Part 1: Old and New, Part 2: the Lanyard and the card stock marudai and Part 3: needle felting of the picture and the name
Many Years ago, Ann did a program at the OVWSG (local guild) on making your own felted name tag. She had taken a couple old blankets and fulled them (as you already know shrinking of woven or knit stuff is fulling, the term felting refers to coalescing fibres into a non-woven structure like fabric.) She cut paper of about the same size to work out our design (our name and something with it; flower, spindle, shuttle, etc.) She had felting needles to use with yarn to write our names and draw our picture. I hope we do this program again. it was quite a while ago and we have a lot of new members now.
My name tag is certainly showing its age. It’s usually in the bottom of one of my spinning baskets that I take to demos. It is now looking worn and it’s about time for it to be replaced.
Part 1 Old and New -the preparing of the tag
The original name tag was about 2 x 3 inches and used a pin to attach it to whatever I was wearing. Pins are not always appreciated by fabric so I wanted to upgrade my new one to a lanyard so I could just loop it over my head.
about 3 inches by 2 inches 2-3
I needed something sturdy and with enough stiffness not to bend when it was suspended. I picked a small, left-over cutting from my part of the unfortunately felted wool duvet that had been donated to the guild for dispersal amongst the felters who wanted it. ( I think I told you about that already). we carefully removed the outer cover to salvage the felted wool within.
-Carsonby Hall Felt in 2018 4-5
It was reasonably firm but not the colour I wanted as a base so I added a nice Prussian blue to even out the surface and fix the colour. I will cut it down to make it a bit more rectangular when I finalize the design.
I used the evil Metal Multi-tool that I got from the Woolery (Wow! That’s fast for laying in background!) if you are doing anything flat that you want to work quickly this may be the tool for you. I made fast work of the base for Sheep ears in a workshop with Wendo at Almonte Fiberfest.
Base done I went on to the lanyard
Check back, Part 2 the Lanyard