Felting with the Kids

Saturday morning the kids were itchy for some type of art project. So I decided to show them how to felt (wet felt). We decided to keep it easy and just make a thin, small little flat piece of felt ... but made it more fun by combining a few colors.

Here they are with the hot water and soap, starting the felting process of agitating the fibers.


The rubbing takes quite a bit of time and is a bit of hard work for little hands, but I didn't hear one complaint and they seemed to really enjoy the tactile process of felting. What kid doesn't love making things soapy warm water?

After a while of rubbing , they wanted to check to see how the felting was coming along. Here's a peek at their pieces and their colors choices for their piece of felt.
Looks like we have a little more rubbing to do! And here's the fulling process of rolling the felt in the mat. Almost done!

We had so much fun making some felt and are still deciding what to do with our little pieces of art. I'll be sure to post pictures once the kids decide what they wish to do with their felt!

If you are interested in wet felting, just do a search on the subject. You will find lots of online tutorials. There are also some great books on the subject, if you prefer to have something in hand while you work.

*Promo* Goodie Bags for Silver Bella

So I had the chance to send in some promo goodie bags to Sadie Lou, owner of the Lollishops (which should be opening it's web doors very soon... it's a new online marketplace for creative, whimsical and fanciful artists ... more on that as it gets closer!) Sadie Lou will be attending the Silver Bella show and invited a bunch of Lollishop vendors to send in promo items that she would distribute during the show. I use the term *promo* lightly because I am so not a fan of promotional items ... not magnets, buttons, pens or other things that plaster your business name but don't really have anything to do with your business or who you are. So I put together a needle felted mini flower hair pin for "big girls" and a set of clips for "little girls". It was a lot of work and with all the wholesale orders I had, these last few weeks, it was a miracle I was even able to get these goodies bags done.



But here they are. Instead of traditional bag toppers, I made and sewed felt toppers to match my new logo designed by the lovely and talented Lisa Bacon. Check out her services here! I love the way the felt toppers came out, and of course I had to add a little felt posie to finish it off! Cute, no?

Holiday Pretties

This weekend, I found some pretty holiday ribbons and fun whimsical Christmas flair to put together some new holiday hair pretties. I am all caught up on my wholesale orders finally, yet that could change at any moment, but hope to get some time to design some new holiday accessories this week. I'll keep you posted ...

Sheep & Wool Festival

Sunday ... I spent the day with my mom, aunt and daughter at the Sheep & Wool Festival. Fun, Fun, FUN! This is only my second year attending this show. It was a beautiful sunny autumn day, but it was a bit chilly so browsing all the handmade scarves, mittens, sweaters and such was a pleasure.








I don't knit (yet....it is SO on my list of things to learn to do) and I'm sort of thankful I don't because I could not imagine how much I could have spent on all the gorgeous yarns available at this show. Everyone at the show is so amazingly talented, it was a treat to walk amongst all their wares.






My daughter enjoyed the animals ... every kind of sheep in the world seemed to make an appearance here. My favorite had to be the Icelandic sheep. And they all were within petting reach. One even stepped up onto his coral to pose, yes pose, for several cameras.










She even got to see the border collies and other sweet doggies do their tricks in the show arena ... catching frisbees and such. One of the pooches was the dog that does the appliance commercials with Kelly Ripka.




And we waited in the serious long line for the homemade chicken pot pie. This is so yummy and definitely beats the greasy carny foods. They sold pot pies to maybe 2 0 or so people after us and then, they called out "Sold Out, see you next year". I can't tell you how many sad faces I saw ... all those people that had waited on that long line, some just steps away from holding that warm stick- to-your-ribs kinda meal in their thankful little hands ... and for nothing. Seriously it could of been an episode out of Seinfeld with the Soup Natzi. She just announced it so matter of factly, with no warning....I mean didn't you know you were down to the last 'oh I don't know 10 pies' at some point? Couldn't you have given a little pre-warning? She sold that last stinkin' pot pie and then just yelled "Sold Out, see you next year". Just like that!? I may never forget those words....this was a seriously long line folks!



I scored some fabulous wool, some with gorgeous plant dies in the most lusciously soft colors. I wish I could give a shout out to the owners of the booth I purchased from, but my receipt has no name, there is no biz card nor business info on the wool labels. Next year I will make sure I pay more attention! Lesson learned though ... make sure you get your name on your wares!