Teddy Love

two posts in one day who would have thought! haha well I wanted to show you why I'm getting into teddy bears. This is Teddy Love, he's a sweet little thing, jointed by needle felting no sewing. He has his own little hand created cushion that he uses as a bed and to sit on. I also felted this little heart for him, he's a mixture of wool I used dorset as core wool and then hand blended merino roving together to get this neat texture from him that reminds me of heirloom bears.

Bear giveaway

since I'm getting into bears at the moment I just wanted to share this little give away of a very cute hand made bear. http://bearbits.blogspot.com/2010/10/my-fall-giveaway.html the bear looks really well made and so adorably cute its ridiculous! in a good way of course haha. Good luck to everyone in the give away they always bring the community of craft lovers together.

I have also entered this bear give away http://littleleafbears.blogspot.com/2010/10/blog-giveaway.html and love the name of this blog The little leaf. It's unique and hand made bears too.

I'm also entering this give away here to win a so cute crochet egg http://bouffeebambini.blogspot.com/2010/10/amieggs-giveaway.html I love give aways as you can probably tell

Little lion finger puppet

I am so happy awhile ago I posted that I lost a lion finger puppet that I had made and I was worried that I maybe threw him in the trash but I found him whilst I was doing the house work today so quickly I took this photo of him. His body is wet felted and then his features are all needle felted, isn't he cute? he does look a little pensive but no wonder as I almost threw him away!

Sam the Foxie dog who loves his Christmas tree

This is Sammy and he's very taken by the Christmas tree, The Christmas tree is wet felted over a resist and then I stuffed it with polyfibefill and then layered some wool and felted it closed. Sammy is needle felted in Dorset wool and is a Pure bred Foxie dog.

wool guide for needle felting and wet felting

wool there are so many to choose from and I thought that I would create a guide
that is rated from easiest to hardest. I started origially with merino roving and
that stuff is slippery unless you get a courser type or a mixed breed type. I find
the courser the better as it still gives a nice finish.


Easy beginner wools
Merino cross batting very easy to work with comes in a variety of colors and usually
easy to buy. I bought this from Ebay.



This merino roving is a courser grade and is great for beginner to work on eve though its roving its not as slippery as some finer merino roving you can buy, comes in a huge range of colors and I also bought this lot off an ebay seller who dies
who own wool in eco friendly colors.


Dorset wool
I have been using dorset wool lately and it felts similar to C1 Norwegan
batting and Dorset wool is really good and easy to felt, I'm really loving
it though am finding it somewhat hard to buy as Dorset wool is supposedly
known as a meat breed and not for its wool, supposedly Dorset wool
does not wet felt that easily though from my understanding of it. I have found sellers on Etsy but its not as widely available as others.


Intermediate wool
I find if you scale down on the course side to a softer feel all it is
that it takes longer to felt. It's not that much harder but when you start
on it then it gets easier to work with.

Finer merino roving is available in most colors and people die their own
very easily.



Alpaca wool is normally in batting form, I find it relatively easy to felt
but can have longer fuzzies that you may need to trim. I love the natural un dyed
versions but I also love the fantasy colors people can create when creating their
own battings. Comes available from ebay quite easily.




Advanced wools
I have a small selection of fine fibers that work well for longer haired items
or for decorative purposes.
Camel
is very soft and felts easily and I reccomend using it over core wool

Cashmere
so soft to the touch but hard to start off with again good to work over core wool
and can be found on most sites like ebay but Etsy seems to be a goer for fancy yarns and wool


Baby Camel
is very soft and felts easily and I reccomend using it over core wool and it seems to be quite popular. Its somewhat soft but also very similar to alpaca. Can be found in gourmet wool suppliers on Etsy and other similar sites.



Silk merino mixed wool roving I find this great to use in wet felting projects as well as decorative accents in needle felting as the wool itself is very soft and takes ages to felt. Can be found in a huge range of colors and I have bought this easily off ebay from a lady who dies her own wool.


Tussah silk is very popular and is durable and has a really lovely natural sheen to it in the light. Perfect for hair.


Bamboo fiber
is used in wet felting and needle felting for decorative purposes is widely available over the internet.


this is a basic guide for those who don't know the variety of wool out there, these photos were taken by me from wool in my personal stash. I hope this helps you to gain more knowledge.

wet felted lariat

I've been reasonably busy planning my Christmas ornament I'm making for my currently unknown partner. Felt alives needle felting forum is hosting a swap and its Christmas ornament themed. I'm making something relatively unisex but still something in a little my style and also something that they'll like as I like everyone in the group as I've seen all their work. There are at least 20 people in the swap and partners will be drawn on the 1st of November.

