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Jan’s 3rd Quarter 2017 Challenge Part 2

Jan’s 3rd Quarter 2017 Challenge Part 2

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Part 2 of Jan’s post: 

Part 2 create the base and start the octopus


Layout the background.
I had a bag of mystery white wool and some super wash merino, combining them together, I started my base layer. Then I lay in a line for the sky line and spent hours playing Runescape (AFK stuff like fishing and harassing trees) on the computer while hand blending the golden tan colour for the sky. I worked over the big 3 inch thick foam square I got at Walmart for the 12 x 12 pieces I did earlier in the summer. It again worked great with my wicked multi-needle metal tool to make a quick base from which to start.
     10 Needle Felting Tool – Aluminum

I had to put this project aside to work on the guild library, restructuring the Dewey Decimal Classification project, but was able to return to the Felting Challenge in September as my demo project at the carp fair.

There was a lot of interest in felting and lots of requests for Felting workshops this year. I directed them to the guild website and told them there would be more workshops for 2018 on felting so check the new schedule when it was up in November.

Carp Fair demo – the octopod is created…..sort of.
Carp Fair is an old fashion rural fair on a big scale. The Ottawa Valley Weavers and Spinners guild is in the Antique section. Usually we freeze since it’s the last weekend in September. We have spent many years demoing weaving, spinning and felting there, cursing the cold weather. (I can spin without feeling my fingers but not for too long or too well.) Well this year our pleas were answered. We had the hottest weekend of the summer, we were fine as long as we stayed in the shade of the tent and didn’t stand up! SO I got a lot of felting done.

Using my photo reference I chose the general shape and pose I wanted for the octopus to have. I had brought a package of pipe cleaners from the dollar store and had decided that 2 twisted together would make a good leg support armature and allow me to bend the tentacles as I wanted later.

Math is not my best skill it’s right down there with spelling actually but I can count to 8 twice. So I laid out 8 pairs of pipe cleaners beside me on the table, twisting them together as I put them down. (Are you having awful premonitions yet?) I pulled out my Rideau Arcott core wool and started shaping the slope back for the head, and adding the first leg. Then wrapped it with wool.

Friday is when all the kids come to the fair to do “research” for a questionnaire they have to fill out and to do the games and rides. They usually wander through the antique section in waves, it wasn’t too busy this year. We also had a canon being fired and a tractor parade in our area. So it was a bit busy in the early morning and later in the afternoon, it was quieter at the hottest part of the day.

Got to the last leg and started to build up the tentacles with more core wool to get the more triangular shape. By the end of the day I had what was obvious some kind of octopus like creature.

Saturday morning;
Once I had the general shape to my liking I started with the super wash to lay in the colour. I have discovered that super wash has exquisite colours and take forever to felt…. I will not be lured in by the evils of super wash again! It will felt with needle felting but it is a lot of extra work and it makes felting a lot slower! I will likely just save the super wash and blend it with corriedale or merino that still has all its scales.

One of the woman who was working at one of the other displays in the antique section came over and asked “does your octopus have 7 legs?” No I’m sure I put out 8 sets of pipe cleaners to start with. Oh no, one is missing, too late.


Sunday Carp fair;

The Octopus has its base colour layer, and one-sided blow-hole. I used a few fine skewers to rap the wool then Felted it quite firmly pulling out skewers as it shrunk. Thus making a hollow blow tube which I added to the skin fold just behind his/her eye.

You will have to wait for the next post to see how he/she turns out.

Jan’s 3rd Quarter 2017 Challenge Part 1

Jan’s 3rd Quarter 2017 Challenge Part 1

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My friend Jan really got into the 3rd quarter challenge. She worked on it most of the summer and fall. If you have read other posts by Jan you know she is a great story teller. So, I had to break this into 3 posts. This post and the next 2 will take you on a journey with Jan from concept to finished challenge.

3rd quarter challenge part 1 the Plan

I was instantly intrigued by the third quarter challenge. I have always appreciated the aesthetic of Japanese prints and the Hokkaido wave had been particularly interesting to me. A bit strange when you consider I really don’t like getting wet. Ok, I am a bit hydrophobic. When I look at the Wave I don’t concentrate on the impending death of the fishermen in there precariously tipped boats, the fact that mount Fuji may be plunged into unpleasant wetness at any moment but that the repetitiveness of the design on the inside of the wave reminds me of a Japanese umbrella. Umbrellas are good. They keep you from wetness. A giant umbrella in the middle of the ocean sounds almost appealing, as if you might stay dry surrounded by all the wetness.

