Mother and Daughter Felting Fun :)

As you know my baby turned 14 a couple of weeks ago.  The weekend before Rachaels birthday the boys were busy working at Garys moms house, so we had a girlie weekend... perfect for a biggish felting project.

Rachael designed her slippers.. unfortunately we got the drawing wet so I can't show you.. but this is how the weekend went..

After drawing round her feet & cutting them out we worked out the slipper shape
adding 1" to each side and  1.5" at toe & heel, and cut a template from newspaper

We cut the resists from foam floor underlay.. and drew the inner design onto the template to
make it easier for Rachael to lay out.  They were going to be GOLDFISH

From this point on Rachael worked on the slippers pretty much on her own with just the occasional helping hand to show her how to work it.  I have a lovely big work table.. Rachael worked at one end and I worked at the other.

Rachael put sari silk fibre on the goldfish for scales, outined in red merino.
We put silk chiffon on TOP of the blue areas to stop it disappearing into  the orange layers which followed

Orange for goldfish :)

Now... as we planned to mad flat bottomed, slip on slippers.. We planned to make the cuts and remove the resists and then turn the heel part 'inside out'  the tricky part was getting the tails on the right side!

We used 6 layers of Icelandic wool, the inner 2 layers were a pretty yellow.
Rachael made fins from silk chiffon sari fabric

Unfortunately, momma got muddled and the fish tails ended up on the wrong side - oops.  So to rescue them we cut around the outside of the heels, placed the fish-tails on top and stitched them with merino wool yarn.

Rachael working hard

After working and shaping you cant really tell that we sewed the seam.

Rachael spent about 5 hours straight on both the Saturday and Sunday working on these.. I don't think she could quite believe how much she needed to work them to shrink 'em down enough & shape 'em :)  she kept asking "is it done yet?" answer "no, another 100 rolls" - thank goodness she enjoyed every minute, and she certainly appreciates her felted slippers now she knows how much work they are.

I finished them off for her while she was at school by defining the lips with a few stitches.. sewing button eyes on (just normal buttons stacked so they look nice and boggley) and sewing some dusky orange leather soles on. 

And the good news is.. she is actually wearing them!

A week of highs and lows.. and a little bit of felt

What a week!  Started off on a high preparing for Rachael's birthday, which went really well, she had a lovely time.  She just had a few friends around for a pizza party after school.. it was lovely listening to them all chattering away and having fun :)  Rachael always makes so much effort to make other peoples 'special' days extra special.. it was nice to spoil her a little.  Unfortunately the pressie I was most excited to give her didn't arrive in time, it got snarled up in customs :(  but I have today collected it from the sorting office and can't wait to see her open it tonight.  I shall show and tell soon.

So.. that was the high.  The low was my mom having a small stroke.  She is doing ok and seems to be in good spirit, still in hospital at the moment.  So between visiting, checking on dad and making sure he is ok & eating properly things have been a little fraught.

I did manage to get a little bit of felting done in between everything else that was going on..  On Monday I made a hat to give to my mum-in-law for Christmas.  I've crocheted her hats in the past but this is the first felt one I have made for her.. Thought I'd have a go at something a little more formal, but fun.

Think I need to use the steam iron on the peek to straighten it out a little

It has a slight peek at the front and rolled brim at the back

It was like making a short witches hat really.. just folded in on itself at the end to form the spiral.  

I needed a light hearted 'fun' project to work on when I had chance toward the end of the week.  SO I felted a cauldron for halloween..

Couldn't resist a Harry Potter reference :)  I needlefelted;
Pewter - Standard Size 2 on the back..
from the Hogwarts equipment list in the first book

And on the front..

What else but a slimy green tentacle gripping an eyeball!?  :D

I used purple glass seed beads for the suckers.
I already had the  felted eyeball bead.. can't for the life of me remember why, but  it was just what I needed

A cauldron full of 'green goo' with a tentacled something swimmin round in it :)

And now I have a stinking cold and have to keep away from my parents so I don't add to their problems by giving them germs :(  I don't feel energetic enough for felting so think I will do a bit on the computer then go cover some shoe boxes.  I like to post my felted slippers /boots out in recycled shoe boxes.. which I cover with paper torn from old damaged books and magazines (only interesting, pretty paper of course) .  They make nice gift boxes... I can have a quiet few hours glueing collages over my bare boxes, it'll be a job I don't have to do another day.

xx

Where to begin..

