Simple Felt Stuffed Critters

This was a project that spanned the last two weeks of our session. Students started by wetfelting abstract patterned squares using merino batt from Opulent Fibers.

As we are constrained by the limits of a 60 minute period with 15 minutes to clean up before the next class arrives to use the space, the students felted their batts inside a zippered plastic bag, a method I discovered here. This is a great way to contain the mess of wet felting, but still give students the experience of working with roving and seeing the transformation into a new fabric. The only thing I have changed from this tutorial is the addition of a square of bubble wrap inside the zippered bag. This gives the felt a little extra friction as the students rub through the bag.

After using this method many times with dfiferent ages in several classrooms, I have observed most students are tired of rubbing their felt through the bag long before it is done. Singing songs together will sometimes distract students long enough so they can achiever a firm felt, but not always.

The week we wet felted these pieces, most students asked me every two minutes to check on their felt to see if it was done. The only student who really felted her roving into something sturdy enough to use for our subsequent sewing project, worked without stopping and without asking me to check her work for a solid 15 minutes. When class ended, the rest of the pieces needed a little extra rubbing and some hot water to make them super sturdy, so I finished them up at my studio.

The week before our class, I photocopied cartoon animal templates from the back of several craft books. My intern cut out the templates, traced them onto cardboard and cut them out again. Students traced two identical patterns onto their felt with a marker and then cut them out.

They added features to their stuffies with buttons, needlefelting, and embroidery stitches. After pinning the two pieces together, they sewed almost all the way around the perimeter, using either a whip stitch of a blanket stitch. Leaving a small opening, they stuffed fluffy bits of washed wool into the cavity, then stitched their creature closed. Aren’t they sweet?

Nunofelt Workshop at Pacific Northwest Art School

What happens when you bring fine merino wool together with a light, gauzy fabric? You get texture galore.

From ruffles to puckers to subtle texture, there is endless possibility when working wool through fabric and then letting the magic of felting happen.

The weekend of April 26 and 27th, I will be teaching a two-day workshop at the Pacific Northwest Art School in Coupeville on beautiful Whidbey Island. Students will spend time experimenting with various fabrics to achieve different textures. Once they have sampled, they will create a scarf, wrap or shrug.

Tuition: $255, material fee: $40, registration fee: $15

Register online at www.pacificnorthwestartschool.org or by phone 360-678-3396.

Felt a Monster, Sew a Puppet

Our studio fiber class continued the puppet madness. Students needlefelted faces on pieces of felt cut from a fulled blanket I thrifted two weeks ago.

After the details are put in place, the front and back are whipstitched together. This puppet has tiny black button eyes and contrasting patterned arms.

This octopus puppet with felt dread tentacles is just about ready to be sewn.

A reverse black cheetah gets his last yellow spots.

Button eyes and embroidered features bring this puppet to life.

 

Upcycled Felt Wearables

Today I brought a mixed tub of fulled wool fabric and a tub of wool roving for students to transform into accessories: hats, arm warmers and headbands.

Before I get any further, I need to pull out my soap box to make a clarification. The handknit wool sweater thrown in the washing machine that emerges half the size it was before washing has been fulled, not felted.

When wool is spun into yarn, then knit (or woven or crocheted) into a new fabric and subsequently shrunk through vigorous agitation in hot soap and water, this is fulling. When unspun wool, also known as roving, is transformed into a solid fabric through vigorous agitation with hot soap and water, this process is called felting. As there is water involved, it is called wetfelting. Poking roving into a base fabric with a felting needle is a third technique called needlefelting, or sometimes dry felting.

When a friend brought in a whole bunch of sweaters she was no longer wearing, I cut them apart at the seams, tossed them in a couple lingerie bags and washed them in my top-loading washing machine in hot water with the dial turned to ‘heavy agitation’. Cutting a garment into pieces allows the fabrics to shrink more evenly. Sweaters fulled as an intact garment often have sections near armpits and neckline where they have not shrunk as much as the broad expanse of front and back.

