Tuesday, April 19, 2011

Felting Experiments

I am still knitting fish and got the idea to try felting them. I am thinking it will make the increase stitches show less and make them a firmer object. I knitted 5 different color variations and took notes on the pattern, yarn and needle size. I put them in the washer with HOT water, a little soap and a couple of pairs of jeans. Then let them agitate for 7 minutes. Squeezed them out and into a bucket of cold water. Repeated this a few times.



They came out rather torpedo like......So I made some more, trying to exaggerate the length and the tail. Here they are before felting.






















I also made some bunnies....felted everybody:

























The striped fish and the gray bunny were gifts for my friend Mike's kids.



























I am still working towards the perfect fish shape. Have been also knitting bunny accessories....

4 comments:

  1. Nice work- I love love love the bunnies in their striped shorts.

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  2. Beautiful gifts Dianne!
    this reminds me of when I tried felting my sheep's wool. (of course I had more luck when I wasn't trying-like when I was washing fleece)
    I tried shrinking a few hand woven pieces with yarn from my white faced wooly girls (Dorsets)which felted somewhat successfully however the Suffolk's wool would not no matter what I did. I was told it is why Suffolk wool is preferred for sport socks.
    I can't remember if I tried boiling but then I heard the agitation is also key. Sadly I no longer have sheep and haven't spun or woven for years. Deb Seite

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  3. I like the torpedo fishies. I think they look great. What about making a split tail fin? Maybe gathering the middle before felting or doing a series of decreases from the middle. These would also make super fun rattles. But I don't know if the wool would be a problem if it goes in the mouth of little ones...

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  4. Nice! I've done a lot of felting. Different yarns behave very differently when felted. Or I guess wool from different kinds of sheep behaves very differently when felted. I've had some get like cardboard and others barely felt at all, and everything in between. Sometimes nothing much happens until you hit some magic point and then BAM, it felts up. Weird.

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