Saturday 18th May 2013
 
The Slipper Workshop Day finally dawned on Saturday 18th May.  Eight excited students arrived at the Village Hall to be greeted by Cathy from Sticky Paws – our tutor for the day – with boxes and packages full of wonderfully coloured Merino wool tops and gorgeous silk ‘hankies’ dyed every shade of the rainbow, all for us to play with - what joy!
 
The group consisted of five ‘regulars’ and three newbies – all with varying levels of experience and bundles of enthusiasm.  Our morning was enlivened (as if that was necessary) by the efforts of an amateur (by which I mean non-professional) group on guitars and drums playing in the Bar area for the morning.  

Undaunted, we set to and laid out what seemed to be huge mounds of wool
tops –75 grams in each slipper – after carefully making our own resists; these  slippers are couture fashion items and made to fit each owner perfectly. 

Lunch came quickly and was thoroughly and properly enjoyed – soup, eggs, salads, goats cheese and spinach filo pie, a potato bake plus lemon drizzle cake and a moist and scrummy rhubarb cake – and so we built up the energy for an active afternoon of rolling and bashing and throwing and hardening (all processes known to we felters as compulsory but fairly harmless).    

It was very fun. Cathy was as patient and expert as ever, guiding us through the process, advising on colours and technique, reassuring us and keeping us going until we all emerged with pairs of beautiful, remarkably slipper-like objects just awaiting final adjustments and embellishments. 

From us all, ‘Thank you so much, Cathy’  :-)  We all look forward to another workshop with you later this year.
 
Cathy is available on email: [email protected]
Or  telephone her on (01394) 412060 
Her website is http://www.stickypawsfelting.co.uk/


 

We had a good turnout on Saturday – six people in all – and everyone worked on different things. 

Sue’s pair of wonderfully woolly slippers –a work in progress for a while
now - received the ‘shaping’ treatment.  With a lot of hard work (made
from a local English fleece, they don’t felt as easily as Merino) Sue
managed to pull, rub and throw them into a very satisfactory – almost
shoe-shaped – slipper.

Gay experimented further with the Shibori technique: pre-felting a flat
piece in many colours with a pink dyed silk cap finish and then tying small
areas up into ‘knobbles’ which, this time, she stuffed from the back
with dry tops in various colours.  She felted the item further
and put it through the spinner on her washing machine when she returned
home.  Then came the happy moment: cutting through the bobbles to see
what lies inside. This piece may need more work; it seems hard to
decide how far to go with the cutting and how much to leave.

Annette made herself a cover for her iPhone.  She used some of the wool tops that Cathy kindly gave the group – this is ‘cobweb felt’ weight and seems tougher and more fluffy or ‘whiskery’ to work with than standard merino.  Gay tried it and made a very robust piece of felt with a really miniscule amount of fleece – it felts rather like mohair yarn.  In the end, Annette’s cover dried with a smoother finish than expected.

Lin’s work was a panel background for a piece of 3D felt among  other
things and Melanie worked away at her competition entry cushion.

Lunch was wonderful as always; three courses with soup, salads, cheeses
plus two cakes and sweetmeats; everything was perfectly delicious so many thanks to everyone.

A good turn out with 10 felters: Sue H, Melanie, Lin, Lisa who brought along Lynn from London, Hazel a complete newcomer to the group, Jacqui, Gay, Wendy and me, Alison, NP for the day.

Everybody bought contributions for the display of work - even our visitor and newcomer. There was so much to look at, so many questions to ask and suggestions to make, that we made quite a late start at actually doing some work.

Once we got going, most people seemed to be trying out new things or different slants on techniques used before so quite an experimental day. I don’t know what the general consensus would be but I found it all a great learning experience and absolutely loved seeing and talking about the things on display.

We didn’t manage to label each exhibitor’s work, although Gay had thoughtfully brought some with her, but we assembled table after table full of finished articles and sample pieces making a sea of colourful felting including other crafted items like ceramics, stained glass, knitting etc and even some handmade soap! It was all most exciting.

More work made by Never Ever Felt Better members

As usual we surpassed ourselves with the quality and quantity of our food which took us right through to tea-time and the arrival of the invited guests.  Altogether it was a most successful and enjoyable day and something to develop in the future maybe mounting a more organized exhibition and perhaps even attaching some price tags with the labels?

The Gathering on Saturday 17th November looks to be popular.  We have at least nine people booked to attend.  Around 4pm, we'll put out on show the many and varied things members of the group have made; either at a Never Ever Felt Better Gathering or elsewhere in 2012.

Nothing fancy or formal but people and friends are welcome to come up to the hall and have a look/see :-)  We hope to offer tea and coffee and we'll try to leave few nibbles from our Pot Luck lunch for our guests.

