Week 1 – A Dye Job
The Tour de France 2018 – July 7 to July 29
You may or may not know that the tour de fleece is usually the only time I spin wool during the year. During that time, it’s usually hazy, hot, humid, and my evil little spinning chair is just as ornery as ever. Funny how I almost never spin in winter when the wool/fiber would keep me warm, it’s totally illogical.
This year my goal is to dye, comb and spin a bag of Romney fiber from Anchorage Farm that’s been in my basement for at least a couple of years. The plan to clear out the basement turned into the plan to wash the fleece. It took weeks!
Here’s how the whole thing started (at the NY Sheep & Wool Festival circa ?):
I was so impressed with the crimp. It never entered my mind how much fiber was in the bag, or how much upper body strength it would take to comb it. All I saw (back then) was a mountain of rich, creamy, crimpy white fiber and hours of spinning joy.
I was also impressed with the staple length, why, I’d never seen fiber like that before (considering that I usually stick to Shetland and Merino, oh, and already prepared top):
And then things went south when I washed it and saw that all of the fiber had a yellow stain dead center of each lock and some golden yellow in parts. And let me tell you, washing it was no particular joy. It took forever! In fact, it took so long to wash that each batch of fiber went from “really clean” to “mostly clean” to ‘good enough clean’. Yeah, I embarrass myself with my lowered standards:
Anyway, that big bag of fleece had to be dealt with (washed), and out of my basement, so onward I trudged. Sometimes weeks would go by and I wouldn’t touch it. To stay on track, I decided to make it tour de fleece goal (23 days and done) or it was going to sit around forever.
Days 1-6 and I managed to dye some of the fiber, but not nearly enough to call this week a success – yet. Turns out I have to dye fiber on the weekends to make a dent – thanks to my work week stupid commute which wastes my time every weekday.
This is what I got done, so far:
OK, maybe you’re not impressed, but I am! Why, if I was retired I would dye fiber all day long! Oh wait, I was retired and I didn’t dye a darned thing. Rewind …
This is just week one, I can dye what I want, use my new drum carder to blend it all together (week 2) and start spinning (week 3).
Think I’ll get it done? You can watch my progress over here.
Moms With Yarn 