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Looking For Dimension

Looking For Dimension

I thought I’d try out a couple of things inspired by Marilyn’s challenge. A while ago, I bought some ‘budget filling‘ from World of Wool, with the intention of using it to make texturey felt or try it as a weird texturey surface effect, but I’d never got around to it. I thought I’d just try a smallish sample piece to see how it worked. I laid out a couple of regular layers of an Olive Merino, then added a pile of the filling:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAI covered it with another 2 layers of Merino in greens and browns, I’m not sure you can tell there’s a mound from this photo:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAI think the wool content must be quite high, because it flattened quickly and didn’t ‘bounce back’ after drying, it’s not very obvious (not as obvious as that face on the right!):

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAIt’s a bit more evident at an angle, though most noticeable is the migration of the fibres through to the top:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAEven looking along the surface there’s not much thickness, though the wavy edges show it did have an effect overall:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAThe other thing I tried was using organza. I had a tangle of strips, bits and unravellings in the bottom of my organza box. I laid out some of the separate strips onto some netting, and added the shorter/tangled bits in between:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAYou can see the tangle of fibres here:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAAnd here, too:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAThen I added a couple of regular layers of Merino over the top and then felted the way I usually do. I was expecting a bit more texture and more loose bits:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAThere is a lot of rippling:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAThese bits were loose at the ends:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERASome sparkly golden bits:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA
Maybe I should try combing the filling with the organza? 🙂

Finished Texture Piece

Finished Texture Piece

I mentioned in my last post that I’d finished my white texture piece that I’ve talked about recentlyHere is the photo from the last post of it all sewn up.  I finally managed to get a bright enough day to take a photograph.  With all of the locks it’s really quite big, so I had to take it outside and photograph it on a large piece of cardboard.  It’s roughly 16 inches x 11 inches, but the locks at the bottom are almost 11 inches long.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAI wanted to try something different, so when I laid it out I left a space in the centre without any wool then added a piece of cotton gauze after the second layer of wool.  It was here that I added the wool locks around the edges as well.  I then added another two layers of wool. The surface texture around the edge of the gauze is soybean top, a piece of cotton gauze and silk noil.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAIn this close-up, you can see a few wisps of wool have crept behind the gauze.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAThe wool locks all kept their shape really well and none of them tangled together.  The Angora, Wensleydale and Teeswater locks in this next photo show how nicely they turned out.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAI kept the whole texture piece soft and spongey by using wools like English 56s, Swaledale, Texel and Cheviot.  For surface texture I used cotton gauze, scoured Bluefaced Leicester and Wensleydale as seen in this photo.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAI also used Mohair, wool nepps, raw Gotland, Teeswater and Wensleydale locks, and embellishment fibres soybean top and silk noil.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAI’m really pleased with the way it turned out, especially the gauze panel in the centre.  Doing this piece has given me some good ideas for future projects.

Finished Stitching Project

Finished Stitching Project

I’ve managed to add quite a bit more stitching to the felt piece I’ve been working on lately. After the yellow and orange stitches I added a square of burgundy around the yellow and then some rows of black stitches in the middle.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAAfter that I added a row of white stitching at the two short ends, then using one long piece of variegated white and beige shaded thread, I added some more rows, then went down the long side.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAI finished it off by sewing alternate rows of a pale yellow and chocolate brown. I haven’t decided what I might do with it yet, but I like the way it turned out.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAI did finish my white texture piece as well this week. I haven’t had a chance to photograph it yet since it dried, but here’s a photo of it all sewn up, waiting to go into the washer–I usually put them in a pillow case to protect them and to stop fibres getting on the laundry.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAThe next piece I’ve decided to work on now is a nuno felted piece, I used muslin as a base and merino for the wool. I haven’t decided yet if I’m going to make a pencil case or something else.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAWhat have you been working on lately?

January Projects

January Projects

I’ve been trying to find ways of having a few projects on the go so I can work on them for a few minutes at a time where possible. A few months ago, I posted about a couple of felt pieces I’d made with the intention of practising stitches for the Take A Stitch Tuesday challenge. I didn’t keep up with the challenge, so had the pieces spare. I decided to add some stitching to the first piece. This is how it looked originally. I started by machine stitching around the patches of colour.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAThis is a close up:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAOver the next couple of days, I added some hand stitched straight stitches, first in in yellow and then added some in orange.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAAnother project I got started on this week is a white texture felt piece. Liz from That Fuzzy Feeling blog, recently made a gorgeous piece of texture felt and it inspired me to make one. I decided to make a natural white one, so I got to play with (and smell!) my collection of wool, alpaca and mohair locks. They are mostly unwashed so my hands felt really nice afterwards.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAThe first day I managed to get as far as laying it out and sewing up around the edges.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAHere are some of the gorgeous locks I positioned around the edges:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERASo far, I’ve managed to add the stitches from the top to the bottom.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAThanks to Ruth for encouraging us to find ways to fit in a few minutes of fibre time each day, I’ve managed to get a lot more done this week than I otherwise would have. It might not be much each day, but before long, it all adds up to finished projects I wouldn’t have had without the challenge 🙂

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