Bird Nests

After a flurry of posting regularly I seemed to have slipped back into my old ways again! In my defense I am quite busy trying to make lots of things for the woolfest, without wanting to sound silly, I'm in the creative zone right now. I seem to have an unending supply of ideas at the moment and keep surprising myself with new designs. It makes a nice change from struggling to come up with new designs and relegating prototypes to the recycling basket. That's the beauty of felting, you can recycle it, my recent needle cases and notebooks were made out of a felt scarf I made last year, but was never happy with. Here's a few pictures of some of my latest creations....can you spot the theme?



And here are a few pictures I took at the weekend. My parents have a fantastic garden, so I took the opportunity to practice using my macro lens.

My first award!!

A few weeks ago I had a nice surprise, I was given the Arte y Pico award by ethel and edna, a lovely crafty blog which I've just recently discovered.

The rules read:

1) Pick 5 blogs who deserve this award for their creativity, design, interesting material and who also contribute to the blogging community no matter what language.
2) Each award must have the name of the author and also a link to their blog.
3) Each award winner must show the award and put the name and the link to the blog that has given her or him the award.
4) The award winner and the one who has given the prize must show the link of the “Arte y pico“ blog so everyone will know the origin of this award.
5) Show these rules.

So here's my 5:

1. Sarah at guerilla embroidery

2. Leah at Kneek

3. PG at middle of nowhere

4. Sarah at paper-and-string

5. Anabel at fieltromania

It was very difficult to pick just 5 as I subscribe to 109!!

And just to finish off the post I have some work in progress to show.

Sunshine and Felted Beads

Hurray!!! We've had a whole week of sunshine and it looks like today is going to be another good day. We've had to wait a really long time this year for the weather to hot up, lets hope it stays.

Last Saturday I went to the region 10 members day for the International Feltmakers Association. The theme for the day was jewellery, I had a great time and learnt some new techniques as well as being hugely inspired. Here's some of the work I did on the day,

A flower made from Finn wool.

A giant bead made from Finn wool.

Some interlocking hoops from Finn wool (not sure what I'll do with these yet).

And a bead made from merino wool.

As you can see I was quite taken with the Finn wool, so I ordered some from Piiku, it arrived yesterday, just look at the gorgeous colours!!


And finally, here's some beads which I've been churning out this week....


And here's a cute little bag modeled by my daughter, just before the grass was cut :)

Bags, Books and Bowls

Where does the time go? I can't believe we're nearly into May. I have been busy working on ideas for woolfest, it's getting very close and at the moment I don't have a lot of things to sell. Here are my latest pieces, a felted bowl, which I dip dyed and embellished with buttons and this cute little notebook cover. I'm really pleased with the notebook, and plan to do some more.


I have also been playing with the Gocco, I wanted to try making a screen from a photograph, unfortunately not all of them worked so I've wasted two screen, which is a bit of a pain as I have to order them from Japan, but here's one that worked, I'm using them as thank you cards to put in with my orders.


I've also been soaking up inspiration from these two books which I'm borrowing from the library, our local library has a good craft section, which is just as well as I have no more room on the shelves for more books!!

Fabric Jewellery by Teresa Searle

Felt So Good by Betz White (UK version of Warm Fuzzies)

The jewellery book had some pompoms made from fabric which looked really nice, so I had a go with some scraps of silk I have and made this one, which I attached to bag which was lying around waiting for a little something to lift it.

And here's a bag with some lace felted into the front, it gives it a lovely texture, I dyed this the same time as the bowl, cerise pink is one of my favourite colours.


Anyway, best go now, I have some felt balls and pincushions to finish off before the school run.

Felt Making Workshops

Here are my new workshops. Each workshop is £25, which includes all your materials. To book a place you need to send a £10 deposit, this is non refundable, but if you can't make the workshop for any reason, it can be transfered to another workshop, providing there are places left. The remaining £15 is payable on the day. All the workshops are at Calcutt Village Hall, just outside Knaresborough in North Yorkshire. There is ample parking available. The maximum number is 10 so book early to avoid disappointment.

Saturday 26th of July 2008
10.30 - 3.30
Felt a Bag
Make a felt bag using the resist method of felting (no seams) and make a felt flower to embellish it.
Only 6 places left.

Saturday 23rd of August 2008
10.30 - 3.30
Felt Jewellery
Use a combination of wet and needle felting to make felt beads, sushi beads, rope, flowers and pendants.

Saturday 20th of September 2008
10.30 -3.30
Felt Vessels
Learn to make 3D felt that can be transformed into felt vases and bowls.

Saturday 18th of October 2008
10.30 - 3.30
Felted Monster Bags
Have fun making your own unique monster bag.


Saturday 29th of November 2008
10.30 - 3.30
Felted Scarves
Keep warm and snug during winter with your own felted scarf (made from merino wool which is extremely soft and comfortable against the skin).

To book a place contact me at fibrespace@gmail.com

Competitions!!!

I love entering crafty competitions, I find it motivates me to try out ideas and have a go at new things. In the past I have seen competitions on the web, and got as far as thinking about possible designs, but then the closing date has come way to quickly and I end up missing the deadline. I seem to have a bit more time on my hands now (with the youngest doing 4 half sessions a week at pre-school), or maybe I am just more motivated with my felting at the moment, anyway, I'm going competition mad. I've just entered the last of my softies in the 2nd Annual Softie Awards, I ended up entering the big blue ugly monster in the cutest face category along with his friend the blob, so as not to hurt their feelings, but between you and me, they don't stand a cat in hells chance when you look at all the very cute entries. Still, I've told them that it's the taking part that counts and that not everyone can be a winner.


I've also entered Victor into the embroidered to death category. I finished him last night. I've been wanting to do a large owl sculpture for a while now. I'm really pleased because Victor came out better than I had imagined. At one point he wasn't looking so good, but I managed to manipulate his head to give him that 'w' shape on top, which made a big difference.



Here's another competition that grabbed my attention, I was reading the craftzine blog, and there was details of a competition to make a pair of baby booties out of Michael Miller fabric. I have designed and made a few booties before and love Michael Miller fabric so I was thinking that I must enter (also there are some great prizes on offer). Then I nearly fell of my chair when I scrolled down and saw a pair of my booties posted on the blog for inspiration! Here they are, I'd made them last year for my friends little girl.

Pink

Vone got in touch and has picked Dixie, so Dixie has been wrapped up and parceled off to start new adventures over on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean. So I just spent the morning listing the other mini monsters on etsy.

I was teaching a felting workshop yesterday, Nuno felted scarves, unfortunately there wasn't enough time to take photographs, which is a shame because the students made some fantastic scarves. I'm having a bit of a break from the workshops, but they'll be starting up again in June. I'd like to do some new workshops and am thinking of offering a monster bag workshop and felted vessels.



Here's my latest felt creation, another mini monster, she's my favourite so far, I've entered her into the pink category of the 2nd Annual Softie Awards , and I was very excited to see her make an appearance on Softies Central.

I have the house to myself as the rest of the family have gone to look at bikes, so I'm going to go and make the most of it now.