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My year in review; 2025

My year in review; 2025

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Belated Happy Solstice, Happy Hanukkah, and Merry Christmas. I hope you are still enjoying the festive season (hopefully with fibre and felt!)

What in the world did I get done this year? This should be interesting, since most of this year was a blur of post-surgery and anaesthetic recovery (including a few very tiny but powerful pain pills – I have no idea what they were, but I vaguely think they may have been green?), I am extremely curious to see if I actually got anything done this year. If you are curious too, let’s take a look!

 

January: I was trying to get organised after getting bad medical test results (I was never good at tests) and found out I was going to have another surgery at the end of the month. Then be out of commission for a lest a couple of months afterwards.  I focused on getting notes ready for the other librarians to take over running the whole Guild library while I was out of commission.  I also taught an inkle weaving workshop and took a workshop on tablet weaving.

A big cheer up was the felt Christmas card from Eleanor. I was not feeling well after diagnostic testing and dreading the impending surgery, so perfect arrival timing!

Felted cristmas card exchange from 2024, a 3-D christmas tree and a raven on a branch in black / white/ grey1.1) Above the card from Eleanor, below was the card I sent to Eleanor

 

February 1st found me getting a drive home from the hospital rather than going to the Spin-in in Chesterville, Ontario. I have photos of the guild’s February meeting, and a few shots from other guild members of some of the things I missed. I know I was doing things, but I don’t remember any of it.

 

March was also a write-off. Anaesthetic and my brain are not friends. Luckily, Ann and Ann were running the library.

 

By April, one of the Librarian Anns had to step away from the library due to illness. I returned to work,  a bit early, Glenn dropping me off and picking me up (driving was not an option yet), it was unfortunately shorter than normal hours. I was not really up to speed; it took all day just to keep the library running. I brought in felting to work on if I got my library work done, but no luck.moose head and moose bag i had been working on at the end of 2024 but was not getting enuff work done to work on them in January2.1) Moose head and moose landscape bag. At this point, it was still probably a good idea not to be doing a lot of stabbing with sharp objects.

April was not all frustrating and forgotten, I also got a surprise to cheer me up! I was watching Marie from Living felt on YouTube and had been commenting on her videos (not that I remembered doing so shortly after each episode), one of which was her store’s Birthday party. My anaesthetic brain at the time did not remember winning anything, so I was so happy and surprised when one of her deluxe wet felting kits arrived! Thanks, Marie, that really cheered me up! (and I got to try it for workshops much later in the year).

Living felt from Texis wet felting tool kit and bag2.2)A surprise from Living Felts on line Birthday party

 

May arrived, but was still mostly lost in the fog. I seem to have worked on the Library report, and I am pretty sure it was Glenn who drove us down to the fibre festival at Spencerville (south of Ottawa). I have vague memories that I was very sore getting there and back, but it was so nice to get out and see friends and look at shopping.

3.1) Spencerville Fiber festival 2 photos of shoppers and booths3.1) Spencerville Fibre Festival

The long weekend in May (Friday to Sunday) was also CanGames and ghelting convention, which I have told you about before. I finally thought it might be safe to try a needle felting project. I may have been a bit premature in trying that. I somehow wound up with 6 fingers on one hand, and my under structure wrapping was not as tight as it should be.

3.2-3.3) Oops still can’t count! hand with 5 fingers and a thumb 3.2-3.3) hand repaired to only have 4 fingers and a thumb3.2-3.3) Oops, still can’t count!

evicting racoon in live trap from the garrage3.4) I somehow forgot we evicted another garage dweller. He was not impressed.

 

By June, I was feeling safer to make expensive decisions, but I limited it to one new camera. The old one was over 13 years old and was needing an upgrade. I still don’t really remember much unless I am looking at the photos from what I was up to. (I am glad I took pictures, or I would not remember doing anything!)

4.1) new Nikon bird watching camera with sneaky powerful zoom feature.4.1) new Nikon bird watching camera with sneaky powerful zoom feature.

4.2) I continued to putter on the Mer-Boyfriend I was creating for the missing Miss Mer 4.2) I continued to putter on the Mer-Boyfriend I was creating for the missing Miss Mer.

June 07, we tried to be in two places at once, the Lamsdown Fibre festival and the Dickonson Day Demo. I was doing shopping and photography, so no felting!

4.3) Demo at Dickonson Day4.3) Demo at Dickonson Day

4.4) one of vendors at Lamsdown 4.4) one of the vendors at Lamsdown

I had been trying to be careful about large perchasess with anesthetic-brain but I had been waiting for a stock tank of about this size to go on sale, so I bought it!