Once a sweater has been fulled, and the fabric is ready to be put to another use, it is called recycled felt or upcycled felt. This distinguishes the fabric from industrial craft felt, or felt created through wetfelting wool roving.

Recycled felt is a perfect base for embellishing by needlefelting roving into the surface. The bond made with felting needles is not permanent, as it is when fibers intermingle during wetfelting. In order for the roving to stay firmly attached to the fabric, it must be poked repeatedly. This can be time consuming and tedious, but it is important if students want their designs to last. I recommend using a Clover multi-needle tool to finish a design once all the elements are in place.

These two students spent the entire class needlefelting their designs. They were working with larger pieces of fabric. It will be interesting to see what they do with them next week.

There’s a sheep with a rainbow tail hiding on the inside of this hat. Whipstitching seams can take a little time, but it will prevent the seams from coming undone over time.

This student selected some upcycled felt with a colorful motif embroidered in the wool before it was fulled. Her two pieces of fabric once needlefelted and seamed made a fantastic bird hat.

This student needlefelted cat eyes, nose and whiskers on two rectangles of fabric before sewing it into a hat for her little sister. By sewing two rectangles of fabric together, the peaks naturally form pointed ears. How lucky they are to have each other.

Needlefelting Puppet Faces

This week, students in both of my Family Learning Program clases began a project that will span two weeks.

Using recycled or upcycled wool fabric harvested from fulled sweaters as their base, these students needlefelted Harrisville wool to create features for puppets. Harrisville is an ideal wool for needlefelting because it has lots of crimp and the fibers are not aligned, as in many rovings sold as a sliver. It also comes in a wide array of colors and can be quickly blended with your fingertips to create even more combinations.

The students traced a cardboard outline onto two pieces of fulled wool, then cut along the contour lines. Next, they worked on adding faces to one piece of felt. This student is making a cyclops with a red mouth and fangs.

This student preferred to be the set decorator, creating backgrounds for the puppets he overhead various students describing. The mixed blues were going to be an ocean for another’s mermaid. He offered to make a tree for my sample owl puppet and a cave for the cyclops.

Adding surface embellishment to fulled fabric is an easy introduction to felting for young children. Working on a foam pad, they can keep track of where their fingers are, reducing the chance of accidental puncture or snapped needles. The best part for many children is the ultimate flexibility of the method. Don’t like that eye placement? Rip it off and put it somewhere else. Don’t like that color? Rip it off and choose another. Can you think of another medium better suited for those paralyzed by commitment anxiety? This is also a perfect way to allow children to experiment with color and texture.

Felt Heart Pockets and Vessels

Today’s project was a lesson in creativity, ingenuity and humility. As a teacher, I’m sure I learn as much from my students as they learn from me.  Before class, I had a project in mind and I had worked out how it was going to proceed, but I had not created a sample for the students to see. Some would say this is the best way to teach because the students don’t have a preconception of how a piece ‘should’ look to skew their innate creativity.

We started out by drafting two layers of roving over a heart-shaped bubblewrap resist. After wetting the roving, we flipped the bundle, folded the roving over edge of the resist and then laid out two more layers of roving. The bundle was flipped again, the edges were folded over again to create a sealed package. If you want more detailed photos of the process, there is a felt vessel tutorial I wrote here.

The students folded their bubble wrap on top of the heart bundle and rubbed, gently at first and then more vigorously. When the roving started to hold together, they dunked it in warm water and then rubbed a whole lot more.

This student project end up exactly as I had conceived it. After rinsing out the soap and giving it a dunk in a vinegar bath, the students cut a small slit near the top. They pulled out the bubblewrap to reveal a pocket. When dry, I imagined they would write a little valentine and slip it inside.

The loop of single ply yarn (placed between the layers of roving when the batt was still dry) can be used to hang the ornament.

