Entry by Cindy M.

I was delighted to see the 2nd Quarter Challenge – it is perfect for the piece I just made -a close up of Saguaro ribs. I have been admiring the light and shadows on the ribs on the saguaros in my backyard. I made a few small saguaro felt sculptures trying some different techniques to get some textures. I then had an idea to make a close up of the ribs -thinking that the Shibori process would work for image I was seeing. I made a piece of prefelt with layers of colors, then stitched with running stitches to make the “ribs” and between the ribs for design purposes. I then continued to felt and full the project by hand. I cut small snippets out of the top of the “ribs” to unearth/see the colors underneath. Felted a little more to heal the cuts. I am very happy with the final piece – shown here on a piece of felt and wood frame. I enjoy working with fiber every day and find it amazingly wonderful all the ways you can work with it! Hope you enjoy! cindy 🙂

 

Entry by Marie E.S.

Needle felt and stitch attempt to recreate the moss-covered stone in my garden, for the 2nd quarter challenge.

 

 

Melissa O

For my 2nd quarter challenge, I took a photo of chipped paint on the side of a building and then created a large (about 4ft long) multilayer design with nuno felt at the back followed by a layer of joomchi paper rods, free motion embroidered cheesecloth and finally more joomchi paper on top. I decided it needed to be a wall hanging and added a series of felt ropes as my interpretation of macramé. When I hung it on the wall, a completely different image emerged – I thought it looked like a dress! I added another series of ropes as a “belt” and am calling this one done. Having seen some of the dresses at the Met Gala this week, I think this would have fit right in. 🙂

Capi’s 2nd Quarter challenge entry

To read more about Capi’s challenge piece, click on this link.

 

Donna B’s 2nd Quarter challenge entry

Here is my submission for the 2nd Quarter Challenge! I loved the inspirational photos provided and attempted to incorporate many of the images into this single piece. It was great experience for me to try to replicate the peeling paint, the bird’s wing, the sedum? plants, the lichen growth on the brickwork. I used mostly merino wool as well as some silk fibres using a combination of wet and needle felting techniques. I would appreciate any comments that could help me increase my skill level as I am still learning (and probably always will be).

Ann B’s 3rd Quarter Challenge Entry

These are 3 felted flowers and 1 sprig of oak with acorns which are attached to stab pins for attaching to matching scarves.

 

Ann B sent another excellent submission for the 3rd quarter challenge.  Ivey on a stone wall

This is modern stump work ivy on a needle felted stone wall. The wall is my first step into using mixed media with felting. The stones of the wall, after shaping with felting needles, were painted with artist’s gesso and then, when it was dry, painted with acrylic paint. Then the “Lichens” were added with needle and thread. Something I completed more than 15 years ago I think – I can’t really remember when.

 

Mireille G M sent this submission for the 3rd quarter challenge

Inspired from a quilting technique called “yo-yo” flowers which are usually made of round fabric loosely gathered with thread and then sewn in place with many buttons.
For these flowers, I used small discarded pieces of silk fabric, gathered then made a centre of needle felted wool later wet felted. The flower assembly was set into a crocheted linen base pod.

Third Quarter Challenge Entry by Penny E.

Australian Merino wool, hand dyed by ‘colour Steams’ (Australia). Appliqued thinner felt flowers, free machine stitched with a neutralized green cotton. The brim edging was a length of free machine stitch, worked on ‘solvy’ in the same cotton.

Now to tell you the truth….I appliqued flowers because there was a very small area in the crown that was thinner than I liked and once one flower was sewn on I had to keep going until I liked it! In the end I was glad that there was a week point as I enjoyed the appliqued effect and have used it on other hats since. This hat sold as soon as it went out on display so someone else must have liked it too!

Third Quarter Entry by Cindy M.

