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Tour de Fleece 2006

I’m a new spinner, and it’s my first time trying Tour de Fleece.

I got some matted Cotswold locks from the textile drop-in with the Toronto Guimd of Spinners and Weavers at Riverdale Farm. I spent a few weeks picking the wool to get it cardable. (Oops, forgot to get a “before” photo)

Picked locks ready for carding

Cotswold being a fairly long staple, I decided to diz it instead of making rolags

Small nest of roving, with my carders and my diz

There was still a lot of vegetable matter in the wool, so I kept to carding outdoors. Sometimes while watching intercounty baseball at Christie Pits Park. (Go Maple Leafs!)

Carding wool at Dominico Field

The test spin turned out well enough that I’m on track to make the most Toronto yarn ever, spun in the city with wool from sheep that live in the city.

Test spin with Riverdale Farm Cotswold wool

Tour de Fleece coincides with the Toronto Fringe Festival, so I’ll be travelling all over the city with my spindle and my roving

I’ll see how many landmarks I can hit along the way.

Featured

Hourglass Eyelet Rib Socks

Pattern notes. This pattern assumes familiarity with sock knitting.

Original prototype Size 41 with high instep

Eyelet rib in the round: 
Round 1: (p1, k2tog, yo, k1 yo, ssk) 
Rounds 2-4: p1, k5 
Round 6: (k1, yo, ssk, p1, k2tog, yo) 
Rounds 7-8: k3, p1, k2

Cast on 84sts in tubular cast on in main colour.

Knit 1.5 inches in k1b, p1 rib

Work 9 repeats of eyelet rib pattern

Heel flap:
Join contrast yarn. Heel flap = 3 stitches garter stitch on either side, and work heel in Eye of Partridge until 22 ridges of garter stitch are done. (20 ridges for a regular height instep)

Turn heel from 8 centre stitches using k2tog and ssk joins on short rows.

Beginning of round – Work 43 stitches in eyelet rib starting with round 1. 
Gusset decreases – K2, K2tog, K to last 4 sts, ssk, k2. 
Continue decreases until 41sts remain on sole of foot.

Work instep in eyelet rib across top 43 stitches and stockinette across 41 sole stitches until 2.5 inches from picked up instep row

Work instep in eyelet rib, k2sts, work to last 2 sts in p1-k1 rib, k2.

Continue with instep in eyelet rib as established and sole in 1×1 rib for 2.5 inches.

Work instep in eyelet rib and sole in stockinette for 1.5 inches. Redistribute stitches so there are 42 instep and 42 sole stitches.

Change to contrast colour and work 2 rounds.

Work standard toe decreases until 16st remain (8 instep and 8 sole).

Graft toe stitches and weave in all ends.

End run

The last few stages of Tour de Fleece involved some spinning far from home. I had some matters to attend to, so I packed up my most expendable spindles and fibre and hit the road. I had a mixed bag of mystery (but probably merino) wool that I got from a guild give-away last year, picked up a simple clay spindle from work, and MacGyvered a support for it with a sauce tray from take-away sushi.

Spinning at the airport
Spinning on the airplane
Spinning at layover. For four hours.

Most of my spinning was done in flight, but I did do a bit more at the end of the road.

Once I had filled my spindle with as much as I felt like I could chain ply in an evening, I pulled out my heavier spindle and set it in motion

About as much single ply as I can manage
Chain plied

Plying completed 20:57 Sunday July 26

I gave it a bath in the hotel room sink to set the twist, but forgot to take a photo.

I have ended up with 13 grams of approximately 16 wraps per inch yarn.

It is yarn

While working with it, I thought it would be fun to try blending it with a solid black for a tortoiseshell effect. But that’s a project for Tour de Fleece Femmes.

Tour de Fleece stages 14-17

Most of my singles spinning on July 18-19 was done walking around Big on Bloor street party, and I didn’t take in-progress photos. I used stash Corriedale and my tiny lace spindle.

