The Dodo Blog

Easter is just around the corner. Here's an idea to make your Easter gifts extra special! 

WHAT DO YOU NEED FOR THE BUNNIES?

That will depend on how many you want to make. So, I’ll just give you the list of materials for 4 bunnies like mine. You can adapt the colors and/or decoration to your own taste.

• 40 cm of green ribbon
• 40 cm of pink ribbon
• 2 small bells
• 2 sew-on strass pieces
• Green and pink thread
• A thin needle (that can pass through the holes of the strass)
• A thimble
• 2 thin felting needles
• Felting foam
• Some white fine merino wool
• 2 thick (about 7 mm thick) sheets of pre-felt (pink and dark brown); each of them should be big enough to cut 2 bunnies
• The pattern
• Some gold and silver thread

INSTRUCTIONS

Start by making the pre-felt with your wool of choice. I can’t say exactly how many layers you need, since that’ll depend on how thick you lay your wool. But 4 should do if you’re working with thick layers.

Cut 2 bunnies in pink and 2 in brown. You’ll need...

THE STORY BEHIND THIS PROJECT

I belong to a small felt club that gets together once a month via Zoom to felt in a group setting.

In our December meeting, the suggestion was that we create seasonal pieces. We usually felt 3D/sculptural items, and that was planned for December as well. But even though we work on a certain topic each month, we do have much creative freedom in the group. So, this time I thought of doing something slightly different.

I have tons of felt leftovers from many projects along the years, and I wanted to do something seasonal by recycling what I already had, instead of producing something entirely new. These bits accumulate with time, and it bothers me to see so much material not be used.

So, I gathered the thicker white felt leftovers (some of which was Nuno felt, which made it even more interesting), as well as some fun “Christmassy” templates I also already had from past projects. And, without having a clear initial idea, I started cutting the flat felt i...

This week I’m answering the question: “How do I make thin felt from 2 layers of wool without getting holes in my felt?”

The way I see it, there may be a couple of different reasons you’re getting holes in your fine felt:

• Your layout is uneven,
• You’re doing your layout on bubble wrap,
• Or you’re using felting/fulling methods that are too aggressive.

When you’re getting an uneven layout, have a look at:

• The quality of your wool,
• The way you’re drafting your fiber,
• And if you happen to have gaps in your layout.

If all of these 3 factors are ok, your problem may be that you’ve done your layout on bubble wrap. Especially if the bubble wrap has very big and tough bubbles, it can create holes or, at least, marks on a thin felt. So, I recommend laying out the wool on a plastic film or piece of fabric.

And, finally, make sure you’re using gentle felting and fulling methods, like the ones I suggest in the video.

If holes in your fine felt have been an issue for you in the past,...

We know that the amount of shrinkage in wet felting depends on many variables. Among the most important are:

• The wool type: breed, microns, fiber length. Fine wool shrinks more than coarser wool.
• The number of wool layers: if they’re odd or even, how many you lay. Also, thin layers shrink more than thick ones.
• The layout method: chevron will shrink more than the traditional layout, for example.
• Decoration: if you add silk, viscose, fabric, or pre-felts.
• Fulling methods: which ones you use, how many times, in which direction, was it evenly fulled, was it fully fulled. Aggressive fulling methods cause more shrinkage than less aggressive ones, as well as more fiber migration.
• Even the water temperature and the way the wool is dyed can influence the way it shrinks.

So, the only way to know what your results will be is to make samples before beginning a project, unless you always work with the same wool type, so you get to know very well how it behaves.

After you’ve made your...

One of the questions I'm asked most often in my live classes is "is this enough soap?"

Felters who aren't very experienced are often unsure about how much soap to apply to their wool fibers. But there are a couple of clues that can help you avoid drowning your project in foam. And that's what I'll go into today.

Before I get into that, I'd like to say that the best way to avoid getting your project too soapy is to add soap slowly and only add more when you notice it’s not enough.

This is why using soapy water is not my preferred method of adding soap to the wool. I like adding water, getting my hands soapy first and only then applying it to the fibers. This way I have more control over how much soap is going into the wool. If you use this method, the tips I have for you today make much more sense.

You’ll know you have the right amount of soap when:

1. The wool doesn't stick to your hands.

When you’re applying soap with the method I mentioned above, you’ll notice the fibers sti...

