Monday 28 March 2011

Q~ What did I get upto last week...?

A~ Lots of felting!

I had a week with no work interuptions - so I felted my days away very happily.  Im not going to bombard you with photos of everything in this one post.. I'm planning to trickle them out over the next few days :)

My first projects of the week were critters!  I felted a 2nd moongazing hare doorstopper... she was made on Monday.  The lady who first suggested penguins to me, after seeing my penguin doorstop post she requested a mommy penguin doorstop and cuddly baby penguin - as a gift for her daughter. And so, the penguin family grew.. 

I actually remembered to take a couple of photos as I went along this time!  So heres a bit about how I made them :)

Covering the penguin shaped resist with merino fibre
I put a layer of dark charcoal merino down for the first layer of the body, then a nice soft grey for the next 2 layers.. the way the charcoal mottles through the grey looks like baby is starting to get his adult feathers..
Thin plastic stops the flipper felting right into the body
I fulled the felt till it wouldn't go anymore, after rinsing & pushing/pulling it into shape the penguin dries on top of a radiator. 

Once dry he was stuffed.  I sewed a sort of teardrop shaped pouch from this lovely blue wave-like cotton, with wadding in the middle.  Some rice on the inner-body side for weight, then handstitched in place.. et voila - complète!


I now have a whole family of penguins :)  Mom, dad & baby...


Mom, dad are both doorstops & baby is a cuddly with a beany bum for stability

The baby is so soft and snuggly; he is well felted from merino.  You cant see too well in the photo but he has that nice pebbly texture.
Momma is felted from the same fibres as daddy penguin & has the same feathery texture from the Norwegian fibres coming through the merino.

Next post.. new bag design & a great new book!
xx






6 comments:

Kelly said...

I am in love with these sculptural pieces you have been making! I cannot wait to see the rest of what has been keeping you busy!!

Heather Woollove said...

So sweet...I love how the baby and Mama fit together like that!!

Tracy Markey said...

wow! these are just delightful :) looking forward to seeing more pics.

Anonymous said...

oh my word! what a wonderful collection :)
hope I get to see them next week! can't wait for your next post either, Deborah! Glad to see you've been enjoying yourself xXx

FeltersJourney said...

Oh thank you!! What lovely comments :)

This weeks is getting frantically busy.. and not much time for felting :(
xx

An Aussie Felter said...

Oooh, they're gorgeous!