The Tour de Fleece

Those of you not on Ravelry or not into spinning are going to be completely amused and befuddled by this entry. The Tour de France (a bicycle race) starts tomorrow. Since many of us work on wheels of a different sort, someone came up with the idea of having a parallel contest for fun. It is for spinners, i.e. those who spin. The whole thing is a play on words but it is a way to challenge oneself, try something new and make a commitment to spinning for the duration of the Tour.

There are teams on Ravelry. You pick a team based on any or all of the following criteria: your friends, your tools, the fiber you want to spin, your goals and objectives, and potentially any other criteria that make sense to you. I am on a number of teams besides the big team of everyone who is doing the Tour de Fleece.

The first is for Spindlers. Spindlers are people who spin on a hand spindle. Here you can see my fiber - baby Icelandic roving that I got at Rhinebeck last year. The picture also has my new spindle that I am inaugurating for the Tour this year. It is also from Rhinebeck, from Golding.

I am also on Team Footloose, which is for people spinning on the Hansen mini-spinners. I will be spinning on the Hansen when I am home and on the spindle when I am on the road as I will be for part of the Tour.

The other team I'm on is Team Corgi Hill Farm, which is the source of the fiber I will be spinning on the Hansen. This is the luscious loveliness that I am going to be working on. I will start with the two green batts on the top left. They are wool/silk and I am going to teach myself to spin them woollen.

The top right fiber is a Blue-Faced Leicester/silk blend in a color called Poppy. The bottom right is yak/merino/silk in a color called Copper and the bottom left is camel/silk in Purple. I will be spinning in that order and we'll see how far I get.