When I discovered felting in 2007, I finally found the creative outlet for which I had been searching. I love that the versatility of fiber allows me to “play” with a wide variety of materials including wool, silk, fabrics, yarns and threads. Creating one of a kind fiber art pieces to share with the world fulfills my creative passion.
It seems that everyone is busy this time of year. Football season has started here and we went down to a football game over the weekend. It was a late game and since we have to drive 2 1/2 hours to get there, we didn’t get home until 1:30 am. Yawn. Then the next day, we felted another wall panel for the yurt. Then coming up this week is my exhibition with my class mates from my Level 2 Hand and Machine Stitch class with Gail Harker. So I’ve been busy getting pieces ready for the exhibition and cleaning up the studio. I have also still been sanding on the yurt parts.
I only have 12 roof poles left to sand. Dennis put a few into the tono to see how they fit. It’s amazing to see what the roof will look like. Wow, 16 feet is bigger than I imagined. 🙂
This is my studio about half way through the cleaning process. I forgot to take the photo before I cleared most of the stuff off the table.
So now it is a bit cleaner. The box on the table is the stuff that will go in the exhibition.
I did finish the Kantha tractor and got it framed. It will be in the exhibition as well.
And I got these three Kantha pieces matted and ready to donate. So what have you been doing? We’d love to see what you’ve been working on, so please post on the forum when you get a spare minute.
Dennis and I are still plugging away at the carpentry work on the yurt. This past weekend, we drilled the holes in the tono. The tono is the circle at the top of the yurt that the roof poles fit into. Dennis bought a special drill guide so that we could drill the holes at a 30 degree angle. I can’t imagine how we would have drilled at the proper angle without this guide.
It works really slick. Dennis had measured and marked where all 52 holes needed to be around the outside of the circle.
So now we just need to sand the tono a bit more and it will be ready to paint. You can see that one of the holes is a little bit off. We’re not sure how that happened but it will just have to do.
We also felted two more wall panels on Sunday. Luckily, I got recruitment labor. 🙂 To prevent the felt from sliding around on the PVC pipe, we added a couple of additions. It’s pipe insulation covered with duct tape.
We also had to replace the small inner PVC pipe with a galvanized steel pipe. The plastic PVC was getting eaten by the chain inside.
After the water was applied, all our felting party guests walked on it. Here’s a little video I took:
Because I had helpers, we were able to lay out two walls and get them felted in a day.
Here we are on the first roll of the day.
That’s Paula trying to get rid of some of the air under the plastic.
Is it tight enough?
Now to get the ropes in place to tie the roll.
And tying it up with square knots. If you don’t get it tight enough, it really slides around a lot.
Then the roll is attached to the tractor.
Start off slowly to make sure everything is going to roll properly.
And off it goes. The recipe is 5 times around the field, roll from the other end, another 5 times around, flip the felt over, 5 times around and roll from the other end with a final 5 times around. And it’s felt!! I didn’t get any photos of the finished felt but I will show you all the walls when they are completed. So one more wall panel and then we’ll start on the roof. Progress is being made and I’m shooting for completion by mid October.
This has been a really busy summer for me. The yurt has taken up a large amount of time, the store has been busy and I had color class homework to complete. So in between the yurt efforts, I have been slowly completing the tasks on my list.
I was running quite low on cat toys at the store. So I made several batches. I put them all into the panty hose and then throw them into the washing machine. The other batches were different colors so now I have enough to last the next couple of months.
The rest of my spare time has been spent completing my color studies homework. So I have painted lots of color scales, color wheels, color schemes etc.
This little book (6″ x 6″) is filled with different color schemes.
I haven’t finished the bigger book yet. It has all the scales and color wheels plus colored pencil studies, magazine color studies and other fun stuff.
Here are my blue pages.
And this is what I’m working on now. I am making a color study from the photograph with various pieces of painted paper. The colors are pulled from the photo and then different amounts of each color are used in the layers of color. I got in a hurry and spilled water all over the photo. I’ll have to print another one.
