Another little Teacup Mouse

Last fall I shared some sweet felt mice and mushroom cups here.

On the workbench recently I noticed a few of the mushrooms remained and I know all the other cups have sold so I made this sweet little guy.

I feel like I want to make some new ones.

I feel like they might be different.

I would like to do some all white and cream ones.

Like a winter fairy forest.

Maybe even make the mice white with really big ears...

Sounds like the perfect thing to do when the weather cools down, doesn't it?

I may have to go dig out some things and cut all the pieces so they are ready to go.

The perfect project for when I don't feel like thinking too hard.

I love hand stitching for those kinds of times...

Thanks for stopping by...

                  Linking up with these great blogs.

Needle Felted Bunny

So how cute is this bunny?

Pretty cute, right?

He started with one of those needle felting kits.

I love those.  

They come with a mold.

After you make the front and back, you just felt them together.

When you finish your bunny, you can make more bunnies.

Since you already have the mold, you just need to purchase more wool roving.

You can make a bunny any color you want.

I love this brown roving the bunny came with.

I like the way he turned out but I think I was hoping for a more natural bunny.

Like a real bunny.

This one is like a cartoon bunny.

Still, he is a cute bunny.

I felted him much better than the dog I made last year.

This bunny is very firm.

He fetched a second place ribbon at the fair...

Yay, bunny!

Thanks for stopping by....

Linking up with these great blogs.

Needle Felting...All Warm and Woolly...

One of my favorite winter crafts is needle felting. 

Have you tried it?

Very relaxing...

I love needle felting by hand...

The rhythmic tapping of the needles through the fabric....

But I must confess...

I also own a needle felting machine which is much faster and easier.

The drawback is that with 12 needles loaded in the machine, when they break it is a pain to replace them.

And expensive.

However, you can achieve really cool results quickly.

Let me show you.

This was a piece of wool felted sweater.

I just machine felted it onto a scrap of burlap a little bigger than the piece of wool.

Then I wrapped it around my jar to see where I would need to stitch it.

I stitched it with some cotton string.

I love those little primitive Xs.

This little purse came from the thrift store.

I needle felted the little wool butterflies on by hand.

Just get a little cookie cutter in a shape you love.

Put your felting mat inside the bag under where you want your shape.

Lay the cookie cutter on top.

Add some wool roving inside the cookie cutter and needle felt it.

Be sure to do the edges extra to give your shape definition.

Then remove your cookie cutter and continue to needle felt it until it looks like you want it to.

You can add details with more wool like the lines down the center of the butterflies.

I used a scrap of wool yarn for the butterfly trails.

Just needle felt it in place too.

I added a wool butterfly to this little wool hat as well...

A sweet fun touch that can take a simple gift from nice to much more personal.

A project I have been wanted to try is a machine felted landscape pin.

This one used scraps from a blue sweater, green sweater and a black sweater as the base.

I cut my shapes and then machine felted them together.

 

I learned that the piece grew quite a bit larger when it was felted. 

 

This is quite a big pin, but it started just the right size.

If you try it, make yours smaller than you want the final product.

After I machine felted the sweater pieces together, I added little wisps of wool roving in green to the hills and white for the clouds.

While I had the felting machine out, I did a little experimenting.

I had this doily from the thrift store and wondered if the felting machine would work on it.

It did.

I did have one little place where the machine sort of ate a little bit of the doily.

But it was on the edge and not super noticeable.

I felted it on a piece of wool and then trimmed the wool afterwards.

A successful experiment.

  WooHoo!

Hope you got some new ideas for felting.

Thanks for stopping by....

Needle Felting Fun

Over the winter, I bought a needle felting kit.

I have needle felted before but never a 3-D figure.  

So I bought this cute little dog kit with my 40% off coupon at Michael's.

On a visit to my in-laws, I took it with me.

I skipped the evening fishing (and mosquito bites) and came in and worked on the dog.

Two hours and thousands of needle pokes later....

Here he is.

I think he is pretty cute.

The kit was awesome for a beginner because the forms make it super simple to get the shape right.

My typical issue with felting is that I should poke a lot longer.

But I am so excited and impatient...

I just have to go to the next step so he can take shape...

I think he should probably be firmer.

Although he will stand on his own.

The cool thing is that next time, I will know.

And if I want to make another dog, all I need is the wool.

Which I have.

If you want to give it a try, I highly recommend it.

This is the kit I got.

A word of warning.

That little needle is sharp!

 The forms make it easy to work and if you are careful, you do not get poked while using the forms...much.

But when you need to felt the two halves together, be very careful. 

 I got poked. 

A LOT!

I get so intense on what I am doing, I sometimes forget the little things...

Like, my hand is holding him and the needle will go the whole way through and hit what is on the other side....
my hand/fingers/etc...

Just saying....

I would NOT recommend it for children.

But if you have ever wanted to try it...

Give it a go.

Everything is included...

Thanks for stopping by...

Check to see who we are linked with HERE.

also linked with:

From My Front Porch to Yours