4.5) 75-gallon stock tank, becomes perfect fleece washing station. 4.5) A 75-gallon stock tank becomes a perfect fleece washing station.

With the addition of a fleece washing station in the side yard/Driveway, I got to work washing my way through the fleeces from the last couple of summers I had not felt up to working on.

4.6) Glenn was very helpful working the spin dryer for me. (its an old RV hand washer/spin dryer) 4.6) Glenn was very helpful working the spin dryer for me. (It’s an old RV hand washer/spin dryer)

4.7-4.8)the father’s day weekend brings a blacksmithing workshop to the Glengarry Pioneer Museum in Dunvegan Onrario (East of Ottawa) - black smith made sisors on display on a folding wood table 4.7-4.8)the father’s day weekend brings a blacksmithing workshop to the Glengarry Pioneer Museum in Dunvegan Onrario (East of Ottawa) - needle felting mer-person4.7-4.8)the Father’s Day weekend brings a blacksmithing workshop to the Glengarry Pioneer Museum in Dunvegan Onrario (East of Ottawa).

This was a great chance to do some photography of blacksmithing, and do a bit more felting, on the young mer I had started last month.

4.9)There was also a demonstration of finishing a blanket by walking it. (walking is likely spelt differently when applied to a wet blanket thumped repeatedly on a table.) 4.9)There was also a demonstration of finishing a blanket by walking it. (walking is likely spelt differently when applied to a wet blanket thumped repeatedly on a table.)

 

July continued fleece washing, a bit at a time. I still seem to keep over-exerting myself, but I was feeling so far behind.

5.1) 3 more bins to sort and wash. 5.1) 3 more bins to sort and wash.

5.2) Trying to sort without a skirting table 5.2) Trying to sort without a skirting table.

This month, I was back to the Glengarry Pioneer Museum to demo felting for them at their Fibre/Textile day.

5.3) 3 of the Mer Family and their pets get out to a demo. It was an extremely hot day and they seemed happy to be in the shade of the porch.5.3) 3 of the Mer Family and their pets get out to a demo. It was an extremely hot day, and they seemed happy to be in the shade of the porch.

 

In August, the guild had a workshop on Cyanotype printing with felt. It was a half-day workshop and ran twice. I took lots of photos, which reminded me of playing with the enlarger in the dark room.

6.1)Cyanoprinting with felt6.1)Cyanoprinting with felt

August is also the time of the very large fibre festival Twist, about an hour away in Quebec. Glenn came with me as my attendant, and I filled in at the guild demo table with the Mer boyfriend I was working on. I missed getting a roll of garden felt, so I went back on Sunday. (We had the comfy duck sandwiches twice this year!)

6.2) I missed out on this size, but got a piece from the big roll 6.2) I missed out on this size, but got a piece from the big roll

There was more shopping, a bit closer to home, at Stash-it Fibre Festival in Kempville, Ontario (about a half hour south of Ottawa)

6.3) I seem to be focused on fiber acquisition again, I see more fleece washing in my future.6.3) I seem to be focused on fibre acquisition again; I see more fleece washing in my future.

 

September is Almonte Fiberfest (about half an hour west of the west end of Ottawa). I again did a “few” photos for the Mississippi Valley Textile Museum, who run the event (I hope I remembered to send them!)I am pretty sure I showed you the Booth Birds of a Feather by Catherine

7.1) Birds of a Felter booth, at Almonte FiberFest7.1) Birds of a Felter booth, at Almonte FiberFest

A few more fleeces to wash, the stock tank has been helpful, and fall seems to be holding off, so I may get these done before snowfall! One was a lovely but horribly dirty ram Shetland fleece

7.2) big Shetland fleece (looks like he took a mud bath before sheering)7.2) big Shetland fleece (looks like he took a mud bath before shearing)

 

In October, I tried a wet felted Slipper workshop with Ann. I was sure I could make a simple pair of slippers in a day…. No, not quite yet, it seems, but I had lots of fun, stayed reasonably dry and am looking forward to finishing up the slippers when I have another burst of energy.

8.1) Jan’s almost finished slippers at the end of Ann’s Class.8.1) Jan’s almost finished slippers at the end of Ann’s Class.

This month, I also spotted a cottage for sale, very close to my brother’s cottage. It had just had a major price drop, which might have potential, so worth taking a look at it.  There is also a Quonset hut, on about an acre of land, not too far from that’s for sale too. One is better for spin and felt in’s the other would be better for blacksmithing. At least neither is attached to a piece of protected swamp, which was almost everything I have looked at for the last few years!