It seems like I spent a vast amount of time deciding how much of each color to show. Now I have to cut the pieces and tape them down to a background page. I’ll probably change my mind again as I’m taping them down.
I have also been preparing for my stitch class’s exhibit which will be in September. I had to get a few more pieces ready for hanging. I don’t have any photos but generally it was matting pieces and lacing pieces in preparation for framing. Have you been busy this summer? Do let us know what you’ve been up to. We’d love to see photos and hear all about it on the forum.
Dennis and I started felting a wall panel this past weekend. It was a ton of work but now that we have the process down, I think it will go faster (keep your fingers crossed!). This post has a ton of photos so I hope you make it to the end.
I set up this tent and my massage table with a water thermos for breaks. I am having a few neck and back issues so I need to take frequent breaks.
I started with a 12 foot by 16 foot tarp and 4 batts of wool.
This is the field dragger that goes behind the tractor. We will attach the felt roll to the back of this to roll it around the field.
First I measured and taped off what size I needed the wool to be before shrinkage. I was working on the idea that the felt would shrink 6-10%. The sample felted down by 6%.
I just marked the edges and corners with blue tape.
I was really disappointed that one batt didn’t cover the entire width. It was short about 6 inches.
The batts come folded up in thirds and then rolled. So I spread out the batt.
And then I had to take a portion of another batt and cover the extra 6″.
So I cut the batt and lined up the pieces along the edge.
I did overlap slightly and spread the batt a little thinly at the edges so it wouldn’t be a big lump where the two batts attached during felting.
I filled this 5 gallon watering can with cold water from the hose and soap.
And sprinkled about 5-6 cans on.
Covered it with plastic and tried to get some air out. That didn’t work too well.
So I took off the plastic and sprayed it with the hose.
Here’s the first layer after being wet down. You can see that it wasn’t all completely wet.
Next I add a second layer of batt in the opposite direction.
That had to be pieced and cut as well.
So here’s both layers and I added more water with the hose after this photo.
Then we walked on it.
Next I made sure the edges were relatively straight.
Where the edges weren’t completely wet, I sprayed them into submission.
Covered it with thin plastic,
folded the tarp in on both sides,
And then we’re ready to roll around the PVC pipe.
Here I am starting to roll. I told Dennis at this point that it looks like I am all by myself and working really hard. But he helped, I promise. Just no photos as he had the camera most of the time.
We got it all rolled up,
You can see the cable that will attach the roll to the tractor,
and then we decided we should put another tarp on the outside to keep the dirt away from the felt.
Then I tied it with rope.
This was the way we tied it the first time and it didn’t hold well. After that, I cut the rope into equal pieces and just tied each one instead of wrapping longer pieces of rope.
Then Dennis attached a chain to the end of the field dragger,
hooked the cable to the chain and,
It didn’t work, sigh…
So after a trip to the ranch supply store, we cut off the end of the bigger PVC pipe,
took an old cable we had and made loops on each end,
got a skinnier PVC pipe and put the cable through it,
and put the smaller PVC pipe into the larger one. And drum roll please –
It worked!!
As you can see in the video, the roll of felt moved on the PVC pipe. So we unrolled to check on the felt and it had started to felt.
But it certainly didn’t pass the pinch test!
I added more water and we pulled it behind the tractor 5-6 more times around the field. I opened it and it was still not completely fulled. We quit for the day and just left the felt covered down in the field overnight. On Sunday, we started again, redid how we attached it to the tractor and found that the reason the roll was shifting was because the cable attachment kept moving. So we just attached it with chains which didn’t move and it worked great.
Here’s the finished piece. It shrunk about a foot in each direction which was what I wanted. Yippee! It worked.
And here’s Dennis triumphantly bringing the rolled felt up to the house. It took two days to dry. I have 3 more wall panels and 4 roof panels to finish. I decided I need reinforcements. The next felting session is planned for August 25th. Do you want to come help?? Please??