For one student, the bubblewrap resist shifted early in the felting process; her end result had three lobes and looked more like an anatomical heart than a typical valentine. She sliced it open, removed the plastic. Without skipping a beat she said ‘I wonder what it would look like if I turned it inside out’ and then did so. She pushed and pulled a little and suddenly it was a little vessel, perfectly sized for the turquoise felt ball she’d brought from home.

It wasn’t long before the entire class had slit their hearts wide open and flipped them inside out. I didn’t grab a picture of the whole class set, but I have to admit they are much sweeter as little petal vessels than the hearts I had imagined.

Lesson learned: put down your expectations and step away from the table. You have no idea what power these children wield in their imaginations.

Felting Pictures

My studio fiber arts class created felt pictures this week. They started with merino batts from Opulent Fibers as a background then cut shapes out of the prefelt we dyed with Kool-Aid last week and added additional embellishments with small pieces of merino roving.

The merino batt allows novice students to skip the tricky step of drafting thin shingles of roving into an even layer. The batt arrives as a thick roll; once unrolled, it can be cut like prefelt and peeled apart to separate layers of the correct thickness for the project at hand.

Once the details were in place, they squirted some warm soapy water over the felt. Since we didn’t want the wool details to move around, some students layered a piece of nylon tulle over their design. Other students folded over the bubble wrap to cover the felt, rubbing gently through the plastic.

We peeked at the work in progress often to see how it was felting. The tulle only needs to stay on the surface until the layers of roving begin to felt to each other. Once the lines demarcating the cut edges begin to fade, the felt is firm enough to work directly by hand with a gentle rubbing motion.

While many traditional feltmakers roll the felt design and bubblewrap around a styrofoam noodle, then roll the whole package in a towel to accomplish a firm felt; I have found that it works just as well to vigorously rub felt by hand. In my experience, rolling felt in bubblewrap often causes creases to develop and skews the design. I rarely roll work, though there are exceptions to the rule. For the purposes of this class, it is unnecessary work and mess.

Once the felt was holding together, we squeezed out the cold water and dunked it into a small basin filled with hot water. Then we bunched up the felt and rubbed it on the ridged mat covering my worktable. Using hot water causes the felt to shrink rapidly, so it should be used sparingly in the early stages to control the process.

To finish up the edges, we rubbed the felt with a glazed ceramic felting stone and a palm washboard. This helped smooth out the wavy ledges that don’t get as much attention in during the hand-felting steps.

The students and parents were excited by both the process and the results.

 

It’s hard to make out the details for all the grins here, but the picture on the left is a giraffe sliding down a rainbow on it’s back. The middle picture is an ocean floor seascape. The picture on the right is a herd of anatomically correct cows.

To display work at home, thread a few pieces of yarn through the upper edge and tie to a pretty foraged stick.

Birth of a Felt Flower

Here’s a snapshot of the wet felting process I use to bring felt flowers to life.

The finished flower measures 5″ in diameter.

This blossom will be on its way to the Bainbridge Island Museum of Art gift shop next week.

Handsewing and Fiber Arts 8-13 yrs

This post is intended as an archive of the projects created in the fiber arts class I designed for the Family Learning Program. Taught weekly at the Southwest Teen Life Center in West Seattle, the Family Learning Program was established to provide curriculum enrichment to homeschool families.

Week 1: Embroidery

Our first week started with an exercise in simple embroidery on recycled wool fabric and pieces cut from a fulled wool blanket to create nametags. Students embroidered their names on the off-white blanket fabric using a blunt needle and wool tapestry yarn. After selecting wool fabric, they sewed a pinback to one piece. Next, we cut out interfacing, and ironed it between two pieces of wool fabric to create additional stability. The last step was adhering the embroidered blanket fabric to the stiffened wool fabric using another piece of interfacing.

As some students were still working on their embroidery when class ended, they either chose to continue working on them at home, or left them with me to complete in week 2.

