The second quarter is almost done and I finally have one of my planned pieces done. It is the simpler of the two but I  know I will not get the more complicated one done. This one was done like a line drawing with just a few bits of colour. It didn’t turn out as nice as I would have liked.

I make myself a piece of prefelt. Prefelt is just barely felted wool. You stop the process when everything is just holding together. I used Briggs and Little country roving. It comes as 5 strands of very thin roving ready to be put through a spinning machine. The only colour I had was red. It bleeds. I thought it might give the piece an interesting look. Here is the first strand on the prefelt.

Next I drew the picture and added some coloured felt from my left overs bin. Before cutting out the shapes and placing it, I brushed the back side with a dog brush to make it fuzzy.

I covered it with netting and rolled it up in a straw mat and rolled in all directions. I didn’t do any heavy fulling to shrink it because it does not need to be really strong.

I did start my second piece. I made the felt for the base. I used some cotton gauze for strength so I wouldn’t have to use much wool. I plan to cover the whole base with more wool  in several layers using my embellisher so wanted to start out fairly thin.

While we are talking a little about technique people ask me why I use a star burst Tupperware lit to do my rubbing. I do it because when I rub directly on the sheer no mater how lightly I rub the I pull would right through the sheer and out. I’ve found about 1/3 of the people who come for classes have the same problem. I don’t know if our hands are just to rough or what.  Here are 2 pictures of what happens.

And lastly my excuse. Besides waiting to long to start I have been getting ready to sell at our local medieval fair. One of the things that has taken time is my costume. Here is the under dress drying on the line after tea dying so it is not bright white.  There is a lot of material in it and I haven’t hemmed it yet. I have a little over a week to go and I have to make the top dress yet. I have a busy week ahead.