. Life (and God who gives it) = GOOD.

Tour de Fleece

For the past two years, I've participated in the Tour de Fleece on Ravelry. It's great fun and great motivation to spin more and document one's spinning escapades. I don't need much motivation to spin more :) but I could do a better job of documenting (yes, Blog, I hear you) so I look forward to participating again this year.

I haven't done much in the way of goal-setting yet, other than deciding that I'll be spinning from my favorite four dye artists (Enchanted Knoll, Southern Cross Fibre, Spunky Eclectic, Hello Yarn). As the time grows closer, I'll narrow down some specific goals (which fiber, which challenges, etc.) and post them here.

I've joined two 'Wildcard' teams - Enchanted Elves (for Enchanted Knoll) and Monkey Farts (for Spunky Eclectic).

In case anyone wants to join up too, here are the (non) rules:

This year the Tour de Fleece starts Saturday July 3rd and runs until Sunday July 25th, 2010.

Guidelines (NOT RULES):

1. Spin every day the Tour rides, if possible. Saturday July 3rd through Sunday July 25th. Days of rest: Monday July 12th, Wednesday July 21st. (Just like the actual tour)

2. Spin something challenging Thursday July 22nd. (The Tour’s toughest mountain stage from Pau up the legendary Col du Tourmalet)

3. Take a button if you want one. Then we can use the button on our blogs in show of solidarity. Take it from here or grab a clean one from the flickr pool. Come join the flickr pool!

4. Wear yellow on Sunday July 25th to announce victory. Why not wear yellow on any day you feel particularly successful? (Yellow is the color of the race leader in the Tour - but here we are all ‘race leaders’)

5. Other colors if desired: Green (sprinter - think FAST), Polka-dot (climber - as in uphill), and white (rookie)