Recommended reading: Kids’ Embroidery by Kristin Nicholas

Week 2: Sewing

In the second week, students stitched needlekeepers out of manufactured wool felt. Closures were braided out of yarn, or sewn with buttons to the felt. Students were encouraged to embellish or decorate the felt with embroidery stitches or buttons.

Felt sheets sold in fabric stores are either acrylic, a bamboo blend or wool. Acrylic felt is the least expensive, has a slightly squeaky feel when rubbed between your fingers, and is a little more difficult to sew than 100% wool felt.

Upcycled or recycled felt fabric can be created by deliberately shrinking a loosely woven or knit fabric (blanket, skirt, sweater) in the wash. This process is known as fulling. Pendleton blankets and shirts are made from fulled wool yardage. Fabric and craft stores sell pre-cut, packaged shapes harvested from recycled fabric. There are many craft books with simple stitching, sewing and embroidery projects made with felt. Cutting up an accidentally fulled sweater is a great way to get the fabric required to start one of these projects.

Recommended reading: Warm Fuzzies: 30 Sweet Felted Projects by Betz White; Stash Happy: Felt: 30 Fun Projects for Felt (and Fabric) Lovers by Amanda Carestio; Super-Cute Felt: 35 Step-By-Step Projects to Make and Give by Laura Howard

Week 3: Needlepoint

In the third week, we worked on needlepoint using rigid plastic grids. Students were shown how to do the simplest over-under-over stitch, which leaves some of the plastic grid visible. They also were shown how to do the traditional needlepoint stitch, passing through a square twice (once going up a column, and once going down a column). This covers the grid in a dense pattern of diagonal stitches. Several colors of yarn can be used in a single piece, carrying the yarn across the back between sections.

During class, I noticed one student creating a spiral pattern, similar to a spiderweb and another student crossing four columns of squares for an elongated diagonal stitch.

To further explore this idea, plastic grids are sold in 10″ x 13″ sheets at craft stores. Cut a grid into six pieces, fill each grid with needlepoint and then stitch them together to create a box or a tote.

We used wool yarn for this project as it will expand to fill the gaps between the grid lines nicely, but needlepoint is typically done with either wool tapestry yarn, cotton or silk floss. Separate the strands for fine color work.

For students ready for a further challenge, try stitching on gingham fabric, using the colored grid as a guide or move on to traditional needlepoint fabric which has a fine grid built into the weave. Draw a pattern on the fabric with colored markers, then follow the color changes with the floss. Some people find it is easier to handle fabric when held taught by an embroidery hoop, but this can be cumbersome and more difficult for some hands to manage. We started with plastic grids so students could focus on their stitching instead of worrying about keeping the fabric stable.

Week 4: Weaving

For students ready for a further challenge, try stitching on gingham fabric, using the colored grid as a guide or move on to traditional needlepoint fabric which has a fine grid built into the weave. Draw a pattern on the fabric with colored markers, then follow the color changes with the floss. Some people find it is easier to handle fabric when held taught by an embroidery hoop, but this can be cumbersome and more difficult for some hands to manage. We started with plastic grids so students could focus on their stitching instead of worrying about keeping the fabric stable.

Weaving just a few rows of the warp with one color and the the rest of the warp with another color for a few rows will create an opening that can become a buttonhole. The buttonhole should be followed up with several rows of dense weaving across the entire width of the loom to close the gap.

Try adding dried grasses or lavender to the woven piece. Feathers and flowers can be added to a section. This preschool teacher created a beautiful woven roof for a backyard playhouse using materials harvested on their nature walks.

Recommended reading: Kids’ Weaving by Sarah Swett

Week 5: Needlefelting

In week 5, students needlefelted pumpkins and creatures using wool roving. Needlefelting is ideal for creating soft sculpture and adding surface embellishment to many fabrics. Layers of wool can be added to create dimension, in the same way a sculptor would add small bits of clay to create a nose, brow and cheek ridges on a face. Individual fibers are poked together without creating a permanent bond. This is both a blessing and a curse. Should the artist decide they don’t like the way an ear is perched on their squirrel, it can be easily removed and repositioned. It also means that Fido will likely tear the felt squirrel to bits the first time it is left unattended.

