Books

Quite a while ago I decided to do felt books to have on hand for gifts. I love working with the fibers, so it's a good excuse to use all the things I've collected--and continue to collect in spite of trying to use things up!

 

To a base of craft felt, I used the embellisher to felt down a thick and thin yarn-love the way it creates random rows. Then I used metallic and machine quilted it. I always steam the felt several times along the way to block it. The ribbon was given to me by a friend. The button is from my stash.

It's lined with a hand painted cotton. It has 3 signatures that are covered with heavier hand painted papers. This one was painted, then plastic wrap was laid on the wet paint to create the crystal pattern. I always use another button on the inside when sewing one on the outside, so use doesn't rip the cover.

Embellisher

After watching the DVD on Feltmaking by Pokey Bolton, I decided to try to make one example from it. On a base of felt, I put strips of cotton fabrics from my scrap pile. First that is felted down, then strips of dyed cheesecloth were added to the surface. The embellisher really likes cheesecloth and eats it up creating weird shapes. The lace motifs were painted with Dynaflow and heat set when dry. They too were embellished down. I was surprised that it worked but was very careful, as some of the spots were thick.

Next I machine embroidered the piece with metallic thread in the circles that I always seem to do. I was going to fold it in half for a book cover but need to use the whole thing as is and just make another for the back.

Here is the reverse side with the unbalanced tension I was using to machine embroider. I like this side better! Now I won't be lining it but letting it show.

Embellisher Class

I'm taking an embellisher class from Janet Clark from http://www.joggles.com/ -need to learn the machine I bought over a year ago. Here are a few samples. The first is woven strips that will be a purse when the other side is done.

The circles are needled from the front then just the outside is needled from the back. I like the ring it makes.

The last is done with fabric, yarn, and roving.
As you can see, I haven't figured out how to delete a second photo. Oh well, I like that one.

Embellisher Class

Last night I attended an embellisher-felting machine-trunk show and class given by a friend that I hadn't seen for a long, long time. The best part of the class was seeing her-neither of us has aged of course. We are both still deep into creating, and her trunk show was wonderful. The purses were yummy; the wall hanging nice. She was wearing a jacket with Machine embroidered butterflies with Angelina behind the lacy parts-very nice.
The photos are of my class samples to see what different fibers do when needle punched. In the first one the white is silk organza; the Angelina adds the sparkle. In the second I particularly like the red shapes that remind me of flowers. I want to develop this idea. It reminds me of Art Nouveau. In the last one, I liked the way the yarn looked. A nice way to spend the evening.