If you’ve followed my work for some time, you’ll know that something I constantly mention is how I like to teach in a way that empowers you to develop your style and explore your creativity.

I see no point in just showing you how to felt an object. When I’m developing my courses, my goal is always to go into the details and the reasons why I’m using a particular technique. That way, you can apply what you’ve learnt in a different project, so you’re free to develop your own designs. That allows you to grow way beyond the methods taught in a tutorial.

That’s one of the reasons I was so happy when I got an email from Audrey Petzold a couple of weeks ago. Audrey bought the tutorial “Felt Food – Fruit” last April and she wanted to know if the basic procedures I used for making the toy fruits could be scaled up to make life size fruits.

I told Audrey it was perfectly possible, and that she just had to make sure that the inner layers were felted enough to apply the next ones. Basically, al...

There are thousands of ways you can decorate a wet felted project. Some just involve wool, others can include silk or other fabrics, as you know. This is then called Nuno felting. But today I bring you a sample that contains wool, silk and something else.

I wanted to show you an example of how you can use a transparent piece of silk to hold any type of synthetic material, that wouldn’t otherwise attach to wool. In this case, I’ll be using a pre-felt and a piece of white silk chiffon with the same size as the pre-felt. Alternatively, you can lay merino wool tops or batts, and use light gauze instead of silk.

TIP # 1 – USE LIGHT GAUZE INSTEAD OF SILK TO MAKE YOUR EXPERIMENTS CHEAPER

I’m also using circles of a synthetic golden fabric (that doesn’t attach to wool), but you can choose countless other materials like small beads or sequins, for example.

If you’re making a sample, please remember to measure the size of the wool now and after shrinkage.

TIP # 2 – ALWAYS MEASURE YOUR SAM...

You plan the piece you want to make.

You draw and cut the resist.

You lay your wool.

Everything is going great, but when you start fulling, your felt just seems to be stuck. Somehow the wool just doesn’t seem to become compact. In fact, nothing seems to happen.

You’ve been felting for hours and you feel tired. What started out as fun is now getting on your nerves. So, you decide to stop.

But then you ask yourself:

WHAT HAPPENS TO MY PROJECT IF I STOP NOW?

IS MY PIECE RUINED?

SHOULD I JUST LEAVE IT ON THE TABLE LIKE THIS? (I ACTUALLY NEED THE TABLE!)

I DON’T EVEN KNOW WHAT WENT WRONG!

Do you recognize the scenario? It’s happened to me dozens of times. The difference when it happens now is that I know exactly what to do.

So – because I suspect it’s happened to you too – I wanted to bring you a couple of tips today on what to do.

Let’s start with “what went wrong”

Well, felting is a physical but also a chemical process. That means that sometimes different factors combine in a...

Today I’ve got a fun tutorial that shows you how to wet felt a ball necklace for children. It’s called Kid’s Dots, and it’s a piece I’ve sold for a long time. Now you get to see how it’s done (for FREE) 🙂

I decided to film this project because Stacy Tavassoli from Truly Majestic invited me to create a tutorial for her arm knitting community. Arm knitting is done with big amounts of wool roving, the same we use for wet felting. But it produces lots of scraps that you can’t use for knitting any more.

So here it is for you. It’s an easy tutorial, which is great for beginners. You won’t need much equipment. Actually, you probably have everything you need at home already. And it shows you 10 tips that are useful for other felting projects.

I’d love to see how your necklaces turned out, so click here to send me your photos 🙂

Have fun!

P.S.: The special Mother’s Day Pack is a 2 for 1 pack for crafty moms, that is only available until May 10. Check out this exclusive offer!

Welcome to the first episode of my new Q&A series.

If you still have trouble finding the right way to make a resist for a 3D wet felted object, this episode is for you.

Today’s question is from Kathryn, from Walla Walla, in Washington state.

And Kathryn writes:

“I am trying to make a wet felted case for my son’s new MacBook Pro computer. I viewed your template making video for the clutch bag – thinking I could use that for my effort.

I made the template and started to lay out the wool and realized that I didn’t know why I needed the top resist.

You have a resist that has a top and bottom, when I thought I only needed the bottom to cover with wool, so that I could make the pocket.

If I don’t intend the top to have a pocket, why do I need the top part of the template?

I ended up cutting the template in half and placing the top part under the bubble wrap to serve as a guide, as I wanted the top to cover the bottom of the bag as I see on your photo.

Can you help me underst...