Surface designs can be needle felted easily to wool felt; many craft books suggest creating custom pillows with needlefelted designs. Because the wool is only poked into place with the needles, the design will pill over time and may rub away if it is in a high-traffic spot. To afix the design permanently, it should be washed with hot water (either by hand or in the machine). We will explore wetfelting in the coming weeks.

The needle tips are fragile, so should be used with care and with adult supervision. Used correctly, in a vertical poking direction (as opposed to poke and twist or aggressive stabbing), needles should last many years.

The type of roving we used was from Corriedale sheep; it had been washed, dyed and ironed to straighten the fibers. A general rule of thumb when evaluating roving is to look for a coarse wool with lots of texture. The felting needles will grab a coarse wool more easily than a fine wool.

One of the younger students in the class made a pair of bumblebees, a pair of ladybugs and several more creations from her imagination.

Single felting needles are sold in several gauges, from 36-42, rated for the coarseness of the fiber. We used the medium gauge size 38 needle. Clover makes a spring-loaded multi-needle tool which is useful when finishing a large design to tamp it down. In the background of this photo, there is a handmade multi-needle tool I bought from Moxie, a Seattle artist. The multi-tools are much more likely to result in unintentional finger stabbing. With a little coordination, using two single needles held together in one hand can be an efficient way to speed up the process, but I still return to a single needle when working to get a small detail fixed in place.

You can buy needles and wool roving at Weaving Works on Brooklyn Ave in the University District. I also sell needles, roving and felting kits through my studio and Etsy shop: http://kneek.etsy.com.

The Japanese bookstore Kinokuniya, located inside the International District Uwajimaya has many small books full of inspiring projects: pastry, cartoon characters, novelty foods. While the instructions are written in Japanese, the illustrations are sufficient to guide you through many projects.

Recommended reading: Wool Pets by Laurie Sharp; Felted Feathered Friends by Laurie Sharp; Little Felted Animals by Marie-Noelle Horvath.

Week 6: Wetfelting

We jumped into my favorite subject this week: making felt from wool. I showed the students raw wool in the grease, and the same locks once washed. Then I demonstrated how the locks are turned into batt using hand carders.

Next we laid out small pieces of merino batt on 10″ squares of batt I had previously cut. Dyed locks, yarn and small pieces of pre-felt were also available as additional embellishments. I chose to use batt to minimize the difficulties beginning students have with drafting fine layers of roving.

Once the design was complete, we placed them on a 12″ square of bubble wrap, then slipped the batts into a ziploc bag, squirted in some warm soapy water, then sealed. We started by tapping the bags with our fingers and then pounding the bags with our fists. At this first stage, the designs are fragile. Details may move around if agitation is too vigorous. Tapping is a way to agitate the wool without disturbing the design. After three or four minutes of tapping, open the bag, and peek at the wool. Is there a sharp delineation between the surface design and the background? If yes, then the design is still fragile and should be tapped or pounded longer. Can you see the small fibers migrating into the base? If yes, then the design is felting well and you can work more vigorously. Seal the bag again, then rub the wool around on the bubble wrap. After ten minutes of vigorous agitation, open the bags again. As the wool transitions to felt, it will start to shrink. The edges may fold over on themselves, but they can be peeled away and straightened along the way. Pour a little more hot water on the felt, then rub some more. Once the felt finished, rinse and squeeze out the excess water.

Some students were eager to take supplies home to continue felting. As we had enough material for each student to make two pieces of felt, they were encouraged to take a square of batt and as many small pieces to embellish their design as they can use. Add a small amount of mild dishsoap to hot tap water, then squirt into the ziploc bag. I avoid harsh grease-cutting detergent as they strip the natural oils from the wool.

