Fun with Felting!

Happy Halloween!

Today for t-shirt reconstruction week it is all about working with felt. I think felt has a very homemade look to it, which I realize is not for everyone. I however love the way it often screams hey I made this.

One of the first projects I did was try my hand at needle felting applique. Those of you who do not know what this is, it is where you take wool roving and use a sharp pen like needle to poke the roving into the fabric of your choice (typical wool or a thicker cotton). This tutorial on youtube is helpful for getting a visual of what I mean. The project I had was actually something I started a couples months ago, but got stuck on. It was a grey polo shirt that somehow ended up with some pink stains on the side and I wanted to try felting to hide them. The picture on the left is my first attempt at felting. I really did not like the way it was turning out and put the project away for a while.

When we decided to have this party I thought it was a great time to bring my unfinished top, rip out the old and start fresh. This time I bought a mold to help me come up with a different design. I started using the mold to make circles and that helped me to see the process a little better. I played around a lot more with how much roving to place. Eventually I became more comfortable with the process and used the mold to help me form the circles, but free handed the rest.I realized that last time my flower got so big because I was using too much wool and the design just kept expanding in size. I also realized that I had a bunch of small spots on the shirt I wanted to cover up and I needed to re-think my design so that I could really utilize covering up the pink stains. The first time I tried the project I had a vague idea in my head of what I wanted. This time I laid out the roving as I was going to really be able to start to see it come together.

I added a little embroidery to cover up a few more spots, but also because I was really going for that detailed, homemade look and I thought this added well to it.

My other project is basically using felt to hide parts of clothes with stains or in this case, a hole. The inside of my hoodie formed this little hole, which was not a big deal, but why leave it when you can add a felted outline of a dinosaur! Yep, I cut out two layers of a stegosaurus and sewed then into my hood for an extra surprise.

And since this is all about felt today and it is Halloween, it seems only right that I post a picture or two of my Halloween costume, which of course used felt! I was Strawberry Shortcake, (hence why I HAD to make Strawberry Shortcake Cake in the middle of Fall). I used felt to make strawberries for the bonnet and for the purse I carried around. I’m looking down in the photo not to play coy, but so you can see the hat as much as possible.