8.2) cottage option8.2) cottage option

October is also the month for KanataCon Board game and Felting convention! They are the gaming convention with the HUGE second-hand game sale where I found a game about alpaca and one about lamas! I also got a lot more work done on the Mer-Boyfriend for Miss Mer.

8.3) Fiber related board games8.3) Fibre-related board games

8.4) Glenn with the young Mer-sturgeon now with bumps!! (on the mer not Glenn8.4) Glenn with the young Mer-sturgeon now with bumps!!

The day after the gaming/felting convention was a new Fibre festival in Merrikville Ontario. It was a nice drive down, fabulous weather for photographing the locks and a bit of good shopping.

8.5) Fall colours and the locks at Merrickville8.5) Fall colours and the locks at Merrickville

October was very busy. The day after Merrickville, we jumped in the car and headed for Toronto. We did a couple of shopping stops on the way to Oakville, but made it through all the Toronto Traffic! (Rush hour may be nearly 24 hours long!)

On Tuesday, Glenn and his brother did legal stuff, and I had a lovely day staring at architecture, photography, and felting.

8.6) Happy with his hand upgrade8.6) Happy with his hand upgrade

The next day, we stopped to shop with Monika at the Olive Sparrow on the way back to Ottawa. By the time we made it home, I felt wiped!  I think I could have slept for at least a week.

 

November arrived, and it’s time for the Guild Sale and Exhibition. This event is run by Ann, and I help where I can. I am still noticing I am not back to full steam yet. I usually can photo-document the event as well as run the music and demo felting. Not this year, photos and music were all I could manage. Most of the signage and layouts could be updated from last year, so not as much pre-work either. We had a couple of good felters with booths this year. If you check back in the blog, you will see the photos.

 9.1) Ann showing how a drop spindle works (she is wearing her new name tag) i cant remember when i made her her new name tag?) 9.1) Ann showing how a drop spindle works (she is wearing her new name tag).

At the end of November, I ran the needle felted landscape workshop. We look at wool in a painterly approach. Ann took this workshop and has been having fun with mist and trees!

9.2) November students and their felt Paintings (it looks like they had fun)9.2) November students and their felt Paintings (it looks like they had fun)

The next day, I got up nice and early and headed back to the guild. This time Ann was teaching, and I was the student. I was oddly tired (as if I had been very busy the day before) even before we started, but it was fun (and dangerous, you could get wet). I was able to get all the rolling done by the end of the class. I still need to do a bit more shaping to finish off, oh, the want of free time!!  I am not sure where all the time goes, but I seem to be missing more of it this year than usual!!!

9.3) my odd shape black hat in progress9.3) My odd-shaped black hat in progress. (Can you guess what it will look like?)

 

It’s finally December, and I’m not sure I was ever going to make it to the end of the year, but I am happy I did. I had a workshop teaching beginning Inkle weaving, with great students again!

9.4) Inkle weaving workshop9.4) Inkle weaving workshop

Inkle looms make straps, belts, trim, ties, and narrow woven band. It is usually woven where only the warp is showing, and usually the colour order of warping will determine your pattern. There is the option of Pickup (for which there are other better teachers), and I have taught the “inkle Two” class of many of the truly weird things you can weave on an inkle loom, but may or may not want to.

 

Throughout the past year, with the help of the other librarian, I have continued to volunteer at the guild library. I usually put in over 500 hours each year.  I am about to get to the number crunching for the library year end data. (which, considering my lingering deterioration of math skills, may make this more of a challenge this year)

I am glad this year is almost behind me. It was interesting to see what I did, even if I didn’t remember doing it, until I saw the pictures. The heavy fog seemed to go on for more than the first half of the year, with mini fog attacks even up to recently (I will be able to add again any time I want to soon). I am going to try to avoid having any anaesthetic for as long as I can in hopes my spelling improves, and my little bit of math comes back!!

 

I am optimistic that you are as excited and hopeful about 2026, it’s a pleasant shape, for a number, so I am optimistic. I also have some wet felting to finish and some dry felting to find! Have fun and see you Next Year!!!

A Felt Landscape Class with Jan

A Felt Landscape Class with Jan

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I keep wanting to take this class with Jan, but it always seems to get scheduled when I have a class the next day or when I am at the Farmers Market. I finally got to sign up. My class was scheduled before Jan’s. Then I got the dates for the Christmas markets. The hat class was planned for the day after the last market. It would have to move. I would still be exhausted the day after the market. I don’t want to do that to the students or myself. So now I am taking Jan’s class on Saturday and teaching Felt hats on Sunday. I am sure it will be fine. I got all ready for my class early in the week, so all I have to do is load the car on Sunday morning.

