I'm Baaaaack!

YAY!  I have a computer that wants to play nice with me :)  It has a nice new hard-drive so hopefully should be fine now (really, really hope so!)

Last week was veeery strange, I got lots of felting done :) but it was very odd being offline for so long.  Time to catchup now and I've got LOADs to tell you about.

The Woolgatherers had our third meeting - a truly lovely morning. I shall be posting seperately about our challanges later in the week; I have 2 to tell you about - #1 tiny frames, #2 vintage buttons & beads. I shall also post seperately about the gorgeous bunnies the girls made for Operation Bunny Drop.

I had a wonderful and touching suprise... Suzie Q presented me with this beautiful little seamless bag that she made for me - as a thank you for starting the Woolgatherers. I cant express how lovely this is.. Sue is quite a new felter and she has done a stunning job with this - she's so sweet and generous. I put my make-up and perfume in there & took it away this weekend to Dorset.

My favourite colour combo :)

Love this lining!

I didnt even spot this detail straight away!  So sweet

Sue had a good hour or so of baby-cuddling - Clare brought Evie along with her.  Brenda has booked baby for next time lol.

 

What else has been happening...?

Well, I still owe you pictures of the orange bag (not to mention the nuno shawls from February; note to self - photograph them!!).  This bag is a little smaller than the red & blue one, but still roomy

Seamless bag with internal pocket. Icelandic wool.
Hard colours to photograph!

I had a request from a lady who has one of my Moongazing Hare doorstops, for a mate!  The family feel that their Moongazing Mama Hare is lonely and needs a Papa Hare to keep her company - which I think is adorable. 

Papa Hare dallying with my Moongazing Hare
... shhh dont tell Mama Hare

He is bigger, heavier and likes to stand in the shadows more than Mama, so he has more dark bits on him (for shadow).  He has big masculine ears- he often flings one across his shoulder to hang jauntily down near its fellow. 

I have done some spinning!  I need to spin a stash of funky yarns to add to my felt.  I've moved my spinning wheel downstairs with the intention of spinning a small skein whenever I get chance.  So far Ive only done 2 skeins in the same fibres (1st one wasnt bumpy enough!) but its a start..

At Wonderwool, I was very interested to see Alison of Pure Tinctoria demonstrating an all-in-one method of dyeing useing her natural dye extracts, alum & creme-of-tarter.  I just happened to have some at home - I havent used them much; taking the time to wet fibres out properly (24hours!) then mordant them THEN finally dye them is just too much for my limited patience.  But this sounded much more do-able.  The colours are aparently less strong than when mordanting & dyeing seperately, but look what I got from my first dye pot..

Dyed with Pure Tinctoria - Purple Lac dye extract

I had a bit of everything in this pot :) BFL locks, Norwegian top, tussah silk top, throwsters waste silk, silk caps and silk fabric.  I was thrilled to bits with this lot & shall be experimenting with other dyes soon.

I have also done lots of carding.  Paul at Classic Carders asked me to try out his new style jumbo carder compared to the one I already have (you may remember I brought his very first Jumbo carder). My original works well - but this one is wonderful! It cards beautifully, and Paul has developed a very user friendly slicker brush attachment - that I really like.  I forgot to take pics of the batts before I started felting with them - but heres the carders



Classic Carders - gorgeous solid wood & so well made

Paul & Mandy also asked me to send some of the shawls I've felted from batts made on their carders to brighten up their stall at Woolfest in June - which is wonderful for me!  The shawls will be for sale, though I dont think they will want to part with them until the end of the show - I can always post them on later if someone cant wait around till then.  Must admit I feel really quite honoured to be asked.  So if you are at Woolfest & see shawls displayed on the Classic Carders stand - they're mine :)

And thats probably about it really.. I felted 2 shawls & 2 scarves last week which I am yet to photograph - I'm about to make the pins to go with the shawls - I shall photograph all together.  And I made my piece for the Woolgatherers next challenge, which Brenda set - FLOWERS. 

Well, I'm off to find some food

xx