When faced with a BIG box of pretty new fibres to play with :D   I actually felt spoiled for choice, so decided to work on just a couple of colour combos at a time..

Orange and pink - with a little purple silk..

Gold silk caps stretched over the resist before laying
down the  merino makes it pretty inside  :)

 And mallard green with black and again purple silk ..

Palm side

Outer side

 And a larger than normal Tree of Life bag

More on this one soon

Which I have yet to finish!  

The weekend and week so far have been super busy.. Its Rachael's 14th birthday tomorrow (Wednesday) so at the weekend we embarked on a mother & daughter project.. a new pair of slippers for Rachael, it went really well - I took lots of pics and will be blogging later in the week.  Now I'm doing all the momsy stuff that goes with an upcoming birthday.. plus I need to get the leather soles cut and sewn on for her by tomorrow ... while fitting in as much felting as I can.  Have to say I'm thoroughly enjoying all of the excitement.. but I can NOT believe that my baby girl is 14!  It feels like just 5 minutes since I was 14.. 24 years ago.. now thats scary!

Right.. I'm off to work on a pair of slippers then decorate a cake..

xx

Ruffled Scarf take 2.. and the rest of the week :)

Last week was another nicely busy and productive week for me..  I had bash at my 'raspberry ruffle' scarf again... I'm much happier with this one :)

 I do love these colours..  photos a little dark though, a sure sign of approaching winter - poor light for taking photos!

A much calmer coloured nuno wrap.. this piece of crinkle silk chiffon is lovely, a duck egg, blue, cream and red pattern.. I must figure out something to make for myself with the rest of this, maybe a tunic or a skirt..

Nuno felted with these colours it actually reminds me of patterned denim to look at.. I suppose its the 'washed' effect of the wool fibres over the silk.

And more slippers..

This colour combo is proving popular!
Another commission, no probs with shrinkage rates this time thank goodness

Icelandic fibre in natural dark and mid browns..
Burgundy leather soles and a little red in the toggle cords and
blanket stitched edges to brighten them up :)

What else has been going on..?  Well, I got a nice big box full of fibrey loveliness..

10 kilos of it for me to have fun with :)

And I took Matthew to the cinema to see the new Resident Evil film - he was desperate to go during the opening weekend and had nobody to go with, so I went with him yesterday (bonus for me; Gary cooked dinner!  Which was very nice.. I go to the cinema and come home to a lovely meal :)  I have to say though.. its the first and the LAST film I plan on watching in 3D.. it felt like I couldn't see it very well.  

Well thats pretty much my week :)

A bit Ruffled..

This week 3 out of 4 projects had RUFFLES!  I'm not usually into frills or fanciness so not sure where it came from really... maybe the feeling of autumn in the air.

It all started with this scarf..

Thinking of autumn leaves..
Asymmetric - one wide leaf-like end and three lovely long tendrils all with ruffled edges :)

My Truffle Ruffle scarf
I used lots of cream and black tussah silk and gold mulberry silk.
One side is darker, the other brighter

Raspberry Ruffle #1
Not 100% happy with this one.. planning to try again this week

Raspberry Ruffle Beret

I really enjoyed making this hat!  Using colours that I LOVE and experimenting.  I'd been picturing this hat and knew just how I wanted it to be..  I used everything I learned from the ruffle cushions I made last year

Using newspaper to work out the size and shape of the ruffle resists I would need,
and using the newspaper cut-outs as templates to transfer onto painters plastic sheeting

Remembering to number the templates, so I use them in the right order :)

My main hat resist is a circle of foam underlay 48cm (19") diameter.  For wetting out I use COOL soapy water in this, I want it to go slowly.