To start, Jan emailed us some pictures so we could choose what we wanted to make. There was one I really liked, but thought it needed something else. So I had a chat with Jan about that. She does say you are the God of your picture. And she never does what everyone else is doing when she takes my classes. I went searching on the internet to see if I could find what I wanted to add. I did not have much luck. Google thinks it knows what I want to look at even when it doesn’t match what I put in the search. I found out later that I should try the in cogneto mode to get better results. Jan sent me a couple of pictures, and I found what I wanted.

I picked the one on the top right, but wanted to add a small shed. I know you were expecting one of the ones with sheep, weren’t you?

At the workshop, Jan had lots of her work to show us, to help us understand what we were doing.

 

 

Jan gave us lots of information about different ways to work. She explained all the needles she had given us to try out. You can see them stuck in the orange noodle. She included different versions of our pictures to help us pick out the wool we needed.

Then we had to pick our wool. She had a lot of wool. The bags covered 3 6-foot tables. There were also several books on the table for us to look at. I have no picture of the books. We were all wanting to get stabbing. I will ask Jan to look at the landscape book she has that I haven’t looked at before.

On to working. I chose to do a rough outline of where things were by holding the thin felt over the picture on a window. It was fun and absorbing, so I didn’t take as many pictures as I should have.

My friend Judy took this picture of me working.

This was my neighbour, she was working on a musk ox picture.

And here is a shot down the tables, of others busy stabbing away.

After adding the fog, I put in a little shack.

As we neared the end of the day, I went to add another layer of trees in front of the fog, but I couldn’t get them right at all. I think I was done with trees for the day. So I added the snow in the foreground. I may add the grass with stitching.

So now it is a few days later, and looking at the pictures, I can see the fog needs to fade out more. And maybe not cover all the trees. I will remove the tree trunks and fix the shack door.  Taking a picture really shows you what you can’t see looking at it live. I am not sure where I will go with the trees. I think I swapped the picture I wanted with a darker one. I may bring the fog down and add a few trees in the mid-ground, maybe with some snow on them.  We will see. I will take it to guild socials and continue.

Jan included a large instruction manual for us( 32 pages) in case we want to do another picture and forget everything we were told (completely possible, there was a lot to learn).

I think we all need to pester Jan to make this an online class or a book.  She has so much of it already done.

A little picture

A little picture

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I have been thinking I should do more of my stitched felt book. I have August ready to go but I just don’t feel like it. I don’t know why but I am sure you have all felt the same way about a project. So what to do, I am itchy to make something and I need something to chat about. So I went rummaging through my little bits and came up with this, It is approx 4×5 inches/10x13cm. The colours are a bit off the yellow is a bit more green and the blue is a bit more turquoise.

I decided the one on the right looked like some ground then some water and mountains in the background. If you squint I am sure you will see it too.

I started with the mountain adding some shades of grey to define the mountains I didn’t see the funny curved bit on the right until I took a picture,  so, had to smooth that out too. I am not sure why our eyes lie to us.

Then I defined the far shore

Onto the trees

 

And that’s as far as I am. Hopefully, I will have more done by the next post, but no promises.

row of bags of needles and refernce books for workshop on table
Needle Felted “THING” first time running this workshop

Needle Felted “THING” first time running this workshop

Comments 19 comments

The local Ottawa Guild had been optimistic in the latter part of 2022 and started to reschedule workshops, unbeknownst to us the evil covid was friends with 2 influenzas and invited them to drop by too. So we wound up with students and instructors out sick by the end of November into December. This was also the month my new workshop had been booked. I had offered to teach a chickadee or a tiny dragon but had been requested to make a Thing since Elizabeth, the workshop coordinator and I had not been able to decide on a definite thing. This is the description that was listed for the workshop.

“Description:  Jan is paralyzed with too many possibilities for an item to use to teach needle felted sculpture, thus we announce a workshop in needle felted THING creation.  Jan will probably decide more or less what the THING will be before the workshop but it will be a surprise for students.  You will create your THING using three dimensional needle felting. By the end of the workshop, students will have the skills needed to go home and make a THING of their own choosing.  Previous felting experience is helpful but not necessary. Good eye hand coordination is very helpful (those needles are sharp).”

As soon as it was scheduled, I started to work on organizing a brand new workshop. I quickly figured out this scope is a bit broad, so making a small basket protecting thing would help. I had admired an amigurumi mix-and-match monster making book.  “Edward’s Crochet Imaginarium: Flip the pages to make over a million mix-and-match monsters” by Kerry Lord.  Using the simple shapes from crochet to inspire the students, should give absolute beginners an achievable target and those who have felted before the opportunity to try four different wire gauge hands or wings and a tail.

