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Interesting New to Me Scarf Type

Interesting New to Me Scarf Type

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These last couple of weeks in the Wet Felt Makers group on Facebook people have been making in interesting and new to me type of scarf. It’s called a french scarf.

Arlene Toth shared it with the group and shared the youtube video.  It is part of a video from a fibre festival a year ago. The teacher is Elena Nayemova. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ho5B-bOHKwE The instructions start at 28:58 in the video. It is in Rusian. You can probably figure it out by just watching her make it but If you want to and you are on a computer not using the Youtube app you can use a translation future on Youtube. It’s nowhere near perfect but it helps. I will explain that at the bottom.

The scarf in the video is very lacy and mostly yarn, very decorative. I wanted something warmer so used much more wool. After seeing how small the ones using the dimensions from the video were turning out  I sorted out my own sizing that I thought would work and had a go. If you are petite then the smaller dimensions would probably work for you but I am Rubenesque so that isn’t going to work for me. I picked purple and orange, my go-to colours. I used orange and gold silk lap bits on one side and some yarns for decoration on the other.

You can wear it in different ways.

 

The part that goes behind the neck is a bit short I think and maybe the rectangular part too. I added some to both parts and had another go in red this time, using silk hankies and silk top

 

For this one, I used silk hankies on one side and silk top on the other. I like this one better. I pulled the piece through farther so it hangs down to wear it out. I am not much for big bows. If you want to fold it into a triangle and poke the corner though I wouldn’t add the extra length to the rectangle part. Here are different ways to wear it

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The other thing I realized while taking pictures is that you can give the large piece a twist in the loop so you have both sides showing

 I wanted a winter scarf inside my coat. It worked wonderfully even though it’s not really cold here yet. I hope you give it a try.

Translation on Youtube.  You have to be watching Youtube in a browser and not on the app for this to work. Rather than write it all out, I will give you the link to Pat Spark’s blog post about it, as she explained it very well. https://sparkfiberarts.blogspot.com/2020/05/blog-post.html

More Scarves

More Scarves

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I made a short, wide scarf/wrap similar to the white scarf I showed last time, using natural cotton scrim and 18.5 mic Merino:

It’s about 3 times as wide as the scarf, and I didn’t scrunch the scrim first:

I used 3 different cellulose fibres for embellishing this: Viscose, Rose and Tencel, this is the Viscose:

I made a few scarves for the craft fair this last weekend, the weather was predicted to be sub-zero, so I thought I’d get lucky. But this is Manchester, we all have a scarf collection and everyone had come prepared, mostly with ‘scarves’ which wouldn’t look out of place on a double bed!! This is a bright, colourful one I made, I always prefer the side where the wispy ends of the wool tops overlap (or underlap since they’re laid first) the next colour:

This is the other side where the colours are in blocks:

An ‘arty’ shot to shop how soft it is 🙂

Scarves

Scarves

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Just before the end of last year, I made a few scarves that I didn’t get chance to post about. The first one was a present for my sister’s birthday. I took the inspiration for the colours from a previous scarf I made, which was blue and purple. I blended up equal amounts of blue, purple and green 18.5 mic Merino on my drum carder. I can’t remember now how many times I put the batts through, I think it was only once because I wanted random variegation. This is the back of the scarf:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAI added some silk top to the front:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAAnd I just like the way this photo looks 🙂

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAI used what was left of the batts and added some more blue, purple and green, with a lot more green so I could make a scarf for my dad. You might remember the batt. I used some to make a nuno sample (which is now my nuno collar which I wear when I go out, though it looks more like a foppish cravat!) When I weighed it, there wasn’t enough for a scarf, so I had to blend up some more Merino. Even though I only needed about 10 grams to be on the safe side, I had to recreate the stages of the other one to get a similar blend. I think it’s my favourite one so far:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAHere’s a close up

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAOne thing I noticed while carding the batts, was that the more the wool/batts were carded, or re-carded, the more I got soft little nepps appearing. I did pick a few out, but it wasn’t easy so I left them, hoping they wouldn’t be a problem since they were so soft. It might be my imagination because I certainly can’t feel them, but there definitely seems to be more texture on this scarf. I think the light here caught it just right:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAI liked the way this photos looks too, I’d just casually dropped the scarf on the table and it folded like this:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Batts, a Rainbow and a Scarf

Batts, a Rainbow and a Scarf

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Firstly, I’d just like to say thanks to everyone who took the time to comment and offer their suggestions on my last post, they were all really appreciated and have given me lots of ideas for the future.  After a lot of thought about Social Media, especially after Leonor‘s comment and advice, I caved in and made a Facebook page   https://www.facebook.com/pages/Felt-by-Zed/867287306648868  There’s nothing there yet, I’m still trying to work out how to follow people etc, so if you have any tips, helpful hints etc, they are very welcome. Also, what’s the ‘etiquette’ on groups, can you just ‘join’ ones you like, or follow or whatever it is, or should you be invited?

