Felting-sort of.

I took a bunch of pictures as I was making my first crocheted-then-felted project, but somehow they aren't on my camera. In lieu of the photos, I'll give you the blow by blow.

I started out with Jo-Ann's Sensations Kashmira yarn, 100% wool. I needed to hold two strands together, but I hate working from either end of a skein, so I decided to make some center-pull balls. I did take pictures of this, but just use your imagination.

How to make a center pull yarn ball:
Take the tail end of your yarn, about 6 inches or so and make sort of a fist around it with the four fingers on your left hand so the tail hangs out the bottom near your pinkie and the other end is coming out the top above your index finger. You really just want to keep the tail end out of the way. Next take the "working end" of the yarn, the end that is coming out of your fist near the index finger and begin wrapping it around over the top of your thumb, keeping the wraps loose enough that you'll be able to get your thumb back out. You are also still holding the tail end in your "fist". Now just keep wrap, wrap, wrapping until you look like Little Jack Horner. You can pull your thumb out if you want, but just keep your thumb sort of in the hole, so you don't wrap over the hole where your tail is going to come out. Amazing!

Now that I had my two balls wound, I started off with a simple pattern for making a "stash bag". I just chained 13 with my H hook, did my first row of sc, sc into the "butts" of all base chain stitches and kept spiraling around until it was as long as I wanted. Then I chained like 12 or so to make the little loop and sl st to finish. I will add a button for the loop as soon as it is dry. Unfortunately there is now no picture of the bag pre-felting. Wahhhh....

Then I took it into the bathroom and filled the sink with hot soapy water (I used plain old dish soap) and rubbed rubbed rubbed until I could see the stitch definition getting fuzzier and the holes between my stitches had fused together. I didn't want total stitch definition annihilation, so I stopped there, but I can see how rad this would be with a washing machine.

Submitted for your approval:

Ok, now that I uploaded this picture, I'm a little disappointed. It looks pretty normal and un-felty. I swear the stitches were all big and open before and now they've closed up. Whatever. Don't believe me.

I was thinking about making these and taking them to the store down the street that sells glass "tobacco" pipes to see if they want to sell them so the potheads don't break their bowls. I mean, "tobacco heads". If I could sell them one for like 5 bucks and they could maybe sell it for 10 bucks, that would be sweet. I can make one in like an hour, so that's about what I'm used to getting paid.

Felted Friday

I apologize in advance if my posts have been "cat heavy" lately. However, I thought I'd post some pictures of a few needle felted "thingies" I've made recently, because Bubsy (the cat) tends to destroy all felted items quickly. At least this way I'll have a record of them.

Exhibit "A". You may remember a post showing a wet felted pineapple.

Here it is today:

Sucks, right? The piece didn't come out perfect, but it was the first felted thing I ever made, which made it special. While, I'm sure Bubsy did this, perhaps Penelope was trying to frame him. This next photo is Penelope while I was trying to photograph the damage.

Exhibit "B":

The felted pineapple thing above was on a high shelf, which Bubsy actually ripped off the wall to get to it. Sigh...wool is irresistible.

Because these following items will surely be destroyed soon, here they are now for your viewing pleasure. When I first learned how to needle felt, I made a little pineapple. A wee pineapple. It has since been eaten. The fruit thing became somewhat of an obsession for a while.

Here's a few:

This is them on a sewing machine table, so you can get a better idea of the size. (The table is dusty! Where's my house husband?!)

Finally here's a cat toy I made to discourage eating of my other felted stuff:

Giving this to the cats is probably just making me an enabler. Oh well.

Felt-tastic.

I love felting! I started with wet and dry felting over the summer and it reminds me of when I started weaving. It's a "where have you been all my life" feeling. This is going to sound weird, but I'm sure no one is reading this anyway, but I freaking love the wool roving. I want to eat it or roll around on it. It is so beautiful, the colors available are lovely and the way you can transform wool roving into "stuff" is amazing! Whether it's wet or dry felting, it's awesome how quickly the wool dreads together to make material or sculptural forms. This is a photo of the sampler pack from Peace Fleece. If you look closely, you can see that the colors aren't solid, but heathered with all kinds of beautiful colored nubbies. Ancient Fern is my favorite, favorite, favorite. Brown with purple and greens mixed throughout! Nice.