The notes covered wire and needle gauges, fibre, fibre preparations (carded vs Combed it can make a difference), then wrapping. I had gone through and followed a couple of my projects and showed how I had made and built the armature, as well as a few wire augmentations I have had to do over the years. Most of that last section is actually in the blog posts! I finished off the notes with a list of books they may want to investigate and three online sources of videos.

If the various flues and covid were not enough of a challenge we had our first big winter store about to hit. I think most of the worst went south of us. I wonder, what the states could have done to offend the weather? After some debate with Elizabeth it was decided that since the forecast was to have the storm ending by Saturday morning, we would see how the roads looked closer to the workshop.  The snow had momentarily stopped and the workshop was declared a go.  I had collected the supplies together and then pulled the bags of fibre to go from the basement. Glenn hauled and loaded it all into the car. He and our new neighbour also cleared out the end of the driveway and we made a brake for the Guild Studio on the other side of Ottawa.

Car is being loaded to go to the workshop with fiber and suplys, snow covered car, tree and drive way. the driveway is getting quite icy. Grey Kia hatchback still dusted with snow, with hatch back open showing it is Full of bags of fiber. snow covered branches above car hang low from the weight of the clinging snow. Inside my Gray kea soul. there are bags of fiber and suply filling the back of the car blocking direct vision out the back and getting quite close to the inside of the roof. 1-3 it’s impressive how much wool you can stuff in a Kia Soul!

The side streets were not the greatest, but the highway was fine and the parking lot had been cleared!!!

the snow covered and slippery walkway in front of Heartwood house (the Building the guild is in) snow covers the ground and is clinging to the trees, the front corner of my car is visible on the left of the pictures. Front Gallery just outside the Guild studio, 7 large bags of wool on one side and boxes and bags of suplys on the other side of the hall way. in the distance my walker also carying boxes. the gallary has tropical plants along the windoe and artwork (prints) on the walls. 4-5 Arriving at the Guild and dropping off the stuff

He carried in the bags of wool, the box of armature things and the couple boxes of supplies. Then went and found the missing tables.

4 large plastic folding tables and a smaller white one hold fiber and boxes of suplys for workshop within the OVWSG studio6 Tables found and now I can set up!

He set them up in a C or U pattern so I could sit in a rolling chair in the center and help any student without a lot of standing and bending over.

18 pages of notes, a colourfull foam nealing pad (originaly for gardening), a pice of pool noodle, 3 sizes of small wooden dowls, leather Finger cots, wooden single needle holder all sitting on grey folding table 7  18 pages of Notes, Foam kneeling pad, A piece of pool noodle, 2 sizes of dowels, finger cots, wooden single needle holder. Still to add will be the needles.

I had also had a few needles for them to see what difference a gauge will make. T32,T36,T38,Crown40,Revese40 and 42. all needles are in zip lock bags and in little pieces of pool noodle foam. 8 I also had a few needles for them to see what difference a gauge will make.

a book on comparitive anatomy and one on Anagarumi monsters both listed in the text below picture9 the books just past the needles

You may have spotted I brought a few possibly useful Books; Comparative Anatomy (Animals Vs. Human)  Cyclopedia Anatomicae: More than 1,500 Illustrations of the Human and Animal Figure for the Artist by Gyorgy Feher. I also had a book on Anagarumi to give the students some ideas.  Edward’s Crochet Imaginarium: Flip the pages to make over a million mix-and-match monsters by Kerry Lord. (Kerry Lord also has a book on crocheting sheep! Toft Sheep – 18 Crochet Sheep Patterns (uses UK terms))

a couple of my sculptural felting books. both books are listed in the text below the picture.10 a couple of my sculptural books.

Armature/Sculpture books I brought to show the students; A Masterclass in Needle Felting Dogs by Cindy-Lou Thompson, Needle Felted Kittens: How to Create Cute and Lifelike Cats from Wool by Hinali.

There are now quite a few good books on sculptural felting with or without an armature. I had a list of 14 that they may want to keep an eye out for.

plastic haloween skeliton of a dragon standing on pacagease of smartie candys (candiy coated chocholet)11   I also brought sustenance and plastic inspiration

The Ottawa guild has always wanted to have small class sizes to insure good student-teacher ratios. Most workshops have a maximum of six students. With the first snow dump of the year and 2 types of flu plus covid, I was a bit worried that it may not run. In the end, we had one student driving over an hour to Ottawa and made it safely but one was sick and another with a sick child. So we ran with four students.  Three went for Anagarumi-based Things and one went with a Kraken/Octopus combo. They were a bit bigger than I had envisioned but they all still had their armatures in time to have lunch.