OK, I have a theme. Now who would need an umbrella in the middle of the ocean? Hmmm. An octopus!

The Great Wave off Kanagawa also known as The Great Wave or simply The Wave, is a woodblock print by the Japanese ukiyo-e artist Hokusai. It was published sometime between 1829 and 1833 in the late Edo period as the first print in Hokusai’s series Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji. It is Hokusai’s most famous work.

As you may have noticed I tend to do flat pictures with a bit more thickness than flat pictures usually have. So the concept of taking a print you like and using it to inspire something from it but not make a copy will not be a problem. OK wave as umbrella, and octopus holding umbrella. Other elements of the print to work into the finished pieces. The sky, the other littler waves and maybe the boats with fishermen, or maybe not the boats with fishermen. I have nothing against fishermen, I really do like to fish. But I’m not to fond of boats. They are just tempting fate. Why leave nice solid ground if you don’t have to? So let us leave the boats for a later consideration.

I had a plan and all within half an hour of reading the email. A quick sketch (I thought I had lost it but found it inside my new needle felting box. This is why the original idea and the preliminary execution differs quickly. I lost the sketch by putting it somewhere safe.)

Then a trip to the wonderful internet to “acquire” reference photos and do a bit of research.

I’ve got the wave (I found 3 graphics of the wave one with the fishermen very easily visible) so let’s get umbrellas.

Now for some octopuses/octopi.

Phase 1 Planning is complete.

Throwback Post – Texture

Throwback Post – Texture

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We were talking about doing some ‘throwback’ posts this year, and while I was giving the site a bit of a tidy-up and adding a new 3D page over the New Year, I came across this one of mine from September 2014, and thought it’d be a good one to start with. Do you ever revisit your old work and get inspired with new ideas?

A while ago I bought a weird fluffy, knitted, tubular scarf from Poundland to try felting with. If you ever buy one, make sure you cut it over a bucket or newspaper or something to catch all the bits! I laid out a couple of layers of very wispy pink Merino tops left over from a book cover I made last year, then I added the piece of scarf, and 2 more wispy layers of wool tops. It didn’t take long to felt. This is one side of it:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAThis is the other side:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAAnd this is what it looked like holding it up to the sky:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAI don’t remember how long after, but I decided the scarf sampler might make a nice sculptural piece similar to one I’d made before. I didn’t make it in exactly the same way, I concertina’d it and stitched in place, then twisted and felted and fulled more. This is the top:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAClose up of the ridges:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERASuper close up of the texture:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAThis is the back:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAA close up of the back:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAAnd a super close up of the texture:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERANow, what do I do with the other 8 square feet of fluffy knitted stuff? 🙂

Demo Last Weekend

Demo Last Weekend

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This last weekend my guild did a Demo at the Carp Fair I went on the Sunday.  I took a blending board to make some more rollags. I had some hand cards with me and I had a spindle I was spinning a rollag on so I could explain it all.  It was very popular with the visitors to the fair. .

Bernadette was spinning Rambouillet on her wheel. In this picture she is Chain plying it.

Jan was working On the Edo Challenge. And Yes that is an octopus. I am hoping to get her to do a post about her progress. Here she is explaining it to some visitors.

Her fish was there on display and tried to eat a passing child.

Julie was weaving. She is doing shibori on the loom. She weaves the draw strings right into the scarf ready to be tightened up and then dyed. She has a finished sample onto of her loom.

 

And lastly 2 of the display tables.

I didn’t get any of the third table except Jan’s Fish.  We had a great time chatting with people about spinning, weaving and felting.  Have you been doing your crafts in public lately?

 

Using Resists

Using Resists

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I mentioned in my last post that we’d started playing with resists at the well-being centre recently, I showed the piece I’d made using strips and said we’d used flat resists for pouches. This is the one I made, though we all made fairly similar ones:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAAnd this is the back:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERALast week, we used flat resists to make 3D vessels, or at least mostly make, as some of us ran out of time! This is an action shot of Louise, fulling hers:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAStill working on it, but it wasn’t far off being done, and this wasn’t much over an hour after starting:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAIt looked a lot nicer, but we’re in a basement with yellowy ceiling lights. I had to finish mine off when I got home:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAStopping and starting and nattering, and probably general lack of concentration meant my inner two layers of Cheviot were separate from the locks and top two layers of Merino around the top a little bit:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAI thought this week, we might do something sculptural, maybe something like this shell shaped piece:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAOr maybe something more ‘abstract’ and textural, like this:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAI mentioned in the comments to my last post that we’re running out of dyed Merino, the group who originally bought the supplies have moved on to a different centre so we’re going to have to come up with fundraising ideas soon, but for now The Felting and Fiber Studio are our new ‘sponsors’, so I’m going to do a stock-check tomorrow then order some lovely new colours 🙂