After laying out 2 perpendicular layers of fibre to encase the resist..
and adding final surface design 

The first resist goes down

2 layers of fibre are applied to the resist.. merino and silk in both layers.
The fibres come past resist by an inch or so onto the hat
BOTH layers running in the same direction

 Having both layer running in the same direction means there will be more elasticity in the felt, allowing me to stretch and manipulate it into a ruffle.

AFter wetting the first ruffle, the second resist is inset about a half an inch from the first resist
and the fibres are applied in the same way.

Wetted thoroughly (still with cool water) and covered in painters plastic

 I spent about an hour gently rubbing this, concentrating especially on the ruffles.  After an hour I gave it a  hundred rolls in each direction, sandwiched in bubblewrap. 

Cut a hole for the opening and sealed it with soapy fingers

 I used a cellulose sponge to remove as much water as possible at this point, then wetted it thoroughly with very warm soapy water and continued rolling, stretching and working it as usual.. stopping regularly to stretch and shape the ruffle, gently at first so as not to damage it.

This needed to felt down a lot (it was the size of a dustbin lid to begin with :)  For final shrinkage I took it out of the bubble wrap and rolled it in a damp towel, throwing and pummelling it a little too.

After rinsing, spinning and pulling back into shape I dried it on a hat block overnight

September.. getting back to 'normal'

The children have been back at school for just over a week now.. and things are slowly getting back to normal.  I'm still struggling to figure out how I fit in everything before the holidays.. there really just are NOT enough hours in the day!

After a few weeks without making any felt (yes I was getting very twitchy!) I think I went a little felt-mad!  There has been a flurry of scarf, bag, purse, hat and boot making .. with a fun picture panel thrown in too.  Here's a quick catch-up  :)

Turquoise & Chocolate brown Icelandic wool with navy leather soles

A little while back I thought that I had found a solution to save having to wear my hats for photos (I'm quite self concious).. A nice canvas head shaped hat / wig block found on ebay.  Unfortunately I had a 'mad one' when placing a last minute bid and bid on the wrong one!  I brought a mans sized block for ladies hats DUH.  Thats likely to be going back on ebay.  So I'm stuck having to photograph them on me head

Nice rich autumn colours.. won't be long till the leaves are these colours

This one was inspired by one of my lovely ceramic
buttons handmade by Sharry at Buttonalia

The next bag was inspired by a piece of driftwood brought back from Cornwall last summer.. it was a piece of bark which had been bleached by the sea and sun, lots of barky texture but smooth and lovely, cracks where it had dried out and tiny old barnacles in and around the cracks.  I used BFL in white and oatmeal for the body of the bag, with linen fibre, boucle yarn and tussah fibre for the lines and cracks.. and wool nepps for the barnacles.  Its fully lined with a remnant of wool-blend fabric that I've had for quite a few years now (left over from kids Dark-Age clothing sewn for a local museum :) I stitched the handle and fastener loop from the same material.

Lovely chunky ceramic button handmade in Scotland by Julia Smith
in perfect sea colours.. been hanging onto this waiting for the 'right' project

Nuno scarf in blue, green and orange

Burnout silk chiffon and satin fabric -
quite a lot of work needed to get the fibres to work through the satin pattern areas

And apart from all of this I have been totally engrossed in my new book!  Second Skin by India Flint.

India Flint actually commented on my last post, the one about my eco print shawl, pointing me toward her blog and this book.  Within a week I had my copy from Amazon :)  and I am thoroughly enjoying it.  I don't get time to sit and read for long, but I'm taking every opportunity to pick this up and read another page or two.  Its full of useful and interesting tips and info on so many aspects of clothing textiles, with lots of lovely anecdotes from the authors life, family and travels.  The photography is enough to get me drooling!  Very, very inspirational.

I havent actually read the section on eco printing yet, its toward the end of the book and I'm only about a third through.  The fact that I haven't read it yet shows how spellbinding it is.. usually I'd read the relavent section first :)  (I'm a bugger with books.. I excitedly flick through from front to back having a quick look.. then hungrily from back to front stopping and reading the bits that catch my eye.. THEN I start reading properly from the front).  I think I will be adding India's other eco dye book to my collection at some point too.. her ethos is right up my street!