4 images of hands working on bending wire to make there armatures12  Armatures are underway

We had two Things with four arms and a tail, one with two arms a tail and wings, and the octopus creature used pipe cleaners (ok now there called Chanel stems since there are not a lot of pipes to clean anymore) to see how that would help with wrapping later.

After a lunch break, they started to wrap the fibre around their armatures.

wool aplication starts, 3 of the scupltures has the first bit of wool added. 13 wool wrapping begins

I brought a couple of types of fibre preparations. This would let them see the difference between carded (which makes a woollen yarn)  and combed (which makes a Worsted yarn). I am going to talk about this more in a future post.

This thing was being helpful by holding fiber for its creator, even when that was not as helpful as it sounds.14 This thing was being helpful by holding fibre for its creator, even when that was not as helpful as it sounds.

this thing is developing fabulous wings.15 this thing is developing fabulous wings.

Unlike my last octopus this one has 8 arms! The pipe cleaners were found easy to wrap over.16 Unlike my last octopus this one has 8 arms! The pipe cleaners were found easy to wrap over.

A little way into wrapping, the students all realized it takes a bit of time to wrap, so instead of rushing and risking lots of punctured fingers, they decided they would like to add a second half to the workshop and focus on surface work. I did spend part of the time they were wrapping to show them a couple of options for adding fluffy furry surfaces.

two of this things arms were added to increase its head.17 two of these things arms were added to increase its head.

This one still has all four of his arms and is now standing on his own.18 This one still has all four of his arms and is now standing on his own.

By 4 pm we had good shapes developed and no major bloodletting due to rushing.

the octopus is starting to emerge. 2 legs are wrapped in white Top (Combed) and the rest are wrapped in Roving (Carded) wool.19 the octopus is starting to emerge

the thing with 4 arms has now received a head20  the thing with 4 arms has now received a head

the winged thing has temporary eyes and looks like he is looking forward to getting wings.21 the winged thing has temporary eyes and looks like he is looking forward to getting wings.

The class while not quite finished seems to have had fun to this point.  We will get a bit of time scheduled for part two to finish the outer layers in the new year. It’s always hard to estimate on time for a new workshop and the pace the students will progress at. Not pushing for speed, I think is the way to go for this one. Needle felting yourself is not conducive to creating more needle felters!

I hope you will get to take some time over the holidays to do a bit of needle felting. If you are at a loss for what to make you may want to peruse the Anagarumi Monsters for a bit of mix and match inspiration! Happy Hanukkah, Mary Christmas, Happy Solstice and Happy Holidays from the Mer Family, the Scott-Martin Family and the rest of my felted menagerie.

PS is it just my dyslexic brain or is this date really cool 12-22-2022 (if only we had 20 or 22 months it would be perfect! OK, the last few years have felt like years containing more than 12 months) but I hope you can enjoy such a fabulously numbered day! See you Next Year!!

A Felt Solution for a Small Problem

A Felt Solution for a Small Problem

Comments 10 comments

Black thumb drive and black thumb drive and black thumb drive? Which Identical looking thumb drive has the file I am looking for? Silly me I saw them on sale and bought them! Now I again have a handful of thumb drives that I have to open each one to find out what it might have on them…. Well, that’s annoying.

thumb drives Yes, I have a lot of black thumb drives!

I had to pass some files over to Ann and need some way to make this little black drive look different from the rest of them and so it won’t get lost with any that she also has.

Sitting here in front of the computer, with a pile of fibre and lots of needles, I wonder…… can you needle felt directly to an attachment point on the drive? These have particularly small attachment spots for a toggle so a ribbon or leather strip won’t fit. But I think I can get a felting needle in there!

I had bought a pink rose and grey batt from Christine which just happens to be sitting here.  What shall I do? What shall I make? I have no clue… No, I don’t think I want a fish. So I grabbed a bit of fibre and started to poke at it, poke, poke, flip, poke, hmmm, no, not a fish. But it is starting to look like it wants to be a mitt. One of those really big winter mitts gripping the end of the thumb drive. Ha! My thumb drive has a thumb attached to it (with the rest of the mitt!)

OOPS, I gave it to Ann before getting a photo of it.

thumb and palmfingers

thanks, Ann!  the top is the thumb holding on to the hole in the drive and the purple is the back of the mitt. it has a big fluffy cuff. I will have to work more on the palm and wrist when I get it back.

Ah, another day of rain, I guess my fleece washing and drying is now getting an extra rinse again. it’s raining too much to even sit out and felt undercover today.