I wanted something soothing and relaxing which didn’t require much looking after doing lots of sewing, so I thought I’d make some batts. I made them all a bit different, some with just different shades of Merino and some matching fibres, some had a lot of texturey wools blended in and I made a couple with lots of different fibres , shades and textures.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAI also made some single colour textured batts to use on rainbow pieces, these didn’t photograph very well because there wasn’t much colour difference and it’s been really dark here the last couple of days. I did use them on this piece though, I’m going to add a little more green to where the yellow blends into the green, I don’t think the band is quite so defined in real life, but it does look like it needs more green on this photo.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAI finally got around to making a scarf yesterday. It took all week to ‘prepare’ for it as I had to do it on the hall floor, so cleaning the hall floor, working out shrinkage, drawing out the template, etc. When I did get around to it, I was regretting it an hour in. 2 hours in I was regretting ordering 4 more packs of 18mic Merino last week thinking I’d get into scarves for a bit. 3 hours in I just wanted to curl up on the pillow I was using for my knees and have a nap. Today, every time I look over at my scarf and think ‘Ooh, it was worth it though’ every muscle in my body disagrees 🙂  I do like it though. I couldn’t get a very good photo, I’m afraid. Like I said, it’s really dark here, and the blue and purple are quite dark, and my camera seemed dazzled by the shininess of the silk. So, this will have to do for now:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAI started with a template 25 cm wide and 200cm long (roughly 10 x 79 inches). I did alternate sections of purple and blue for the first layer, then the opposite colours on top for the second layer. I then added some matching colours of silk to the top, then contrasting colours:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAIt finished up being  19 x 176cm or 7.5 x 69 inches.

More Dryer Felt and Easter Eggs

More Dryer Felt and Easter Eggs

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As you know I wasn’t very happy with the dryer felt I did last week but I thought I would try some nunofelt. This went much better. I made this piece called snowy night.

Snowy Night

I used fine merino on a silk chiffon. It was inspired by the snow falling outside my window the other night. I had tried this before without being all that happy. I use plastic top and bottom as recommended but didn’t like it. I went back to using my sheer curtains. I did rub it on the back for about 5 min. There wasn’t a lot of wool on this one. I rolled it up around a damp towel an then wrapped another one around it , tied it up and tossed it in the dryer with no heat for 20 min. when I rook it out is was attached somewhat to the sheer. When I roll by hand this happens too. I carefully peeled it off . I though it was done really well and ready to full. For some reason I though I would roll it up the other way and give it more time in the dryer to be sure. I  opened the dryer to find everything had come undone and was in a pile. When I untangled everything I found the scarf was completely fulled and very close to dry. I need ironing but I havn’t done that yet.

Felt Easter Eggs

I made these Easter eggs the other night. I will be teaching an Easter egg class at Just knitting in Carleton Place, Ontario. If your close why not join in.

The Mobius Twist

The Mobius Twist

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When Zed first told us the theme of the challenge, twist, the first thing I thought of was making a Möbius scarf. I have seen lots of these types of scarves that have been knitted but hadn’t seen any that were felted. So I thought I’d give it a try.

mobiusscarf

This is the result, a scarf with a twist. I was supposed to leave the ends dry when I was making it so I could connect them but I somehow forgot about that when I was wetting the wool down. So I ended up using my handy sander to felt the inner portions of the scarf and leaving the connecting ends alone. Once most of the scarf passed the pinch test, I connected the two ends with a half twist in the scarf and felted the two ends together. I used Merino wool and have left the scarf its natural color.

mobiusscarf3

The scarf can be worn so that the top twist covers your head or it can be doubled around your neck. It is nice and warm and I’ve been wearing it with my black coat. So the scarf with a twist is a success. Have you been felting with a twist? We’d love to see what you’ve done. Just go to our Flickr group and post your twist challenge projects there.