I thought it would be a catchy title if I could say “How to Build a Yurt in 30 Days” but once I started counting how long we’ve been working that somehow didn’t work out. There is even a YouTube video on how to build a yurt in three days. Obviously, they had a few more people working on the project and didn’t have all those things like working full-time, running a gallery, doing paint class homework, company visiting etc. to get in the way. Any who, we’ve been progressing along. Dennis is still working on the tono which is the central ring in the roof that the roof poles fit into.
This is the top layer of the three rings that will be glued together. Dennis made 4 grooves with the router for the crown portions. He made cuts in both of the crown pieces so they would fit together.
Then he glued and screwed the crown portions in. Then he worked on drilling holes to put the dowels in the various layers so that the entire tono will be solid.
Here’s the bottom tono layer with the holes drilled.
And the middle tono layer with the dowel bits in place.
A side view of the middle layer so you can see how the dowels will go into the top and bottom layers. Now he just has to put it all together and drill the 52 holes evenly around the edge at exactly a 33.3 degree angle. That should be easy 🙂
Dennis has also been working on the roof poles. They need to fit into the holes in the tono.
So we got this neat little multi-purpose tool to do that.
Here’s about half of them completed. So you must be wondering by now what I have been doing. I have still been sanding wall rods. Remember all those holes in the wall rods? Well, they ended up having bits of wood still in the hole from the drilling process.
So I have been using this little tool to get the wood out of the holes in the wall rods.
That’s only 990 holes that need to be reamed out on both sides. And then I had to sand them lightly again. So I have been sanding, sanding, sanding… And the roof poles still haven’t been sanded. This weekend though I am starting the felting process for the walls. I hope to take some videos to show you next week.
I finally started on felting for the yurt. Not much, but a sample to figure out shrinkage.
This is one of the batts rolled out on the living room floor. That is a yardstick so you can see about how big it is. It looks grey here but it’s really brown.
Here’s my sample square ready to felt. I used two layers of batt so I can make sure it will be thick and heavy enough to keep out the weather.
It was almost 6″ thick.
And here’s the final sample after felting. It is very thick and sturdy. The wool felted easily but it only shrank 6%. That seems minimal to me. I’m used to 30% so I hope that it doesn’t shrink differently when I do a large wall piece. But after a bunch of math, I figured out that I might just have enough wool for the walls and the roof. Now, we just have to work out exactly how we’re going to pull the big rolled bundle behind the tractor. There is talk from my husband about field draggers, PVC pipe, chain etc. But that’s his job. I’m rolling the felt up around the PVC pipe and he’s going to do all the connecting to the tractor and pulling it around the field.
We’re also still working on the frame and I still have some sanding yet to do. These are the final pieces that I needed to cut shorter for the walls. The ends needed to be cut at a 45 degree angle as they will be butting up against the door frame.
The next part we started working on is called the tono. It is the center section of the roof where all the roof poles insert. Luckily, we already had this set up for our router. It is to make circles. It is kind of like using a string and pencil to draw a circle.
Here’s one of the circles completely cut.
We saved the extra piece to make the rest of the tono.
Then we needed to cut another circle within the circle. More measuring and the nail is what holds the plastic jig in the center.
Here it is as we finished cutting the inner circle out.
Doesn’t he look proud!
Here is the first layer cut out. We made three all together that we will glue together to make the wood thick enough for the holes for the roof pole ends.
Then there are pieces that arch up over the flat tono circle. We rigged up a way to use the old center circle and made an arc cut with the router. Now we just have to cut the ends and this piece will be the arch over the circle. It’s a little hard to picture but I’ll show you more photos when we have it together.
So the wall felting will begin in the next two weeks. If you’re in the area and you’d like to join in, let me know and I’ll give you the schedule. I’d love to have you join us!
Well, I bit the bullet and sawed off several of the wall rods in the yurt wall to make the shorter pieces needed to make a squared lattice.
The way it works is that you can get two short pieces from one rod except the ones that have 8 holes instead of 9.