If you have any suggestions for future themes for us to explore, post them in the comments 🙂

Vessel and Pod

Vessel and Pod

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I don’t think I’ve ever used a flat resist for a vessel like this before. The idea was to make it as an example of using resists to take to the felting class at the well-being centre, but before I’d even finished the layout, I knew it’d be too much for us to do in a couple of hours. I used lots of the Gotland locks from Zara, and decided to work inside out, so I laid these on the resist first. I used a couple of layers of Gotland fleece, then some cheaper ‘Scottish Grey’ I’d bought from wollknoll.  Between the Gotland and Scottish fleece I added some more Gotland locks around the top. There is a bit of a ridge inside, but I thought it turned out really well:
OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAThe other side:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAHere’s a couple of close ups of the locks around the top:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAI used lots of different ones:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAA closer look at the bottom, the locks felted in really nicely but still kept lots of character:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAWhen we did use resists at the well being centre, they didn’t quite turn out as planned. Because I had ‘vessels’ in mind and got out all the natural wools, I wasn’t thinking properly, so I cut a resist for a glasses case based on using Merino like I usually do, so when thick layers of English 56s, Finnish and Corriedale were used, it barely shrunk and turned into a small sturdy bag! I was running out of time, so only did 3 layers on my bird pod, so it ended up shrinking a lot more widthways and became very tall and narrow! One of the members in the group liked it though so hopefully the blue tits in her garden do, too 🙂

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Needle felting class and Lambs

Needle felting class and Lambs

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Recently I taught a needle felting class were we made little sheep.

Making Bodiesfelting bodies

Adding Legsadding legs

And Earsadding ears

Then its time to give the sheep some wool. These are hand dyed Blue Faced Leicester curls. They are small tight  curls perfect for small work.

adding curls purple sheep adding curls blue sheep green sheep with red heart brown sheep

brown sheep 1 blue sheeep and snowman

All very cute in the end and a snowman for company.

And this morning we had 2 new real lambs arrive. twin lambs 2015 It’s not a great picture but they were very new and not interested in posing for a good shot.

 

 

4th Quarter Challenge – Land Art

4th Quarter Challenge – Land Art

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I didn’t think I’d ever find time to do the 4th Quarter Challenge. When I chose Land Art, I thought it had a really good scope for some interesting felt sculptures. I really liked the work of artists using twigs and branches, whether they were abstract, patterns, designed by colour, or like Tom Hare’s work in willow, sculptures of plants, leaves, seeds, or even a sliced apple. I really liked this lotus seed head: http://www.tomhare.net/files/cache/6241679806767b541ec85e7977677c16_f44.jpg

I had a vague idea of what I wanted to do and how I wanted to do it. Something sculptural based on the things I’d seen with holes and stems and curves. I even thought I might do a series. Well, time was running out and I hadn’t started, and I was thinking about what I could do to take part that wouldn’t take as much time. For a few weeks I’ve had a piece of felt with a balloon inside, hanging in my living room doorway, it was the result of me thinking I’d try felting a winter woolly hat, and it ended up looking more like the start of a balaclava or fetish mask! So, I thought I’d improvise and use that. It wasn’t far off the shape I’d pictured, and though I would have preferred to work with wet felt not fulled, I thought it was worth a try. So, I started cutting, wetting and shaping, and I was happy to see it was starting to look interesting! I rinsed it and put another balloon in to keep it’s shape while it dried. I thought it looked really good, it was nice and firm and kept its shape without the balloon. I attached some string to get a photo, and this is what I saw when it spun around:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAA ribcage! My fancy felt sculpture was meant to look plant-like, but it looked like a carcass! I took the string off and put it on the table, but it sunk a bit and that didn’t look less dead either!:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAI reshaped it, the way it was meant to be, and that looked much better! I know it doesn’t look like any plant or seed in particular, I wasn’t copying anything, I just had a vague idea of shape, lines and holes:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERADifferent angle:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAIt does look much better hung up, less flat and more round. While I was messing around taking photos, I stood it upside down and squashed it, and that looked really interesting!:

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