***Felted Hat***

Wet felted hat made with Alpaca wool and a ceramic flower button 

I've been wanting to make a felted hat for the longest time. The other day I was in the yarn shop and, low and behold, they had alpaca wool, something I have been looking for and wanting to try for felting. I have watched several videos on how to wet felt a hat, so here is a combination of techniques that I used to make my felted hat...

Step 1:  Partially fill a water balloon with warm water and then blow it up to about twice as large as you want the finished hat to be and put it tied end in a bowl. The bowl and water in the balloon will help to keep things from moving around too much.

Step 2:  Wet and cover the balloon with a thin layer of dish soap.

Step 3:  Place sections of wool (I used alpaca) over the balloon.

Step 4:  Continue placing the wool over the balloon going in the same direction.

Step 5:  Complete one layer of wool around the balloon.

Step 6:  Using a spray bottled filled with warm soapy water, wet down all of the wool.

Step 7:  Wrap pieces of wool around the balloon going in the opposite direction.

Step 8:  After spraying the wool, add a layer of thinner pieces of wool going in the original direction. Then you can add decorations or embellishments to the outside of the hat.

Step 9:  Spray all of the wool to gently wet it down and then cover it with tulle (or you can use the top part of a pair of pantyhose), making sure that all the wool is covered.

Step 10:  Turn the balloon and wool over and tie the pieces of tulle together where the balloon is tied.

Step 11:  Fill the sink (or a large container) with warm soapy water and gently make sure all of the wool becomes wet. Then gently press the wool against the balloon to get as much water out as you can in order to move the balloon to your work area.

Step 12:  With your hands and fingers, gently rub all around the tulle being careful not to move any embellishment. After rubbing for about 10 minutes or so, do a pinch test on the wool. If the wool is sticking together, you can take the tulle off to continue the felting process.

Step 13:  After you have removed the tulle, continue rubbing the wool on the balloon using bubble wrap. When the wool and embellishments have felted together and you can see the wool is starting to shrink, pop the balloon (over the sink) and remove it. Rub inside and outside of the hat to make sure all of the wool is felted.

Step 14:  This is the fulling stage. Fold the wool piece in a square and throw it flat in the sink. Keep turning it over and re-folding it to make sure it that as it shrinks, it maintains its shape. After several folds, refolds and throws, start rinsing the wool. Alternate rising in warm and cold water, first in warm water and then in cold water, and keep checking the shape and size. As the wool hat starts to take form, gently squeeze it to get the water out and also squeeze it in a towel so you can try the hat on to make sure it is forming into the size and shape you want for your hat.

Step 15:  After you make sure all the soap has been rinsed out and the hat is the size you want, shape it and let it dry. You can trim off the edges or unwanted extra wool, but be sure to rub and felt those areas were you cut so they are not left open.

Step 16:  Now it's time to add a little something extra. I have a friend who makes beautiful ceramic art and things, so I decided to add this very cute ceramic flower button she made to my alpaca wool felted hat. If you are interested in purchasing a ceramic button for your hat, please check out Lauren Mesa's Facebook page...

 

https://www.facebook.com/LaurenMesaArt 

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ 

Here are some photographs of my hat so you can see it from different angles.

 

 

 

 

Alpaca Wool Felted Hat with Ceramic Flower Button
♥ I thought it looked cute sitting atop a rock in our garden waterfall ♥

***Nuno Felted Top***

Nuno-felted White Gauze Top

Here is my first attempt at making a nuno felted top. I used 100% cotton white gauze material and merino wool for the felting. It is all one piece with no seams and has an angled bottom edge. I'm looking forward to making another top utilizing silk and wool. I have found the tricky part of making clothing is calculating the allowance for shrinkage, which depends on the material you use and how much felting occurs.

Every felting creation is so unique and no two are exactly alike. It is so fun watching whatever project I'm working on take shape and come to life and each time I try something new, it is always a learning experience. I'm really looking forward to my next project...

