Showing posts with label needle felting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label needle felting. Show all posts

Sunday, April 25, 2010

April ATC's

The theme for one of my April artist trading card swaps was paperless. It was quite a challenge! We weren't allowed to use any paper whatsoever, and I had a hard time figuring out what to do.

I experimented with metal, Fun Foam, Shrinky Dinks, and other materials before settling on needle felting.

The above ATC is for a different swap with a tree theme. We were allowed to use paper for that swap. I made the tree using a fused fiber technique from the book Artist Trading Card Workshop .

This last one is titled "Word Tree."

Next month's theme is a foreign city, which should be lots of fun.

Sunday, July 26, 2009

Weekend crafts and superhero cat

My sister thoughtfully sent me a bouquet of flowers at work the other day, and I brought them home on Friday to enjoy over the weekend. While attempting to photograph them, Charlie decided to strike a pose. I love how this one turned out-- he looks like a superhero who just sensed the bat signal. (Cat signal?)

Friday night I treated myself to a pedicure and an issue of Somerset Studio magazine. That magazine gets my creative juices flowing. I stayed up until two in the morning working on this collage.



I had fun splattering white gesso on it.


I finished decorating another small tote. You probably can't tell from the photo, but it's only about 4" by 5". I wanted to play around with fabric, felt, and needle felting.


Saturday I stopped in at my neighborhood Goodwill store and was amazed to see they cleaned the place up and organized everything neatly. I bought several blouses for five dollars each, and this art print on sale for 50% off. I had a bit of buyer's remorse at first because the colors don't match my apartment, but after I found a place for it on my bathroom counter I began feeling happy about having it in my home.


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There are a couple of giveaways going on I want to tell you about. The first one is from Jill at Mindfully Simple-- she is giving away a lovely handmade bead necklace. The second is a special and incredibly generous giveaway from Kelly Rae Roberts, which I really hope you will take a minute to read about.

Stacy
xxoo

Wednesday, July 8, 2009

Knitting Projects

I'm working on some simple knitting projects, completing a few rows each day. For the above striped wash cloth, I'm using Blue Sky Alpacas Skinny Dyed Organic Cotton. It's loverly.

This one is going to be a mat for an end table. The yarn is called Geranium from Needful Things, and it's a combination of linen, acrylic, and viscose. I love the turquoise blue running through it.

I recently found this booklet of felted projects at a craft store. It doesn't include much in the way of detailed instructions, but the pictures are inspiring.




I wanted to try some of the needle felting shown in the book, but didn't want to invest the time and energy in to knitting and wet felting a bag that I was going to experiment on. So I ended up buying a set of three tiny tote bags at Michael's for a dollar. The first one turned out okay. I gave it to my friend Dogwood with a little gift of lavender sachets inside.


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Katharine at Woollywotnots gave me an award! Thank you, Katharine, I appreciate it. I will pass it on soon.

Speaking of Katharine, she started a very cool book club. The focus will be on craft books, and you choose from the four she selects each month and then post your thoughts on her forum on Sundays. I'm looking forward to it and hope you will join us!
Stacy
xxoo

Saturday, March 7, 2009

Treasures

You know how you hear those stories about people who clean out their attic or closet and find a valuable treasure, like a rare baseball card or a Monet painting? Well, it happened to me. Sort of.

While cleaning out my closet I found this not-so-rare and valuable-only-to-me tiny felted bag! I made it about a year ago and forgot about it. A cute blank canvas for needle felting!




I decided to test drive my Clover Needle Felting Appliqué Mold to see if I could make a flower for it. The flower turned out pretty good, but it’s awfully thick. Next time I won’t use as much roving in the mold.



Then I found another treasure. I bought it at a craft fair last Christmas and tucked it away in a kitchen drawer. It’s a gift card holder made with a vintage postcard in a clear plastic cover. I
t has a stamp and postmark on it-- it was sent from Crabtree , Oregon in 1910. I can see a tiny bit of the letter inside, written in pencil and addressed to Martha in neat handwriting, but I can’t read too much of it without taking it apart.




Wouldn ’t this make a nice birthday present with a gift card from some place good, like Michael’s or Joann’s or a place that sells cupcakes?





Today really was a day for treasures. My Amazon.com order arrived:



And I saw a Great White Heron on an afternoon walk along the creek with my dad.




The birds were out in force at Almaden Lake.





I wonder what tomorrow will bring. Hope your weekend is full of treasures, too.

Thursday, March 5, 2009

Felted Envelope Purse

I made this envelope purse so I could practice decorating it with my new needle felting skills. I knit it with Lion Brand Wool and and then felted it in the bathroom sink. The strap is a felted I-cord.

The pitcher was made by Teresa Wik of
T Pots Pottery . I was given several pieces of her pottery as gifts, and I adore her work.

The swirlies are needle felted sock yarn. The button is needle felted, too.

More swirly-whirlies on the back ...

I didn't write down the pattern for the purse, but here is what I remember-- I used size US 11 needles and knit it in one long strip, and then created the flap by doing a K2TOG at the beginning and end of each row. I seamed up the sides and attached the strap inside along the seams after felting.

The Lion Brand Wool felts up nice and thick.

Sunday, March 1, 2009

Just another rainy Sunday

It's my favorite kind of Sunday-- rainy. Outside, birds are twittering, and inside, I'm puttering around in my pajamas, chatting with the cats and indulging in my new obsession, needle felting. I'm so glad I took that class at Stitches! The instructor, Debbie Radtke, who designed these charming hedgehogs , made it fun and stress-free. She encouraged us to experiment and play with the needle felting, likening it to finger painting.

I pulled this felted PDA case out of my drawer last night and got to work. I made it a few years ago based on a pattern from
Leigh Radford's Alterknits , but I felted it too much-- it turned out too thick and too tiny, which is why it was stuffed away in a drawer with my other knitting mishaps. But the needle felting has breathed new life into it.

Here it is before:

And here it is after:

The ceramic button is the work of Carol Milich. I adore her buttons! Here are a few more I bought at an antique store in Boulder Creek last summer.


I also worked on the Kureyon bag last night. First, I decided to line it. I bought some cotton fabric at Joann's , but I don't know how to sew, so I had to turn to my handy-dandy Girl's Best Book of Knitting, Sewing and Embroidery for guidance.



I'm glad you can't examine my stitches closely because they are rather awful. But I did manage to line the bag.



Then I attached a leather handle I bought at Stitches on Friday. These handles are kinda different-- the buttons really do go on the inside of the bag.

The bag has a million imperfections, but that's okay. It'll work as a shopping tote or a book bag. And at least I got to practice my sewing skills.

Friday, February 27, 2009

It was a good day at Stitches

The needle felting class was awesome. Here are a couple samples I made in the class ...




The short row class was disappointing-- too much info to cram into one hour. Here is the scarf that was our class project ... you can't tell yet, but the short rows are going to give it a wavy effect.


I bought this purse handle from Homestead Heirlooms , which I assembled for the photo. It consists of two dowels, two finials, and two leather straps.



I also bought two skeins of Kollage Corntastic, which is made of 100% corn fiber. I'm going to use it to make Elisa's Nest Tote .