I realize I'm running late on the Easter posts, but Easter starting it by being late this year. Truth be told, I still have a few Easter or Creepster projects to finish so don't judge. Or judge, I don't really care, it's my blog and if I want to do Easter in July, I will.
My first contribution is Bunny Cthulhu, isn't he adorable?
I really like needle felting, it doesn't take a whole lot to get started, a felting needle, some wool roving, a surface to felt on and the desire to do a lot of stabbing.
They make brush mats for felting or you can use foam. I bought an inexpensive
upholstery foam remnant from Joann. My local store has a bin in the back full of remnants. The piece I got was big enough to cut into plenty good sized blocks to share when I have friends over. The three inch thickness is probably overkill, but I like it. Most blocks sold specifically for felting seem to be 2 inches.
I started out with a single needle a friend gave me. That's how they get you addicted you know. It just takes one needle. And I did a lot with that one needle, but needles dull or break and it is useful to have different sizes and types. I have a set like
this that I really like.
My experience in buying wool roving is limited to local craft stores and farmers markets. The chain stores all carry the same stuff. Literally the same exact product, just with their store brand on the packaging.
Yorkshire Rose Farm is a vendor at one our local markets and they always have a wide variety of colors and wools, including curly locks. The one mistake I've made is accidentally buying Merino wool. It's very smooth and silky so it's better for welt felting than needle felting, but it can also be used for hair/fur. There's ton's of info on all the different breeds and how the different wools felt up but I've found Romney seems to be the most readily available for needle felting.
For
wet felting all I use is bubble wrap and a dish towel. I don't do a lot of wet felting but it's useful for thin pieces. Since I just make small embellishments I start with needle felting to set the fibers in place before wet felting. I believe any type of wool can be wet felted.
The best part of needle felting is all the stabbing. Occasionally I have friends over for Stabby Night, it's very therapeutic. Now kids, you shouldn't drink and stab, but we do. That's also why I keep band aids and Neosporin in my stabby kit.
Unfortunately the worst part of needle felting is also all the stabbing. There comes a point where all the angst leaves your body and your hand starts to cramp. It does help to only stab as deep as necessary. If you stab through your project and push the fibers out the other side, you then have to stab them back in, which is just more work. Only stab with the barbed part of the needle, going deeper doesn't get you anything, except maybe hand cramps.
I also want to give a shout out to a club that just opened up this year,
Crucible. They host a wide variety of events that you are not going to find at your local sports bar. Every Sunday afternoon it's Dark Arts & Crafts (and Games). There's no cover and you can bring projects to work on or play games. I love that a club supports us crafty folks by offering up their space so we can carry out our craft addictions. As much as I love hosting Stabby Nights, having a place to meet up with friends is pretty wonderful too and it's because of Dark Arts & Crafts that I got these two projects done.
I would have more felting done, but my friend sidetracked me with Pysanky eggs (that'll be another post). She got quite a few of us addicted and the Crucible has been very supportive of our large group of egg people and helping us get enough tables to set up. I can't say enough how awesome they are.
It's hard to take pictures of the felting process, because the urge to just keep stabbing is so great. My
first felting post, and my
zombie bunny felting one have a little more info on felting. The Bunny Cthulhu basics are as follows:
- two balls one for the head, one for the body
- two wings, first needle felted for general shape, then wet felted, then needle felted to polish the edges and add detail
- two ears, basically the same as wings with less detail work
- five tentacles that started out as three logs, alternating needle stabbing with rolling them like clay to shape them, cut the logs in half, the sixth piece can be used as an appendage on something else
Attach the head to body by adding some loose wool between the two and stabbing. Attach the tentacles by layering loose wool, the cut end of the tentacles, and more loose wool onto the face. Stab the loose wool into a pleasing (or nightmarish) shape around the tentacles to hold in place. Stab in details with small balls of felt such as black soulless eyes or dark pink beauty marks.
A couple years ago I felted a few
creepy eggs, one of which was an eyeball. I wanted to make another one, just a little bit fancier this time.
See flowers, that's fancy right?
It's not very egg shaped from the sides because of how I built up the eyelids.
The vines are made by rolling small amounts of wool roving into tiny strands before felting them on. You can keep adding more wool overlapping the ends to make the vines as long as you'd like. I roll the wool down the top of my thigh. I like wearing jeans or pants with a bit of texture for this. If you want tighter vines get them wet with soapy water and then roll and twist. Either way, always work in the same direction. The flowers are little balls, the leaves are little mice turd shaped rolls. Using a finer felting needle for these details helps a lot.
Couldn't resist asking my favorite zombie hand to model my new eyeball egg.