I took a photo of this prickly pear cactus in bloom many years ago thinking one day I would make a piece of art from it. Well, I am happy to say that I finally managed to do so and it works perfectly for the floral challenge. Actually, I created two of these felt paintings – the first one wet felted and the second one needle felted. This photo is of the first wet felted piece. I don’t know if you are like me, but I love when you have the entire piece fully laid out and it is all texture and fluff. If only there was a good way to keep it in this state without sandwiching it behind glass.

After laying out all the fibers, I needled felted them to stay in place as I wet felted the piece. Unfortunately, it lost too much of the texture and became too “flat” for me. I decided to add line and texture back in it by free motion embroidering it. That really helped to define and finish the piece.

Third Quarter Entry by Cindy M.

Here is a photo of the needle felted piece. The two pieces are not the same size – I made this one smaller than the wet felted piece . I made a couple of raspberry pink pre-felt/felt sheet with wool fiber, viscose and silk edges so that I could cut out the many petals and then needle felt them to the piece. This one has tons of depth and texture and fits more my style than the wet felted piece.

It is fun to show them together – so that you can see the inherent differences between wet felting and needle felting. Hope you enjoy! cindy

Third Quarter Entry by Helene D.

Here is a little piece I did during the summer of 2020 when the world was in lockdown. I am afraid that I can’t credit where I saw the idea, I think it may have been a Russian Felt Maker but unfortunately I cannot locate her name. I don’t know if this is how she achieved her result – all I remember thinking at the time was that it was cool to experiment with fresh flowers and wet felt! I thought it might be fun to share it with you and hopefully it is appropriate for the 3rd quarter challenge.

I laid down white merino tops to start, then I wet the fibre to hold it in place and I popped some single stalks of fresh lavender on top. I then covered this in Margillan silk (this is the finest of silk and quite transparent). I wrapped the silk around the back of the merino and began felting. It was a very delicate process as I did not want to break the stalks. When the silk had attached itself to the merino I gently rolled the piece. There was no rough fulling given the contents. Then it was rinsed and dried.

I rolled the piece up and just found it recently. Two years on and there is still a faint perfume from the lavender which is pretty good going. I should really have made it into a drawer liner. It certainly would have added a little luxury! The photo looks a little unclear but I think that is because of the silk covering. Apologies for not posting this when the plants were in season – it might serve as a small project for next summer!

Third Quarter Entry by Donna B.

Here is my completed 3rd Quarter Challenge (sorry it is a bit late). I made felted covers for our Fortnightly (a local women’s group that has been in existence since 1908 and encourages women to “be occupied in the highest ways of which her nature is capable”) program booklets for our 20 members. All have a floral (or at least an item from nature) image and were fun to create because they are all different. I discovered that I’m better with creating “one-off” items rather than repeating the same design in a production type way. This could make it really challenging for me to prepare items to sell at markets. Does anyone have any suggestions for what the best way is to market my little creations? Thank you.

Fourth Quarter Challenge by Karen L.

This is my submission for the fourth quarter challenge, using the angle of making “something only from bits you already have in your stash.“

The theme for the next 18 months at the Waltham Textile group is Making Waves and so I had this in mind when I was planning my vessel. My aim was to use circles and ovals to build up an undulating surface with lots of texture. I also knew I wanted something I could occasionally pick up and put down over the coming months, continually adding to with stitch and beading.

The various shades of grey fibre were from my “oddments” box, short ends of Merino roving leftover from past projects. The fabrics are offcuts of silk, a bit of an old shawl and a rescued viscose paper towel which I’d used as a carrier for the dye when colouring a silk scarf. There’s also old knitting yarn, sari silk and scrim. The felted limpet shells were left over from making a wallhanging and, of course, I definitely didn’t need to outsource any of the threads and beads!

I’m really pleased with how it’s worked out and would like to make a couple of other items to sit with it for our exhibition. I think I may have to make those with blue or green backgrounds as there’s little chance of me replicating that grey!!

 

4Th quarter challenge by  Ann B.

