It’s that time of year again – Tour de Fleece!

My original plan this Tour had been to work through the Gulf Coast Native fleece I purchased at Maryland Sheep and Wool. After skirting, scouring, sampling and sharing, I still had 14.5 ounces of fiber left. I thought I could compare different fiber prep and spinning methods. Maybe on “Mountain” days I would even try to use my EEW 6 eSpinner, Evie, to spin rather than just plying. (Crazy, right?)

But then the Fossil Fibers Tour de Fleece set arrived in the mail, and everything changed.

I had resisted the fiber for weeks. I feel awkward and weird buying a “Tour de Fleece fiber” from a fiber vendor when I am unlikely to participate in their team because I’m busy running my own. (It’s not too late to join our no-stress spinalong on the Spanish Peacock Flock Facebook group, by the way!) But I saw another spinner’s post of how their yarn turned out, and it was so beautiful I succumbed.

The fiber was even lovelier in real life.

So if you were wondering—yes, I’ll be working on these two gorgeous Bluefaced Leicester/silk blend braids during TdF!

Instead of my previous yarn design approaches, which involved splitting the yarn lengthwise (with unpredictable results, such as with the 2020 Mitt-a-long), this go-around I will be splitting the yarn crosswise as depicted in this schematic:

My plan is to spin two singles (cleverly named in the diagram “Singles 1” and “Singles 2”) to produce an two-ply yarn. I know the yarn will have more marling/barberpole effect than I normally like, but these colors blend so beautiful I believe it will complement the yarn rather than detracting from it.

Splitting the braids across, instead of lengthwise, makes it very easy to make sure that Singles 1, Spindle 1 has the same amount of fiber (weight-wise) as Singles 2, Spindle 1. I can also try to pair up spindles of similar weight and spin dynamic per chunk of fiber, rather than trying to spin with an entire fleet of matching spindles (like I did with the Spintentional Spinalong).

Here is another view of my initial plan for the color progression:

Unfortunately, I then suffered the thought: what if I tried it the other way? Here is color progression option two:

What to do?

What any blogger in a similar dilemma does: put out a poll on social media!

Of the three people who voted—thank you, family! —the overwhelming majority favored color gradient option 2, which starts with blue rather than orange. Just kidding…about the number of votes, anyway. A little over 100 people weighed in, and option 2 was the clear favorite. I set about revising my initial plan.

Luckily, one of my two main goals for this Tour de Fleece was to be more organized with my spinning. I designed a Spinning Planner card, which I could use to label each chunk of fiber, the order in which I planned to spin, and the spindle I had paired it with. This planner allowed me to relatively quickly reorganize my spindles and the chunks of fiber to match the new color gradient.

Eight spindles, eight chunks of fiber, eight Spinning Planner cards. If you want to try this approach for yourself, here’s a PDF you can download that lets you print four cards at a time. No more forgetting which spindle to use or which order to spin the chunk of fiber in!

Oh, my other goal? To stay focused on this one spin the entire Tour. I know I can stay focused, but I struggle with it. I’m like a spinning butterfly, flitting from fiber to fiber and spindle to spindle. But here’s the brilliant part about being so organized.

I can spin any of these eight chunks of fiber on its respective spindle at any point.

Crazy, right?

It’s like I have eight mini-spins (one ounce each) that all get me towards the same goal. So if I feel like a different color, or a different spindle—not a problem! I still know which order they need to go in to produce the final yarn.

In fact, my yarn results may improve by switching between the spindles. The human tendency towards inconsistency (due to lack of attention, rushing to finish, performance pressure, trying to make pretty photos, or any number of factors that can make a singles yarn smoother and more even, or lumpier and more erratic) would be spread out across the spindles and (hopefully) even out over the eight.

Tour de Fleece 2023, let’s goooooo!