Anyways the long and the short of it I've been playing around and a needle broke, I was so sad because I had one this needle in Kay's felt alive blog give away, I do have the rest of the set of course but it just made me annoyed that this one broke and not one of my store bought ones. I did go and buy another set from her website, and I also splashed out on a new felting pad cause mine is starting to crumble even with the numerous layers of felt on it to try to lengthen its life.

But out of all of this I wet felted this lariat inspired from the book How we felt, I did make it smaller however and in my own true style I did it my way haha I don't embroider but I attempted adding beads in the center of the flower.

The Jolly Golly Wog

I've been a mad felting nut lately lol I created this Jolly golly wog for my fiancee's brother as everytime we walk by the craft store that's near us he's always like oh look their coming back into fashion haha he's 46 so I did this gollywog in muted colors which I think turned out well, he's mainly felted in dorset wool which I'm really loving at the moment but he has accents of merino roving.

StringyBark festival and awards

wow I just can't believe it I entered the Stringybark festival and it was right at the last minute because my sewing teacher convinced me I should. It was the last night I had time to enter it and I only had these three items to show and tell in sewing and so I entered them. I placed second in bear category, second in hand made toy category and third in hand made toy category. There were over three hundred entrants so I'm just so happy I placed at all because there were so many more professional entrants than mine I thought. I entered mine in the intermediate section and was so excited when I picked them up again this evening. I sadly didn't have time over the weekend to go to the festival but it was still nice to have my work as an exhibit over the time.

Halloween mouse

Needle felted jack o lantern and mouse ready for Halloween! this quirky little mouse loves climbing and his smiling pal keeps him company. Both made out of merino roving and alpaca and the pumpkin was learned from Kay's felt alive free needle felting pumpkin video!

Wet felting fun

Here are a couple of wet felted thingo's I made today and I'm really happy with how they came out. I experiemented cause normally I wet felt with liquid dishwashing soap but this time I used soap flakes and it worked so much better. I'll be doing it a lot more from now on now I see the difference. Anyways an abstract yellow cat and felted flowers and sun. Made with merino roving, I'm thinking of turning them into cards for friends.

mini bear

we had a downpour today so I'm doing three posts to show off these things I've done to keep me entertained haha we'll be getting more rain over the weekend too so looks like its indoor times again. Meet another mini critter mini bear! of course made from merino roving

needle felted mini hedge hog

very tiny and very sweet, merino roving

Spring has sprung

My fiancee took me on a lunch date today as it was such nice Spring weather we had a picnic by the pond/waterway/park and watched the ducks as they did their ducky things! I took some photos and am really happy with how these turned out, my favorite one is the first one with the duck meandering up the path way all on its own. I'm glad we went at lunch due to typical Spring weather it is now raining quite heavily so we would have been disappointed and missed out on seeing the baby ducklings.

Needle felted little deer

A little deer I have created today not a hundred percent finished but almost there, he's rather cute I think, merino and alpaca wool and he stands at about 3 inches high I felted the little grass patch for him I hope you like him.

New selling site Zibbet and something is lost

I've found another place like etsy called zibbert.com and I hope to make it my new selling home on the web as I find Etsy just too big.

But anyways I'm rather down this week and haven't been doing a lot, nothing has been coming together how I want it to and its just annoying me so I've been taking a break.


In another note
I've lost one of my needle felted items! T_T Its made me really frustrated and sad at myself. I think I've put him in the bin by accident so now I have to go rummaging to find out. If I find it I'll clean it up and post a photo of him as he's really really cute. I looked every where for him last night but just couldn't find him. That's what happens when we're under renovations at home

Oh how sweet it is to love chocolate

I was so happy with how these photos turned out lol I don't normally take photos of food but these chocolates were a gift from my younger brother as my birthday is on Wednesday. Anyways the long and the short of it is these chocolates were too cute not to take photos of! I'm going to use them in reference to make needle felted chocolates out of how cute would that be?!

the flavors are
Creme Brulee
French Almond Torte
Vanilla Ice Cream and Toffee Cup
Strawberry Pavlova
Lemon and Lime Parfait
Tiramisu

my favorite was the French Almond Torte but I liked all of them! The brand of
these chocolates are called Lilly o'Brian Desserts Collection. Obviously this is not a review or whatever I'm just so pleased I was able to try these... I normally don't go for these fancy looking things because I always fear their too pretty to destroy just for the sake of eating chocolate.

doggie is yellow!

wow two posts in one night! here is an almost finished lab dog I'm working on lol the camera showed me its on a slight lean but whatever its still cute!

Mermaid

a wet felted table runner that I've called mermaid because of its kelp like features and sea green colors. Made from alpaca wool roving.