The winners! and Felt

Thank you everyone for joining in with my blogversary draw and for all your lovely comments over the last week. Like everyone, I do like to get comments and feedback on my posts and you are all very generous and supportive. What else should we expect from such creative people? :o) Thank you!

Right, onto the draw! I have used this Random Number Generator to pick the numbers but, unfortunately I don’t know how to capture the screen so I hope you will trust me with the result. The winners are: (drumroll please!) :

1 Elizabeth

2 Kayla Coo

3 Linda

Elizabeth will receive the Journal Quilt, Kayla Coo will receive the cards and Linda will receive the heart so ladies, please email me with your snail mail addresses and I will get the giveaways in the post after the weekend. I’m just sorry that everyone couldn’t have won. Thank you all for taking the time to leave a comment and join in.

Yesterday I did manage to go to the felt workshop and had a really lovely day, although it was very hard work. The workshop was led by Alison Taylor who was a most generous teacher both with her knowledge and the materials she supplied us with. Unfortunately Alison doesn’t have a website yet although I believe she is thinking about starting one. There were 9 ladies taking part altogether and I have to thank them all for being such a welcoming group as I had not met any of them previously.

We were so busy that I didn’t have time for any photographs while we worked. The felt-making was energetic and at one point several of us lost the will to live (!) but eventually with some help from Alison we were all delighted with our results.

First of all we made a piece of flat felt. I know, I know! I’ve gone for my traditional favourite colours! Alison said we could make these pieces into an evening purse so I chose colours that I hoped would match a dress I have. I didn’t really intend it to be quite as solid in terms of colour but when you are working quickly some thoughts are not easy to hold onto and the design changes.

This green side will be the inside of the purse and, once it’s dry I will square up the sides and make a 3-fold and stitch it together. I’m thinking of using any wavy edges I cut from the sides to decorate the flap closure and then I’ll add some stitch and beads in a similar way to the bag Alison showed us. It doesn’t show too well in the photo but I am pleased that some of the green has migrated through in glimpses to what will be the outside of the bag.

After a lovely lunch supplied by the ladies who organised the day (weren’t we spoilt?), Alison showed us how to make a bag,

The bag was made over/around a plastic template and involved more elbow grease but it did seem to felt quicker than the flat felt in the morning. Of course, the thicker the wool layers to start with, the longer it takes to felt. The bag is still drying and needs a handle but it may yet end up as a decorative pot, I can’t decide. The bag is about 10” x 9” and the flat felt is 15” x 10”.

An added bonus yesterday was discovering some toys to play with! Alison had 2 pieces of equipment that I could see a use for in other areas of textile work. One was a feltmakers bulb spray which gives a wonderful spray of liquid and I could see this giving some interesting effects with dye and the other is a knobbly/slatted rolling pin which I think would produce interesting marks in printing. Very naughtily I have ordered these 2 toys from Wingham Wools and I can’t wait to play some more! If the Spray Bulb works with dye I shall order more and keep one for each colour or group of colours. I don’t know whether the bulb can be taken apart to clean thoroughly. Watch this space! Again! Lol.

I was surprised and pleased at how I coped yesterday, partially due to stubbornness I think, but today I am feeling the strain. Don’t feel sorry for me though, all self inflicted and I thoroughly enjoyed the day!