So I cut enough to make one lattice section. I didn’t want to cut them all in case I really didn’t understand this 5 up, 4 down system. But miraculously it worked.
Then was the puzzle of figuring out what piece went where. But this is the completed section. If you look on the right side, the piece on the very bottom right is a “2 up” and the one on the very top right is a “2 down”. It took us quite a while to get this figured out and then I never wanted to pick it up. But I did, cut the rest of the short pieces except those that have 45 degree angle cuts by the door and started more sanding.
Here are the ones that are sanded.
And this is the pile that still needs sanding. Sigh. I did get all the short pieces sanded since this photo but still have a bunch more to sand. But now I have a good idea on the size of the wall and I hope to start the felting process next weekend. I need to do a sample to see what the shrinkage rate for the wool is and then I’ll be ready to felt a wall section. So stay tuned, felting to begin soon 🙂
I finished the umbrella tree and finally got some halfway decent photos taken. I will be submitting this to the “Shelter” Exhibition being held in October. I still have to write up my entry and figure out an artist’s statement to go with the piece. But I’m sure I can manage that by the middle of August when the entry is due. I thought you might like to take a look at the tree. The photos are from several different angles as well as some closeups.
We’ve been working away on the yurt since my last post. We finished drilling all the holes and then there was a scare because I figured out that I had cut all the pieces the wrong size. I had thought something was wrong when we were drilling the holes and the last one was right at the end of the board. So I looked back at the book and the length was supposed to be 78″. I had cut them to 7′ long. Luckily, that means they are supposed to be 6.5′ long. So they were too long. But that’s much better than too short. So I cut them all down to 6.5′ long. Next up, sanding.
Just to be clear, we are making what is called a Mongolian ger. The word ger rhymes with air. Mongolians do not call their dwellings yurts. But since most people know these type of dwellings as yurts, I think it will be simpler to keep calling it a yurt.
When I wrote my last post, Ann had suggested that I use a stationary belt sander. We have a hand-held one but not a stationary one. So Dennis rigged up a way to use the hand-held sander upside down. It is clamped on to a piece of plywood on a saw horse.
The small piece of wood on the right hand side of the photo is used to keep the sander button pushed down. Normally, you have to hold it down the entire time you are sanding. But that wouldn’t work in this position. So the wood holds the button down for me. I’m sure this whole process is not the way you are supposed to use a belt sander. Perhaps I should have a warning of “Don’t try this at home.” 🙂
So here I am sanding a wall rod. It takes between 5-7 minutes to sand one rod and I only have 110. I’ve done 20.
This really does make the sanding much easier. Thanks Ann for your idea. It works perfectly.
I even sand the ends. I want everything to be nice and smooth before we paint the rods. I am wearing ear protection and my glasses but next time I am going to wear a mask. The sander puts all kinds of saw dust into the air.
Next, I have to figure out how to put the walls together. I laid out the boards and the middle ones make perfect sense. It’s just when you get to the ends, that you have to figure out what part of the boards need to be cut off and in what direction.
As you can see, the edges are not right because I haven’t cut the boards shorter. The book says we need 8 up (6), 8 down (6), 7 up (3), 7 down (3) etc. After laying the boards out, I think I have it figured out but I really don’t want to cut them wrong. So I guess I’ll do one wall first so I don’t cut them all wrong. So it’s just a bit confusing and being easily confused doesn’t help the matter! There will be four wall sections when we’re finished. Wish me luck!
After I get one wall section completed, I can begin the felting process. I need to know the exact dimensions that need to be covered before I can make the felt walls. I would hate to do all this work and end up with the wrong size. So felting will begin soon, I promise.
This is my studio about half way through the cleaning process. I forgot to take the photo before I cleared most of the stuff off the table.
So now it is a bit cleaner. The box on the table is the stuff that will go in the exhibition.
I did finish the Kantha tractor and got it framed. It will be in the exhibition as well.
And I got these three Kantha pieces matted and ready to donate. So what have you been doing? We’d love to see what you’ve been working on, so please post on the forum when you get a spare minute.