Students always ask ” how do I know when I’m done?” There should be color migration from front to back (bits of the surface color will be visible peeking through the background color). When you pinch the felt between your fingers, can you feel fibers slipping and sliding? If the answer is yes, the fibers have not fully bonded and the felt is not done. Can you pull, tear or stretch the felt? If yes, then you’re not done. A finished piece of felt will be solid and firm. You can cut it without the edges fraying and you should not be able to stretch it (unless there is a thin spot with not enough roving). The wool will felt fastest with hot water and vigorous agitation. If you’ve rinsed the felt, then decided it isn’t quite done, add some hot soapy water then rub some more. Scrunching the felt into a ball and rubbing it between your palms will work well once the the surface design is fully adhered to the background.

Merino batts can be purchased from Opulent Fibers, and New England Felting Supply; prefelt sampler packs are available through Outback Fibers. If students are interested in further exploring wetfelting, the next step would be to play with roving. Available locally at my studio or at Weaving Works, there are many different fibers sold as roving. Each breed has different qualities and properties when felted. Merino will create the smoothest and fastest felt, but is also the most expensive roving made from sheep’s wool. Corriedale and romney are also common, but they are a coarser wool, better suited to needlefelting, at least for beginners.

Recommended reading: The Art of Feltmaking by Anne Einset-Vickrey

Week 7: Sewing and Spinning

Picking up the handsewing component of our class once again, we worked on transforming the pieces we wetfelted last week into sachets or pillows. I demonstrated a blanket stitch as a classic way to bind two fabrics together.

Some students chose to cut an interesting detail out of their handmade felt, then cut an identical piece of industrial felt to stitch the two together. I brought lavender, rice, lentils and catnip for stuffing. For those who want to create a larger pilow, I will bring fluffy wool batting to stuff next week.

Threading needles continues to be the most challenging aspect of handsewing. Working with large-eye needles will reduce frustration. There are needles available with a notch cut in the top of the eye so thread or yarn can be dropped into place instead of threaded through the eye. Students can competently whip stitch, blanket stitch and straight stitch through a variety of fabrics.

While the sewing was happening on one side of the classroom, some students were learning how to spin with a drop spindle. Our volunteer teaching assistant, Karen and another friend, Marti, stepped in with their spindles and made spinning skills to demonstrate. Drop spindles are a more portable version of the spinning wheel, operating on the same principle.

This is a skill that requires a little individual instruction and then plenty of practice. The Fiber Gallery hosts a monthly spinning circle on the first Friday of every month from 6:30-9pm. Bring your own spindle.

Next week we will have six spindles available for students, but we need a couple of volunteer instructors. If you have a spinning neighbor, aunt, grandparent or friend available for an hour next Friday morning, it would be wonderful to have them share their passion with our class.

If your student would like to own their own drop spindle, Weaving Works and the Fiber Gallery both carry a selection of handturned spindles. You can also search Etsy for drop-spindle kits which include wool, instructions, a spindle.

Week 8: Wetfelting Jellyroll Beads

Working with wool roving for the third time during this session, I introduced another preparation so the students can see firsthand how much variation there is in rovings. For this project, we worked with merino top, which has been processed three times, compared to the merino batt we used for the flat felt in Week 6 (carded once) and New Zealand corriedale sliver (carded twice) we used to needlefelt the pumpkins in Week 5.  The merino top is very fine and smooth; all of the fibers are aligned and the shortest fibers have been removed.

Students selected three sections of merino in different colors, then drafted small sheets into an aluminum pan, creating a striated stack. Just like preparing sushi, students rolled their stack of wool tightly into a cylinder. With a drizzle of soapy water in their pan, they rolled the cylinder of fluffy wool gently, being careful not to saturate the wool all at once. Over time, they increased the pressure on the cylinder until it was time to put all their strength into compressing the last bit of wool into felt.