*** Angel Pillow ***

I made this felted pillow for my mom for Mother's Day. She loves angels. The pillow also has a design pattern on the back, plus it is reversible with a different design on both sides. I used a pillow insert and made the wet-felted cover with a Velcro top-side enclosure.


Angel Felted Pillow

Angel Pillow

Design on back of pillow



***More Fun with Felting***

I continue to have fun being creative with wool. Here are some of my latest felted creations...

~ Sconce ~

Sconce - wet-felted using a resist

Sconce

Sconce with dried lavender

 

 ~ Nuno-felted scarf ~

Designing pattern - merino wool on silky chiffon

Laying out to dry

Nuno-felted scarf with added needle felted embellishments

Nuno-felted scarf

 

~ Small Vases ~

Vases - wet-felted using a resist

 

~ Bracelet ~

Bracelet - wet-felted

***Felted Vase***

It is really true, the sky is the limit when it comes to felting things out of wool. In fact, there are so many projects I have swirling around in my head, it's hard to decide what to make next...With each project, I am fine-tuning the process and deciding what works best for me to get the desired result.

I am very excited about my felted vase. It was my first resist felting project in which the vessel needed to fit around a cylinder glass vase. I have to admit that after cutting out the resist based on calculations for shrinkage and prior to completing the fulling and shrinking part of the process, I was skeptical as to whether or not the felted wool vessel would fit snuggly around the glass vase. Amazingly enough, it did...AND the vessel turned out to be reversible.

Felted Vase (outside/purple side)

Felted Vase (inside/blue side)

For this resist project I decided to use plastic shelf liner rather than cardboard for my template and it worked very well. Plus, I will be able to reuse the template for future projects the same size. To calculate the measurements for the width of the resist, I added together the width and depth of the glass vase and multiplied by 1.2. For the height, I added the width and height of the glass vase and multiplied by 1.2. For this particular vase, the glass vase measured 3.5 inches wide by 10.5 inches tall. I wanted to add some extra felt at the top, so I added an additional 1.5 inches to the height measurement. Therefore, my resist cut-out measured 8.5 by 18.5 inches. In order to make the edges at the bottom of the vase smooth, I cut rounded corners at the bottom of the resist.


8.5" by 18.5" resist on top of bubble wrap (bubble side up)

First, I laid out the design for the outside of the vessel because for this particular project I was going to turn the vessel inside out for the final stages of the process. 

 

Then I laid out thin wool pieces around the edges, making sure half of the piece was off the edge of the resist in order to make the sides seamless.

 

To complete this side, I laid horizontal rows of wool to cover the rest of the resist.

 

Next, I covered the project with tulle and wet the wool down with warm soapy water followed by rubbing a bar of olive oil soap over the top and, in a circular motion with the tips of my fingers, started gently rubbing the top to start the fibers felting together.

 

I carefully removed the tulle making sure the wool fibers stayed in place and turned the project over. After folding over the overlapping wool with wet soapy fingers, I repeated the process of laying thin pieces of wool around the edge and horizontal rows to cover the resist. I repeated this another time on both sides, only this time I placed the thin wool pieces in vertical rows, making a total of two layers of wool around the resist. For the third layer, or inside layer, I decided to use different colors of wool. The result was a reversible vessel. 

 

As with wet felting projects, the next step was rolling. I rolled the project between bubble wrap (bubble side toward the wool) with the resist still inside 30 times on both sides and in both directions (vertically and horizontally). When the "pinch" test indicated the wool had felted together, I removed the resist and turned the project inside out and rolled it 30 more times on each side and in each direction, periodically checking to make sure the inside was not felting together.

 

After shocking the project by throwing it into the sink about 20 times, it was time for fulling and rubbing the wool until it molded around the glass vase. Once again, I was amazed at how the vessel started to take shape and how much it "shrunk to fit."

 

After rinsing the project in hot and cold water and letting it soak in a water/vinegar mixture (1 qt. water/1 tb. vinegar), it was time to shape it and let it dry. 

 

Here is the finished vessel vase. 

Felted Vase

Glass vase and felted vessel vase cover

Felting is an amazing way to be creative and make your ideas come to life. I hope my blog inspires your creativity...