Tour de France/Tour de Fleece 2024 Stage 8

The Cycling: Stage 8 is 183.4km of a flat route that starts in Semur-en-Auxois and ends in Colombey Les Deux Églises.

The Daily Challenge: The town of Semur-en-Auxios used to have a lot of mills supporting its industry, but the building of the Lac de Pont dam caused a change in the river which meant it was no longer powerful enough to run the mills.  Introduce a bit of texture to your spin, extra points for river-theming it.

Suggested Fibre: All of our Sari Silks will bring texture to s a spin, and River Rapids is quite thematic!

What I did

I spun and plied the next two singles of my Llandovery Whiteface Hill blend "Evening at the Bay".  It contains texture and is river themed.  I think the lighter blue parts of the Silk Noil looks like whitewater rapids in the river of blue.

This is spun to double knit weight and the skeins are 99g/218m and 98g/204m.  The fibre content is 75% Llandovery Whiteface Hill Wool, 10% Tussah Silk, 6% Trilobal Nylon, 5% Hemp, 4%Silk Noil.

Tour de France/Tour de Fleece 2024 Stage 7

The Cycling: Stage 7 is 25.3km of a time trial that starts in Nuits Saint Georges and ends in Gevrey-Chambertin.

The Daily Challenge: Gevrey-Chambertin was originally known as Gevrey.  It added the name of it's most successful vineyard to the town name and others soon follow suit.  It is well know for it's burgundy wine production.  Pick any fibre you like, you've got the length of the song "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger" by Daft Punk (3 minutes and 42 seconds) to see how much you can spin!

Suggested Fibre: Your choice!  Pick something you know you can whizz along with.  We'd go for Natural Bluefaced Leicester.

What I did

Well, I'm certainly not doing today's challenge.  I only ever done one of these "spin as much as you can in a given time" challenges once before and it was such a pain in backside trying to measure how much I spun and I got into such a tangled mess in doing so that I refuse to participate in those kind of challenges anymore.  

Following on from what I started yesterday, after I plied the Saffron Sunshine, and spun the first single of my next chosen fibre I spun the second single and plied them together.  This the third of my Llandovery Whiteface Hill blends and this one is called Evening at the Bay.

Tour de France/Tour de Fleece 2024 Stage 6

The Cycling: Stage 6 is 163.5km of a flat route that starts in Mâcon and ends in Dijon.

The Daily Challenge: Dijon is the birthplace of Dijon Mustard - if you hadn't already guessed.  But did you know, in 2022 there was a mustard shortage as Dijon's main supply of mustard seed from Ukraine and Russia was reduced due to the war.  Instead, seed had to be produced from Canada.  This is an easy peasy lemon squeezy one today - spin something yellow!

Suggested Fibre: Corriedale Mustard is the obvious choice; it's yellow and a nice, fast spin.

What I did

Oh wouldn't you know, my current spin also fits today's challenge, kind of, as I consider the colour of my blend to fit in with the mustardy-yellow range of colours.  Did I plan my spins this way?  A hill breed yesterday and something yellow today, oh yes I certainly did!

I plied the second set of singles today and the photos of the finished yarn actually represents the true colour (because I took these photos using my Canon camera and not my phone!).  This is spun to double-knit weight and the skeins are 82g/171m and 86g/177m.  The fibre content is 77.5% Llandovery Whiteface Hill Wool, 8.5% Tussah Silk, 5% Silk Noil, 5% Hemp, 4% Trilobal Nylon.

After I finished this yarn, I spun the first single of my next spin, which I have chosen to spin for the Stage 8 challenge.

Tour de France/Tour de Fleece 2024 Stage 5

The Cycling: Stage 5 is 177.4km of a flat route that starts in Saint Jean de Maurienne and ends in Saint Vulbas.

The Daily Challenge: In 1996 the wonderful Festival of Bread was created in Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne to help promote small businesses and artisans.  It's grown year on year and it is a very popular annual event. (And let's face it, after that cycling a nice, fresh loaf would be welcome!)  Even though we're on the flat it's never totally smooth, so today's challenge is to spin a hill breed.

Suggested Fibre: Hill Radnor is a strong fibre which is good for socks and a surprisingly pleasant spin!

