Tour De Fleece 2025 – Week 3 Final Wrap-up

And that’s a wrap on another year of Tour de Fleece! I was going to start by reflecting on how the challenge has flown by, but looking back at last year’s post I think that’s a recurring theme! I try to pack a lot into TDF, so my challenge often feels quite fast paced, which is at odds since spinning is slow and mindful. It also means that it’s not until the final wrap-up that I slow down and see what I’ve managed to achieve; so if you’re also wondering where July has gone, I strongly encourage you to gather together everything you’ve spun during TDF, take a picture, measure it, compare with any initial to-do lists and give yourself a moment to properly take it in.

But before I get carried away reflecting on the whole challenge, I should first address week 3. I had to switch from the Black Welsh Mountain as the rain stopped me from combing outside and the fleece is too dusty to process indoors, but it did give me the opportunity to experiment with mint & ramie fibres. Halfway through spinning cotton on my wheel I decided to card it (my carders are only 72tpi so I wasn’t sure it would work, but it did make drafting easier), so the mint fibre roving replaced the cotton as my portable project. I also completed my final Tuesday Challenge, which was perhaps the trickiest – spinning with my hands behind my back (the full attempt is in the video below)

Final Reflections

This year I spun for 5.62km (that’s the length x3 to account for any plying) which is the longest total yarn distance I’ve managed during a TDF, and I’ve kept on top of my daily and weekly posting. I’ve also made weekly videos which has been a learning curve and probably contributed to how quickly my challenge passed as I’ve spent a lot of time editing too. The videos are a little different to the project videos I’ve made previously, so do let me know if you’ve enjoyed them or not and feel free to leave any suggestions for the future. I wrote a to-do list out at the start of the challenge, so let’s see how I did:

• Castlemilk Moorit – For the first time in a TDF I carded, spun & plied a whole fleece! Castlemilk Moorit are one of the smaller sheep breeds and their fleece has a very short staple, but this one has been waiting to be processed for a long time, so it’s satisfying to see it finished. I can now write up the spinning post for it and think on the final project (which might differ from what I planned now it’s spun).
• Black Welsh Mountain – I’ve made a start on this one – I’ve probably combed through about 1/4 of the fleece (but spun less since there’s a lot of combing waste ready to be carded up later). This one has been fun to work with and I have exciting projects lined up for both the yarn and combing waste, so this should give me motivation to continue gradually working on it over the coming months.
• Cotton – My first attempts at cotton spinning went well considering the fibres were purchased secondhand and probably meant for blending, coupled with the fact that my carders aren’t the right size for fine fibres. I swapped from the spindle to the wheel to give me a bit more control as I had both hands free to manage the twist and reduce slubs (but I love cotton fabrics that show imperfections in the weave, so it worked out quite well!).
• Challenges – I completed three Tuesday Challenges and don’t think any were a total failure, and hopefully they’ve helped improve my spindle control.
• Things not on my list – I also managed to spindle spin some mint fibre I had been ‘commissioned’ to turn into embroidery thread and experiment with a 50g sample of ramie fibre I’d forgotten was in my stash. I have some other plant fibres from last year’s TDF which I’m planning to turn into a project, so the ramie may be able to join them.

Thank you to everyone who has followed along with my challenge this year – my next task will be thinking up some projects to use all the spun yarn! I’m currently knitting a jumper in gorgeous Zwartbles which I’m hoping will be ready to share in the next few months and also have some plans for upgrading my suint bath set-up, so stay tuned for future blog posts (albeit more sporadically!). If you’ve completed TDF this year, do let me know how your ‘wrap-up’ has gone in the comments below!

Happy Spinning!