A Little Bit About Felting

Hello and welcome back lovely readers. I have been saying for a while that I would talk more about felting so I think it is about time. I would eventually like to make a beginners guide to help others learn this really neat craft, but I do not think I am quiet there yet. I am entirely self taught with one guide that basically just showed me what tools I would need so I am sure there are things I am missing. I do not make felted pieces on their own, instead preferring to accent crochet pieces with felted eyes and details. I love the look you can get from felting, it looks like the accents are actually a part of the piece not just glued or sewn on.

If you don't know what felting is, it is a way of binding loose roving/fibers together or to another fabric piece. You use a needle that has little barbs on it (this is not a craft for children!) to push a little bit of the fiber through your fabric or into other fiber (say into a big ball of fluff you are turning into a sphere), the barbs will catch on the fiber once it is pushed through and then onto your fabric on the way back binding them together. I am sure there are others that can explain this all much better. You will end up with a shaped piece of thin felt or a thick shape of pure felt giving you a much cleaner and seamless look than you would get using felt.

I do not buy my roving, it is always over priced and easy enough to make yourself. Many people suggest only using wool but I don't know why, I have had very good luck using acrylic. Some yarns work better for it than others and some yarns will not work at all (I have had no luck with red heart super saver varigated yarns.) I just use a fine wire pet brush and 4-12 (8 with a thick yarn) strands of yarn and brush it out working from the bottom. The yarn that collects into the brush is what you use. You can buy your fibers/roving at a craft store but they tend to charge as much as for a ball of yarn for a ball of roving the size of your fist or smaller.

As for tools, I am new to this so I am using the cheapest I can find. A Clover five-needle tool for big middle parts of a shape and a Clover one-three needle tool for smaller details. (the five needle can also do fewer but the smaller tool makes it easier with fewer needles) My local Joanns has stopped selling them but I have found them at Craft Warehouse. I felt into stuffed pieces so I don't worry about felting into anything just make sure your fingers aren't behind a thin piece as sometimes the needles go through and they hurt like a bitch! Just be careful in general, I got distracted once and went right into the back of my thumb, thankfully it hit the nail but it still hurt for a while. Again this is not a craft for children, and if you have little ones at home please keep these tools out of their reach.

That's about all the guidance I can give you for now. From there I just play around with it. My first piece was a helmet like shape for a plushie so it was a big piece to practice on with very basic shaping around the edge.

Head and eyes are felts, ears on yellow plushie felted. very annoyed this is the best pic i have of vaporeon

 I find rings to be the hardest, if you get the roving into a nice tight ring, you basically have yarn again and it will warp as soon as you start attaching it. My best friend there is just a pair of scissors and a tapestry needle. just pull up any edges that go outside your shape and cut them off and felt down the line to tidy it up.

I just wanted to finish out showing you some pictures of felted bits I have done. I'm still learning and I am sure they will look better in the future, but for now I am really loving this craft!

Feet and back piece felted

Eyes and Ears Felted

Eyes, Nose, Third Eye, and Ears felted

 

Cutie Marks Felted

So that's it for this time. Hope you enjoyed taking a look at felting, I am sure I will talk about it more in the future. Join me on Friday for my usual project update and next week we should have a new yarn review! Have a great week.