Tour de Fleece update

I had a very busy weekend without much time for spinning, but I did manage to card & spin a little each day so far. This is me sitting at a welcome table at the Bluemont concert in Warrenton on Saturday night, carding in between customers. By the way, the band that night was Furnace Mountain and they were wonderful, as always.


I started at the beginning of the alphabet (actually, I skipped Black Welsh Mountain - it feels like steel wool!) with Brecknock Hill, which as I learned from my reading in the Fleece & Fiber Sourcebook is a type of Cheviot. I carded this fiber and spun the singles on a Bill Hardy spindle and then plied it on my Bosworth Moosie.


So, on the third day I have my first finished skein - a whopping 50 yards and I haven't weighed it yet, but it should be somewhere in the neighborhood of 1 ounce. I washed it this morning and I'll weigh it when it's dry.

As it took me three days to card & spin one ounce, I have my doubts about getting through all 48 ounces in the three weeks of the Tour, but I am delighted to have started this project and I hope to see it through no matter how long it takes.


I am still washing fleece - the last pair was Polwarth and Rambouillet. I have used up my two little sample sized packets of Power Scour and now I'm trying out Kookaburra Wool Wash.

I decided to card & spin the Cheviot and North Country Cheviot next, so as to compare the three Cheviots. I started carding the Cheviot yesterday and may get to finish this evening.

This week is going to be very challenging. With the July 4th holiday it's already a short week, and I'm leaving Thursday around 1pm to drive up to Gettysburg PA to teach at the Mid-Atlantic Fiber Association conference. So I have to get everything packed for my MAFA class (I'm teaching 18th & 19th c. Linens), get work organized to be away for 4 days (we have 6 concerts this coming weekend) and card & spin!

I'll let you know how that works out.