What I did

Following on from what I started yesterday, I plied the first two singles and then I spun the next two singles.  That was a lot of spinning in just one day and the plying will have to wait until tomorrow.  This blend fits in with today's challenge of spinning a hill breed as the main ingredient of this blend is Llandovery Whitefaced Hill wool.

The camera on my phone is still not picking up the correct colour of this yarn but I am sure that my Canon camera will once I have finished the spinning and the twist has been set but the true colour is that of the photos in the blend photos.

Tour de France/Tour de Fleece 2024 Stage 4

The Cycling: Stage 4 is 139.6km of a mountain route that starts in Pinerolo and ends in Valloire.

The Daily Challenge: Valloire is a popular area of skiing and as such, needs to have a good surface of snow.  A constant, high quality piste is achieved by supplementing the natural snowfall with SNOW CANNONS.  Not just one or two, but 710 of these machines are used to maintain the slopes!  We're all about the unexpected today, so today's challenge is to use something unexpected or unusual in your spinning.  We'll leave the choice up to you!

Suggested Fibre: Locky Wool Locks, are great for adding some texture, bulk and a bit of oomph to a spin.

What I did

Because I am a naughty girl and have looked ahead at the challenges to come I have planned some of my spinning to fit in with upcoming challenges.  The fibre I have chosen to make a start on today fits in perfectly with the challenges for both Stage 5 and Stage 6 and it will take me a couple of days to spin the amount that I have anyway.  I have picked one of the remaining three Llandovery Whiteface Hill blends that I put together back in December, as I have already spun up one of the blends, this one is Saffron Sunshine.

Today I managed to spin two singles, each 50g or thereabouts but the photos I took with my smart phone just wouldn't capture the correct colour so the fibre looks more peachy beige than what it actually is.

Tour de France/Tour de Fleece 2024 Stage 3

The Cycling: Stage 3 is 230.8km of a flat route that starts in Plaisance and ends in Turin.

The Daily Challenge: Beneath Turin there are supposedly three alchemical caves, one of which may hide the elusive Philosopher's Stone.  You can't visit these caves as their location is only ever known by three people at a time - and these people don't know each other so they can't share it!  Turin is shrouded in a lot of magical myth and mystery; we fell down the rabbit hold and had to be forcibly dragged out!  Our first non-spinning challenge of this tour!  Share your favourite myth/legend - it could be something local to your area, lesser-known, or just something that you like!

Suggested Fibre: Myth, a lightly textured amber-coloured blend of 33.3% Merino, 33.3% Tweed and 33.3% Bamboo (the remaining 0.01% is a mystery)

What I did

Well, the fibre I chose to start spinning yesterday was picked to fit in with today's challenge and Rudolph is certainly both a myth and a legend. I plied the two singles that I spun yesterday of Rudolph's Nose from the 2021 Advent Calendar.  The finished yarn is wonderfully soft and I have 101g/363m of sport weight yarn.  It is 25% Shetland Wool, 25% Tussah Silk, 25% Bamboo, 25% Bio-Nylon.  

Tour de France/Tour de Fleece 2024 Stage 2

The Cycling: Stage 2 is 199.2km of a hilly route that starts in Cesenatico and ends in Bologne.

The Daily Challenge: Bologne is home to one of the oldest universities in the world. Alma Mater Studiorum was founded in 1088 making it 936 years old!  In the spirit of learning new things today's challenge is to use a new technique.  This could be for spinning, plying or drafting - it could even be something you've recently learnt and want to practice.

Suggested Fibre: Dusty Brick - a warm orange blend of 75% Shetland and 25% Bio-nylon.

What I did

I'm not doing today's challenge but I made a start on spinning a 100g braid of fibre called Rudolph's Nose, which was the Day 16 fibre in the first fibre Advent Calendar that World of Wool produced in 2021, and you can read about the fibre by clicking on the highlighted link.  The reason that I have picked this fibre is because it fits in perfect with tomorrow's challenge about myth's and legends, and of course Rudoph is a both a myth and a legend. The different fibres are very subtly slightly different shades, not massively noticeably, but probably just the difference on how the same dye looks different on different fibres types. Two of the fibres in the blend actually fit with today's suggested fibre of Shetland and Bio-Nylon and Rudolph's nose also has Tussah Silk and Bamboo.

I managed to spin two singles today and this will be ready to ply tomorrow.