Happy Day's

Yesterday we had a knitty lunch at work.  A group of us got together at lunchtime with our knitting and had a good knatter.  There was cake, but sadly it got eaten before I took the picture.

This is how my jacket will look

I did some more of my crochet jacket using the red Drops Eskimo wool that I bought at the Knitting and Stitching show.  Other people were knitting socks, a lacey scarf and crochet slippers.

crochet jacket in progress

When I got home I found that my new felting book had arrived

I was so inspired that I quickly whisked up a small sample of nuno felt.  I have plans for a much larger scale piece in the near future.

Then today I finally managed to get to the Post Office to pick up my parcel, and opened it to reveal these Beauties.

They are from Ren at Fairysteps (http://www.fairysteps.co.uk/) and I can thoroughly recommend her fantastic leather goods.  Superb quality, fabulous design and craft(wo)manship and totally unique. I have quite a few pairs of shoes and boots from her already and I wear them all the time, they are so comfortable and durable.  In fact I think they get better with age!

I'm feeling especially pleased with this pair as they go so well with my new bag.

I'm off to pack my bag now as I'm going to my mum's for a few days.

More felting

I've been felting again.  As usual when I take up something new I get a bit carried away.

I made this little phone pouch from wool leftover from the bag.  I added rings to it so that the bag handles from the larger felted bag can be attached to it so it can be used on it's own as a small bag.  I also added a hook inside the large bag so that it can be attached so I can always find my phone when it rings!

 That was the success story.

After that I remembered the bag of fleece that my dad gave me last year for spinning (which I never got round too).  It's been washed but has sat around in a bag for a long time now.  I thought I would try felting with it.

 So I carded a load of it and laid it out round a template to create a pair of slipper boots.

 Unfortunately it didn't felt well.  It eventually did felt but seemed to have stretched, and no amount of dunking in hot water, cold water and rubbing made it shrink.  

I'm not sure what the problem was.  Perhaps the wool needed more washing before felting or perhaps it wasn't good felting wool (it was a rare breed cross but I'm not sure what breed).  Probably both combined with my novice felting skills.

But it hasn't put me off - I've ordered a book called Felting Fashion, and I am eager to try some more projects.  So watch this blog over the coming months.