I grabbed some more of the same batt of pinks, rose and grey and started randomly poking at the wool. After a bit I started feeling like footwear, yes that is definitely a short felt boot. I added a bright pink bit of fibre as the sole and started pulling bits of curls and added them along the rim of the boot and extended the backup and attached it to the thumb drive.

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I got distracted working on the computer and looked up to see MORE RAIN…. The fleece gets another rinse.

The weekend was busy with getting Mom groceries and birthday cupcake (chocolate on chocolate with chocolate!) She is 89 this year!  I had a wonderful visit with friends, with social distancing and then on to the birthday party and belated birthday presents for my Niece for her 16th birthday (we gave her a starter selection of fibre, needles and an instruction book. She had never felted before and made a very nice strawberry between getting the book, eating dinner and before dessert!

For the next thumb drive, I really wanted to make a wire sheep. I had some of the combed blue locks sitting close to hand so blue sheep it would be! I divided the single piece of floral wire into loops for legs, tail and left the rest for the head. My tiny scrolling plyers had disappeared gain so Glenn stopped into Dollerama to pick up more. I don’t know what I would do without that store, it has most of my not originally meant for felting supplies. I had to wait on the plyers until he got back from work so I hand twisted the legs and used the tail loop at the attachment to the thumb drive. I will tighten that up and make hoof loops later.  I decided to make a nice round little body but leave the legs and neck wire. The head I added ears and a couple of tight curls. I think she turned out quite well.

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The attachment is easier to see with the wire rather than with the boot or mitt felting.

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Since the labelling of the boot’s drive as a Boot drive gives it other meanings in computer vocabulary I will call this the pink slipper drive, and the other will be the blue sheep drive.

That was a fun little project and has successfully made the on sale black identical thumb drives now look different! Have fun and keep felting (but it may be best not to do wet felting with this one!)

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Dyeing some yarn

Dyeing some yarn

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A year ago a friend who also owns a small fibre business asked me to dye her some Autumn-inspired rainbow yarn for her to knit with for her own client. I was happy to oblige, and very pleased with the end results. This is the picture of the leg warmers she made. Her name is The Crimson Rabbit on Ravelry and here is her profile.

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Now, repeating a colourway when you have no written data on how you accomplished it the first time can be a bit tricky, but not impossible. If you’re used to the same dyes you sort of develop an eye to recognise them, and this is more or less what happened in this instance.

You can see the yarn starts out a very light yellow and progresses to a slightly more orange-toned one. I mixed some dyes up, eyeballing the colours and dipping a corner of kitchen roll tissue in the liquid to determine when I was happy with the mixture. I did the same for each colour. I was lucky I recognised the yellow-brown dye at the end or I’d be in a lot of trouble to reproduce that particular one.

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This is what the skeins look after they’d been steam-set and dry. I think it looks quite similar from the original one, don’t you? Winding these two skeins back to functioning yarn took me (I kid you not) around two hours. I had divided and tied up each section previously by weight, and boy it’s a lot more work to put it all back together…

Now, since I know my post is a little late (sorry about that) and a bit on the thin side, allow me to share a couple of images of the park near me when the cold arrived. Our friends over in North America will no doubt think this type of cold is cute, but I sure felt it in my bones…

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Finally, another exciting commission: a raven! I was asked to make this and it had to specifically be a raven, not a crow. Not sure exactly how to tell the difference between the two, I did some internet research and, a few documentaries and image searches later, I think I’m a bona fide corvid geek now…

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What exciting stuff have you been up to in the fibre world? Share away, I’d love to hear it.

 

Painting with wool

Painting with wool

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For today’s blog post, I am sharing with you a workshop I went to, where Dani Ives was teaching how to paint with wool. If you haven’t heard of Dani’s work, I highly recommend you check out her website.

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Portrait of Luna, copyright Dani Ives (taken with permission from the author)

Before we get started, what exactly is “painting with wool?” It is a 2D needle felting process whereby you pick a theme, copy the design onto flat wool sheets or another type of fabric, and then proceed to “paint” it with different colour wools using felting needles.
This term was coined by Dani Ives when she realised she was essentially using wool the same way painters use paint to represent an object.

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My “classmates” before we started

I was asked to bring an image to reproduce. My main goal with this workshop was to learn how to do 2D pet portraits, so I decided to be ambitious and chose a photo of my cat Marshmallow.

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I’m being ambitious but not overly so – her eyes are closed

After transferring the image onto the felt fabric with an ordinary pen, it was time to pick the appropriate colours to use. I confess this is the part I have the most trouble with, because you have to think of the colour not only “as is” but also have a little sense of how it will look after it’s been blended with the others around it.