Still waiting to be plied

On July 21, I finished plying my Toronto yarn at my neighbourhood craft night. I didn’t make it out to Riverdale Farm due to severe weather alerts two Tuesdays in a row.

On July 22 I wound my Toronto yarn from the spindle to the niddy noddy at another craft night, but did pause at the baseball field where I had done so much fibre preparation.

Toronto yarn, almost done

In the end, I got 105g of surprisingly decent yarn. Based on the number of wraps of my niddy noddy, it’s a little under 200yd. I wonder if that’s enough for an Emotional Support Cobra Chicken…

Toronto Yarn

I also chain-plied the 27g of Corriedale from the weekend and tried a food colour dye job. It was just a quick, no-mordant cold splash, but it’ll do for a first try.

Food colour dye job on chain plied Corriedale

I’m going to be travelling for the end of Tour de Fleece, so I’ve got myself set up with a couple of spindles that I don’t mind losing to airport security, if it comes to that.

Tour de Fleece stages 10-13, Gotland edition

I spent July 13-17 working with some Gotland wool from my stash.

My initial attempts at chain plying, with varying degrees of success

I experimented with plying different weights of singles to get a textured yarn. I like the effect and will be doing more of it with various fibres from my stash.

Textured Gotland yarn

I made some more conventional yarn as well, some approximately worsted weight and some light fingering.

Fine Gotland yarn
More Gotland yarn

It’s nice wool, and I’ve got some more to work with after Tour de Fleece is over

Tour de Fleece 2026 July 7-12

I don’t know what stage we’re at, but I’ve been at a lot of Fringe Festival stages… OK I’ll see myself out.

Trying to spin at the Fringe Hub, but it’s too heckin’ windy
Spinning at Casa Loma

I didn’t expect to get all my Riverdale wool spun to singles already, but here we are.

Spinning at Trinity Bellwoods Park
Spinning at The Distillery Heart
Spinning at The Distillery Co-Exist sculpture
Spinning at The Distillery millstone
Spinning at Cherry Beach

I have also decided, based on the super-inconsistent quality of the fibre, that I will be plying it.

Starting to ply my Riverdale wool

My plying setup is more of a sit in one place job, so it did not travel with me on July 12. I’ll probably bring my plying basket to the textile drop-in at the farm, just for the sake of having it go full circle.

I brought some Gotland wool from my stash for spinning on the go July 12, but I didn’t take work in progress photos of it. It’s slippery and I needed to keep both hands on it so it wouldn’t fall apart. I might do better with it on a supported vs drop spindle. I’ll figure that out later. For now I have spun and plied 17 grams of dense, slippery wool.

Tour de Fleece 2026 Stages 1 and 2

My TdF spinning adventure begins…

One of the Cotswold sheep at Riverdale Farm. This may or may not be the actual sheep whose wool I am spinning.

Stage 1 July 4

Fringe Festival and Tour de Fleece, a perfect start to the weekend

Spinning on the transit, spinning and spinning in queue for shows

Spinning on the subway
Spinning on the bus

(The wrong bus, as it happens, and I had to run for a couple kilometres to get to my next show, and only made it thanks to a lenient latecomers policy)

Spinning on the streetcar
Spinning on the theatre patio at Factory Theatre
14 grams of one-ply Cotswold wool yarn

Stage 2, July 5

I didn’t take TTC photos but I did spin en route to Theatre Passe Muraille

Spinning at Graffiti Alley
Spinning and sidewalk koi
Spinning in Chinatown
Spinning by Kensington Market, featuring bad photo edit privacy screens
Spinning and the Kensington Market kitty cat pole (and more bad photo edit privacy screen)

By the end of the day, I had 23 more grams of my dodgy Cotswold wool spun into single ply yarn. I haven’t decided if I will ply it or keep it as singles.

July 6 was a rest day for the Tour de France racers, so my Tour de Fleece spinning also got the day off.

Because that’s how this game works.

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