In the post A Crown for Maris (which is submitted as an entry for this challenge) the title picture shows Maris with her brother Neptune. I forgot to add in the post that Neptune’s crown was the one I made for Avarice in our 2020 Panto “Snow White and the 7 Dwarves”, with a quick makeover of silver paint. You’ll notice how living beneath the sea has bent the points of his crown somewhat, but then it was only made from the card that used to be used by bobbin lacemakers to prick out patterns for their lace, and even painted card doesn’t like getting wet! I will also post a picture of Avarice in crown, wig and makeup as she appeared on stage.

 

4th quarter challenge by Susan W.

I was inspired by Helenfeltzen’s 21Nov21 post on how to make a Christmas Tree. I made one for my great-nephew last year and decided to make some for a local craft fair this year. Thank you for the inspiration.

https://feltingandfiberstudio.com/2021/11/21/tis-the-season-to-make-a-christmas-tree/

 

4th quarter challenge by Ann B.

This was made during my “fungi period” and the “hollow” tree trunk is basically made from old badly felted jacob fleece and finished with the waste fibre hanging basket pack that seems to include the floor sweepings from the mill as well as tatty dyed fleece. As this was a magic tree, inhabited by strange creatures as well as the bracket fungus, I added some bronze trilobal to the bark covering so it’s a bit sparkly. I’m not sure if they are visible in this image, but in a couple of the holes in the “bark” there are some eyes peering out and the “magic” is smoking out around them and from the hollow in the top. The bracket fungi all have black faces and are singing – a welsh miner’s male voice choir! There used to be a hand appearing out of the top of the trunk conducting them, but that didn’t work properly so was removed.

4th quarter challenge by Ann B.

Finally (for the moment!) some of my Magic Mushrooms. I made several different types of mushrooms, thinking that they might sell well – my husband thought they would – but they didn’t unfortunately. Some of them had the plastic “sticks” from cotton buds in the stems to stop them wilting. I think, apart from the Gomphidus Roseus, there were Fly Agaric (red with white spots), large flat mushrooms which we always used to call Horse Mushrooms, a family of button mushrooms, chestnut mushrooms (which were really a bit to hairy as the caps were finished with Herdwick fleece) and a Fairy Ring which had sparkly iridescent trilobal fibres in the middle. All of them had bases made from the hanging basket stuff.

 

4th quarter challenge by Ann B.

The face of this Green Man, including his eyes, is all made from the hanging basket liner “stuff”. In order that it might be accepted for a Guild exhibition (Dorset Guild of Weavers Spinners and Dyers) the leaves were embroidered with handspun wool (I forget what sort) and the leaves on the frame were hand dyed silk with more felt branches. At this time – back in 2004 – felt was not particularly welcome in the Guild (and knitting/crochet was just about tolerated!) I know that Green Men are supposed to be menacing, but I’ve always considered that they are fun and friendly so thought he’d like to be seen peering through the leaves.

4th Quarter Challenge Caterina P.

My submission for the 4th Quarter Challenge 2022 is a necklace/warmer that I wet felted using my last bit of pumpkin Corriedale tops, some extra fine merino teal tops that I had around (used to make mittens last year) , some wool locks from my stash, and bits of shells found in 2019. It is something from my stash, and also something that I can use as look-enhancer during seasonal celebrations. I actually do not know what possessed me when I made it: it is totally outside my comfort zone and I had no idea what I wanted to make while creating it (which is the point of the challenge, I guess)! The colours are not a combination I would normally make, but I had to finish off the Corriedale and use the low-quality locks that remain in my stash, as per challenge requirements, so the pumpkin just called for the teal, don’t blame me. Since I was already doing weird things, I had a whim about including the shells, and I felted them in: now I don’t really want to cut the felt and reveal them, I am in two minds, I would not want them to fall out if I do it wrong…oh, well. I kept thinking about a kind of wildish winter necklace. I thought that I was not going to wear this ever, but now that I have it on for some photos it is actually quite warm and nice to have around…

Entry by Jessika O.

I make gnomes and recently I have begun adding faces to them. It has changed their whole personality. This gnome is a custom gnome “sprout” I made for a customer. He has feet too.