So - from 4 to 6 o'clock - we'll be 'On Show'  - hope people like it!

Six of us met at the Gathering on Thursday 25th, which began around 4.30 pm.  Jacqui and Wendy made seamless felt bags, Lin started on a large many-layered, multi-coloured piece of felt (now complete and really quite amazing), Sue completed a delightful knitted tea cosy from a genuine vintage pattern, Alison worked on embellishing her felt slippers (made in a recent workshop with Cathy at Sticky Paws http://www.stickypawsfelting.co.uk/ ) and I fiddled about; experimenting with making a bowl with a circular resist (instead of over a balloon) and with a finishing layer of a hand-dyed silk ‘cap’.

We all got very peckish around 7 o’clock and generous members produced home-made soups, warm focaccia bread and grain salads which everyone enjoyed immensely. We wondered whether to change our group name to Food ‘n’ Felting and we certainly felt better (and felted better) after such a delicious supper.

We finally cleared the hall and left well after 9 pm; tired but satisfied.

We had a really fun evening on 4th October – the Gathering being held between 4.30 and 9.00 pm.  Many and various items were made including a wool felt hen sculpture, a silk and wool felt scarf, wool felt flowers and leaves and a wool felt spectacle case.

The time went very quickly. Some of us stopped briefly for supper  and Lin took her chicken home to complete the felting as it was made of many layers for extra sturdiness.

Rachel sent in the following write up on the Gathering and lots of photos - I have managed to load quite a few - see below:

'We had a lovely day. As people arrived the hall came alive with the gentle buzz of people greeting and meeting one another. We were delighted to welcome Lin and Sue, two new members of our group. Naturally, at the beginning of each meeting we show our latest projects, the excitement this brings is contagious. Lin was wearing a warm jacket that she had felted and it was so useful to exchange experiences and develop ideas. We all admired her felted flowers and her bag with fluted design and pockets on the reverse

With everyone enthused, we focused on our various projects. Lisa soon had a dye-bath gently simmering and settled to painting a fantastic birthday card for her husband. Wendy and Denise began their felted pots by inflating a balloon, which just leant itself to a photo shoot! Jacqui  joined us  later and made a beautiful pot. I have to admire each one of these organic vessels, for the process is not as easy as it first appears.
 
It was good to have Lin, whose  advice and information was invaluable to us all at times throughout the day. Sue is relatively new to the craft but was soon making a bag, a flower and a gorgeous piece of cloth with Lin’s guidance.

Lunch turned out to be delicious, despite it being ‘pot luck’, with everyone bringing something. Thank you everyone.

What did I do? Oh, just  spent all day in a huge happy haze playing with colour. Thank you everyone for the joy these occasions bring.  Rachel 

Saturday 22nd September

@ Creeting St Mary Village Hall

Open from 9 am – 6 pm

NP: Rachel

Attendees: Denise, Lisa, Rachel, Wendy, Lin Morphy, Sue Morgan,

Poss. Jacqui ?

Thursday 4th October

@ Creeting St Mary Village Hall

Evening gathering 4.30 pm – 9pm ’ish

NP: Wendy

Attendees: Denise, Gay, Jacqui, Lin, Rachel, Wendy

Thursday 25th October

@ CSM Village Hall

(Changed to an Evening Gathering) 4.30 to 9 pm 'ish

NP: Jacqui

Attendees:  Alison, Gay, Jacqui, Lin, Melanie, Sue Hagley

Saturday 17th November

@ CSM Village Hall

Open from 9am – 6pm

NP: Alison

Attendees: Alison, Denise, Gay, Jacqui, Lin, Lisa, Rachel, Sue Morgan, Wendy  Poss. Sue Hagley?

Thursday 6th December

@ CSM Village Hall

Evening Gathering 4.30pm – 9pm ‘ish (to include festive nibbles and celebrations)

NP: Denise

Attendees: Gay, Denise, Jacqui, Lin, Lisa, Melanie, Rachel, Sue Hagley

Poss. Alison?

We had a very successful gathering on Friday 31st August at the Village Hall.  Eight people arrived for the day; six people felted items from bootees and mats to scarves and lengths of silk and felt fabric and two peole spent the morning in the kitchen with bubbling pans of rhubarb and mulberries, dying lenghts of fabrics

Seamless Felt Booties - the wool tops wrapped around a resist cut from 'Funky Foam', wetted and soaped to start felting process.  When the wool shrinks tightly to the resist pattern, the shape is cut through round the centre join and the resist is removed.  Further work is done to felt, shape and full the booties and then they can be rinsed thoroughly, stuffed to maintain their shape and left to dry (see below)