Wednesday 25 October 2017

Getting physical with wool

Hello. I had a smashing time at Hawkmoon Crafts, learning how to wet felt a picture. Sue was an excellent teacher, and we had a lot of fun. There were two others doing it, and guess what, they read my blog and picked up the link from there. That was a surprise. 
Sue's house is full of arts and crafts, most of it made by her and some she has collected from other crafters. We started with a piece of bubblewrap and laid out the base of our picture in white wool. We then chose the  background colours we wanted, and placed them on top, building up several layers. Then we had to decide on the detail we wanted in our picture. 

After coffee and cake we then started the wetting process. Warm soapy water is sprayed all over it, the bubblewrap is folded over to cover it, and then we rubbed it all over with a scrunched up carrier bag, pushing down hard as we did so. The idea is to get the fibres matted together. It gets quite physical as we rolled it up, first one way then the other, putting more pressure on it. We even threw it hard down on the table, just as you would with a piece of dough when bread making. My wrists started aching.

Eventually we ended up with our own hand made picture to take home.

This is mine. I plan to add some needle felting and stitching to it. If my flowers were white instead of orange, they would look like fried eggs, ha ha. It's surprising the difference between dry needle felting and wet felting. All the pummeling makes it shrink. and the picture ends up a lot more messy.

I think we all did ok. I'm glad I learnt how to do it, and it's nice that it was a social event as well.  It's given me a taste for it and I'll probably do some more.

I've got a job to do tomorrow. Helen has a big hutch that she wants converting from a detached bunny house to two separate flats, upstairs and downstairs, for two hedgies. I've had a look through my wood stash and picked several pieces out for the conversion.

Now I'm tired, so I'll sign off. Thanks for popping in, we'll catch up soon.
Toodle pip

17 comments:

  1. never tried wet felting but that looks so good

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  2. Great work Ilona, it does look like such a fun thing to do. Good luck with the hedgehog flats tomorrow,xxxxx

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  3. I do like that Ilona-I've always thought felt looks such fun.I used to wear a jumper that was washed too hot -I really liked it.I've seen felted slippers I think x

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  4. A social event and creating art, how fun. I like the results you show.

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  5. I like the results very much - they look almost like chalk paintings. What fun! Thank you for sharing some colourful inspiration this cold, rainy day. Hugs from Barbara (Canada)

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  6. Looks great, and sounds fun too!
    I’ve been having a look at some of your videos today, having an hour to spare :) Really enjoyed them, especially the recent one about living your own life.

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    1. I have a video page on here, but there are so many of them now, I haven't had time to update it. Best to go straight to yoootoooob for them.

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  7. Glorious. I made felt beads like this once and then stitched glass beads on top and made a brooch which I still wear. It was great fun!
    Arilx

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  8. Hi everyone,I ve only just found the comment section!love reading your blog meanqueen and now all the thoughts of your lovely followers,long may you continue.xxxRosemary.

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    1. Hi Rosemary, welcome, nice to have you on board. Have a look around, feel free to comment whenever you like.

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  9. Fabulous, they're wonderful, I'd love to have a go at that. I love how the colour's have gone together so beautifully. Maggie x

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    1. There are plenty of yooootooob videos to learn from. Depending on how many colours you want it might be a bit expensive to start off with if you are buying them. Ask at your local craft shop.

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  10. Wow, your pictures look amazing!

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  11. Gorgeous work Ilona and hope you do more of this especially combined with your hand stitching. Kristel

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  12. That looks really good. And you had fun with people too.

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  13. Those all look great--I love how colorful they are!

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  14. We had Sue come to our Textile Group and we covered stones with wet felting. It was great fun. Your picture looks fab.

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