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We then proceeded to apply the wool onto the surface and needle felting it in place. You need to keep the reference photo at hand and look at it often, as it’s very easy to get carried away and start using artistic licence – you don’t want to do that when you’re going for a faithful reproduction!

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There’s more hours put into this than I want to admit

This is a slow, laborious process. Obviously you will get quicker as you become better but I sure took long to reach the above phase.

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This is my current progress. It’s slowly coming together. I can’t wait to see this finished.

Finally, I had to share my fangirl moment, a picture of me with Dani Ives herself!

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Have you ever done any 2D needle felting? Let me know how it went for you in the comments section. Thanks for reading!

Chico the needle felted dog

Chico the needle felted dog

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Hello, Leonor here. My guest post for today is going to be a simple “show and tell” as the weather here in London is too warm for complicated thoughts!

Some of you might be aware that I am a fibre artist by trade. Anything wool and I love it. I got into this business a little by accident, and making custom needle felted dogs was even more unexpected – basically, a friend asked me for a mini of his whippet, I took the challenge, and the rest is history!

I’ve now been playing with wool professionally for around 5 years, and I must confess there was one hurdle I was yet to conquer in my work – creating an open mouth. I’d tried once and it didn’t come out right, so I more or less gave up on it. That is, until I made Chico!

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At first I was going to make his tongue out of polymer clay (the idea of finishing it off with a nice layer of glossy varnish to mimic moisture was very attractive to me) but then I decided not to. I liked the idea of a 100% fibre sculpture better.

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I made the lower jaw separately, making sure the upper section was thin enough to accommodate both parts without looking weird. I added a layer of black around the edge to make it more realistic, and then a little white on the back for teeth. The tongue was made using two shades of purplish pink blended together. I made two mini tongues and chose the one that fit best.

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I received a few reference photos to make this little guy, my favourite was one where he was sitting with his leg to the side and smiling. I just had to make him this way.

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I love the detail of paw pads, the feet immediately look real. You can’t really tell from this picture, but Chico is er… anatomically correct. I like a realistic sculpture!

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Below is a picture of the original Chico. The mini version is off to a Spanish island as a surprise for the whole human family. I hope they like it!

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Have you ever created a needle felted animal? What wool did you use and how did you like your experience? Let me know in the comments section.
Questions? Happy to help, just leave a comment!

Tidying up Treasure.

Tidying up Treasure.

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In an attempt to find more storage I had to clear out some junk that should never been stored in the first place. I am sure everyone has some of this. While I was rummaging I found my old tiny needle felting machine. Its a small converted sewing machine. I had forgotten I even had it.

I used to have a larger one but I sold it when I moved more into wet felting hats and scarves.   Instead of having a sponge pad for the needles to poke down into it had a plate with a hole for each needle. I really didn’t enjoy using it. You could hear the needles hitting the edges of the holes as you tried to move the fabric around.  You need to move the fibers and base around slowly while needling to cover an area. I was always sure the needles were going to break and either jam the machine or fly. I didn’t want to have to wear safety glasses as I worked.

I have the big cityscape I made with the little machine framed and for sale.  It has almost sold several times.  With someone trying to decide between it and another piece and the other always went instead. One day it will find the right home. Today I would do more wet felting and less needle felting but all the little machine would probably still be the easiest way to place with the little windows. Not the best shot of it  but I have no place to hang it or even lean it properly to take its picture. framed it is about 36 inches by 24 inches.

 

Anyway I am glad I found it . I think it will be useful for tacking things down and adding smaller pieces that tend to move around to much in the wet felting process. Of course part of that problem is me being impatient. I think I am going to see if I can make a better guard.  I wonder if anyone I know works with clear plastic and I could maybe commission a clear guard attachment.

Felted Sheep Class

Felted Sheep Class

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This last weekend I was teaching a needle felted sheep class. I had 5 ladies in the class and as usual I forgot to take as many pictures as I should. I should hire a photographer I am always to busy.

I showed them how to make the legs by needle felting and then showed them how to make a wet felted snake you can make legs faster and easier if you want to make a small flock.

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They did really well, with very little finger poking. After needling all the parts together in to naked sheep, they all picked their colours form the containers of Blue Faced Lester curls I brought so their sheep could get their wool.

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Four were completely done at the end of class. I love theses little sheep they all have their own personalities.

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One was not quite done and will be finished at home. For the moment we decided he was staggering  home from a drunken bust up at the local pub.

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This is probably the last time I will teach this class and the 5 ladies made it a fun class to finish with. I few other talented ladies are going to take over the needle felting classes at the guild.  This suits me as I don’t needle felt much anymore and prefer wet felting.