Working on a non-slip, textured surface will help in the final stages of felting. We unrolled a couple of foam mats from the corner of the classroom so the students could finish their rolls. At my studio, I work on a corrugated vinyl mat from the flooring department of your local home improvement store. I place the mat on a square of shelf/drawer liner also sold in home improvement stores to keep your dishes or silverware trays from sliding around. When the cylinders were firm and dense, we rinsed out all the soap, then squeezed out the excess water.

The best part of the process is always the cutting. What will the beads look like on the inside? Some thought the patterns resembled letters, others, candy and some peacock feathers. This is a quick project once you get the hang of it. There are kits in my Etsy shop with instructions and roving for felting more jellyroll beads. They can be strung together for a garland or a necklace.

Recommended reading: Hand Felted Jewelry and Beads by Carol Huber Cypher

Week 9: Pompoms, Tassels, Kumihimo

For our last week together, we worked on a couple new skills then pulled them all together with a small sewing project: felt gnomes. The pattern for the gnomes can be found in Freya Jaffke’s classic Waldorf book Toymaking with Children. Using several different types of wool yarn, we made pompoms and tassels, using our fingers and scissors as our only tools. Many craft supply stores sell plastic pom-pom makers, but it is a very simple process. Vicky Howell has a great tutorial on her crafty how-to YouTube channel. Fluffy and/or fuzzy yarns make the best pom-poms, while smooth and silky yarns make the best tassels. 

Freya Jaffke’s pattern calls for a single seam along the hood, and then a running stitch around the base of the hood. The gnomes were stuffed with a little wool batting. Some of the students opted to sew a tiny bell to the hood. With a little yarn strung through the hood, these gnomes would make sweet tree decorations or door charms.

Lastly, I introduced Kumihimo, a seven-strand Japanese braid, as a way for students to complete some of the projects we started earlier in the session. Depending on the weight of the yarn and the fiber used, this technique can be employed to create a very sturdy rope or a fine cord. It can be sewn along the edge of a pillow as piping, used as a strap for a quiver of arrows or tied around a wrist for a friendship bracelet. The possibilities are endless.

The kumihimo discs were made with matte board. The slots will bend and wear out over time. To recreate your own disc, cut a square of stiff cardboard. On each side, measure and mark 1/4, and 3/4 of the width. Cut the corners between the 1/4 and 3/4 mark. This will create an octagon. Cut a slit halfway through each side, and poke a hole through the center with an awl. Cut seven lengths of yarn or cotton cord; pull the seven strands through the hole and knot together. Slip one piece of yarn through seven of the slots. From the empty slot, count 1…2…3. Pull the 3rd strand out of the slot and place it in the empty slot. Rotate the disc so the empty slot is now in front of you and count again 1…2…3. Make sure you are always working in the same direction (it doesn’t matter which) or you will undo the braid.

Thanks to the helpful hands of Sara Cole and Kelly Rogers Flynt, who took over in my stead while the students got to work, several more students took a turn with the drop-spindle. Many thanks to Jennifer Schuster for loaning me several of her fine spindles for our use during class.

Recommended reading: Toymaking with Children by Freya Jaffke

Felting and Fondue Party

For my daughter’s twelfth birthday, we celebrated with a special party at my felt studio. It was the simplest and most fun birthday we’ve enjoyed together.

Perhaps it was the fact that the girls were mature enough to chatter, sing and socialize with little wrangling on my part, perhaps it was the fact that my daughter has watched me teach so many times that she was able to teach her friends with no additional input.

Several of the girls had experience with needlefelting, and a couple had tried making felt rocks at their elementary school. With little guidance, each girl felted her own set of feltilocks.

After felting for an hour, we took a break for chocolate fondue, probably the silliest alternative to birthday cake yet.

The girls weren’t ready to stop felting, so we pulled out some bars of soap to make felt soaps. The best part of hosting a party at my own studio is having the flexibility to change plans on a whim and indulge their flights of fancy.

It felt like we had reached milestone when my daughter was able to plan and execute her party from start to finish. What a success.