It’s my birthday and Barry downloaded a Kate Rusby album for me and it’s soothing me as I browse right now.
Here are some things I just totally love lately. Someday I’ll earn some money and treat myself to someone else’s handmade art.
I could go on, but I keep coming back to these, and have over and over.
Felting is fun for everyone! Felt beads are the absolute easiest felt project to make, so I enlisted my kids to help show you how.
First, you need some roving. Roving is processed wool that is ready to spin into yarn or make into felt. Get MERINO roving– especially if you’ve never made felt before. It’s not too picky about water temperature and felts really fast. I think e-bay is a great place to find roving for cheap and in big quantities.
I just do this on my kitchen counter, but you could do it outside just as well. I set out a towell, get my roving, and fill up a bowl with warm water with a little drop of soap.
Now, pull off a little piece of fluff
and dunk it in the water.
Now, rub it round and round in your hands like you would if you were making a ball of play-dough.
It will seem like wet hair at first, then a soft, squishy ball, and after a little while it will be a firm piece of felt. The harder and faster you rub it, the quicker it will matt up and become felt. Brenna’s (5) beads were pretty round, Jonah’s (3) were oblong because he just rubbed back and forth.
I must admit that most of the time the kids were playing with their little “eels” who would swim in the water and then go potty all over the towell.
White beads are okay,
but we wanted a prettier necklace, so we broke out the Kool-Aid. The only flavors I had left were Blue Raspberry Lemonade, Berry Blue, Pink Lemonade, and Cherry, so that’s what we used.
I put about 1/4 cup of water in each bowl and dumped in a whole packet of Kool-Aid. I’m sure it would work just as well with less powder, but I wasn’t to concerned about having leftovers. Then I put all the bowls in the microwave together for 5 or 6 minutes and let it sit for a little bit. Once it wasn’t scorching hot I scooped the beads out, one color at a time, and put the in a colander and rinsed them with cold water.
Now, let them dry. Then, string them on a string (You can’t use a thick tapestry needle though, you have to use a skinny sewing needle, so my kids need my help to do this.)
We used a piece of skinny handspun yarn that we dyed with the beads so it would match, but you can just use whatever you want.
ALL DONE!! Brenna loves her necklace and Jonah played with his little eels all day.
If you try this with your kids, send me a picture!
Now, go get felting!
to be continuted…
It started as this. Then it was this. My super soft angora yarn has been sitting in my yarn bowl for months just waiting to be transformed into something other than a skein, and April’s bunny pattern was the perfect thing!
Despite my crazy day I got quite a bit done. We started swimming lessons at the YMCA. Jonah screamed, so despite my best efforts to swim laps while my kids were in class, I ended up standing by Jonah, trying to convince him that holding on to the wall with me two feet away or 20 was the same thing. Brenna the fish had a blast.
Then we had the food delivery at church and one of the sisters didn’t get most of the groceries she needed. So, I spent the afternoon on the phone trying to track down canned goods and beans while Logan screamed and eventually fell asleep in the high chair.
Now it’s time for me to do yoga and go to bed.
I was sitting back and letting yet another month go by without submitting something to Loobylu’s Month of Softies, but last night I decided to just do it. I broke out some pants full of holes and made some bean-bag monsters. Their hair is made of scraps of handspun yarn and their teeth are handmade wool felt, then I got an old bag of lentils out of the pantry and stuffed away.
This is Abenya from the land of Abanar (ask Brenna for details). She especially loves the sweet smell of cherry blossoms, and the view from up here.
This is Jonah’s monster Mo. He’s a little scared of heights, so he’s soaking in the spring air here among the lilly of the valley.
The kids have been playing with them all day– and they should be good for a game of bean bag toss too.