Bank Holiday Felt Balls

This tutorial is for Wendy who asked about making felt balls after I posted my pictures of fleece. So here goes. The first problem I had was photographing a two handed thing - rolling the balls - with one hand, but then Geoff turned up and obliged.
The second problem was handling the camera with wet hands, so there was a lot of drying going on.
Here goes.
Get everything ready first.
Apricots to eat
water to drink
flask with hot water
dish with cold water
soap
towel
fleece

Its nice to have a bit of company and the radio with The Archive Hour about John Betjeman was helpful too.

A word about soap. I used to use washing up liquid, but I heard from somewhere that this is very bad form and one should use posh soap. I acquired this wool fat soap and the tin of laurel and olive oil soap flakes, both of which are malvellous for felt making. (But the washing up liquid always used to work too...)

Felt is made by the action of soap, agitation and hot water on wool fibres. We have all done this by mistake with our favourite jumper on a hot wash. Here we are doing it on purpose.

Tease out a handful of wool fibre. These are 'merino tops' - I buy them from Wingham Wool who do mail order but they were at Woolfest this year. Not sure if they do overseas? You could ask.

 

Roll the wool into a ball, dip it into the hot water - rub soap onto your other hand and roll this hot, soapy, round, soft mass between your hands.

I used to get water and soap everywhere, but this demonstration took place in my shed, which has no water supply, and (are you reading Mum?) there was (almost) no watery mess anywhere!

Now, its not uncommon for a fissure like this to form. I don't like the loo k of this on the finished thing, so I remedy this by applying a small amount of fleece as a sort of 'bandage'

and felting it onto the forming ball.

keep on rolling, applying more pressure as the ball gets firmer. Dip it into hot water and apply more soap if you need to and finally, when the ball is as firm as you want it, dip it into cold water and give it a good rinse.

Make a few more, put them in a sunny window to dry and there you are!

Then I had a go at needle felting dots. This post already has more pictures that my brother likes, so needle felting will have to wait.

Apologies to all of you who know how to do this with your eyes closed, one hand tied behind your back (impossible actually) and the standing on your head..... and for any inaccuracies. This method works for me, but I'll just add this - it can get a bit tedious and I think it would be much more fun with more people!

Comments

[wendy]

THANK YOU thank you thank you, for a wonderful tutorial and taking the time to do it. I will definitely have a try. I have a feeling mine won't be such a good shape.

[martha]

I'll come home and make felt balls with you. It was nice to talk to you last night, I will find out how much it cost and try it again sometime. A request: Could you please keep all the weekend and observer magazines until I get back, I am fed up of reading the paper on the internet and there are no pictures, so I was thinking of back isseues and tea. This is not an odd thing to ask, I know that you probably wouldn't get round to throwing them out anyway but thought I'd make sure. lots love xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

[tania]

&hearts! oh how I love felt balls- thanks for the tip on posh soap and repairing fissures!
:)

[Katie]

Hi Katie

Thanks for dropping by my journal! What a co-incidence that we've chosen the same blog name. :-)

[melissa]

ooooh!!! I've been wanting to make some of these forever, and your tutorial looks so fun! Thank you thank you!

[Amelia]

I have just stumbled across your blog and what good timing. I have had a go at felting and had no success. So thank you for the tutorial, I will give it another try.

[Rebecca]

I have made a number of these with washing up liquid but your posh soap looks so much nicer, where did you get it from please? I love the polka dots, great colour combination.

[Linda Harre]

Thank you so much for the tutorial. I never did know how that was done. I would love to try some felting and your info has helped build enthusiasm. Thanks again.....Linda