Page 1 Needle felting Needle felting is quite different from creating felt by shrinking wet wool. There s no water involved, it requires very little space and creates no mess at all. It s a craft that is so easy to learn; even children will soon be creating gorgeous things. All you need is a barbed felting needle, a padded work surface and some carded wool the kind that spinners use to spin yarn with. Needle felting is a very forgiving craft: it requires no cutting out of patterns, no stitching of seams and no stuffing of tiny arms and legs. A bear the size of would be extremely challenging if made using typical bear making techniques, but with needle felting, he s a breeze. He s solid wool felt all the way through and you will have him finished in just a few hours. Because needle felting a three-dimensional project is a free-form sculpture technique, your version of will no doubt look slightly different to mine. But each and every version of ever made will be absolutely unique! - A Christmas Elf This little Christmas elf bear measures about 10cm (4 inches) tall. He was created using corriedale wool sliver; it felts down quickly, so is good for beginners. See the body shape guide below to give you an idea of the shapes you are going to make. Use the shapes as a guide only, as you will find that your bear grows into an individual as you work. You will need: White wool sliver Green wool sliver Red wool sliver German glass teddy bear eyes (3mm size) Black thread for the nose embroidery Medium felting needle (36T) Fine felting needle (40T) Dental floss Foam block for working on Long doll needle (for attaching head) Embroidery needle (for nose) Small pliers (Wool, felting needles, eyes, foam blocks available from Cobweb Cottage) The Head To start with we are going to make teddy s head. This is made as a round ball, which is then flattened slightly to form an egg shape. The size of the finished head will depend on how much wool you begin with. Try not to make it too large or it will take too long to felt down. My teddy s head measures about 3 cm in diameter. Pull off a wad of white wool and try to squeeze it down into a tight ball in your hands. This will give you a rough idea of the size of your finished head when it is felted down. If it is going to be too big, remove some of the wool, or add some more if it will be too small. Begin poking the wool with your medium felting needle, pushing it through the wool and slightly into the foam, then pulling it all the way out again. Repeat this action 4 5 times. Now pick your work up off the foam block and rotate it a quarter turn. Think of it as a round sphere and you need to needle every part of surface of the sphere, not just the front and back. Poke 4 5 times in the new area, then rotate and repeat these steps. You will notice that your work begins to shrink down and hold together. Continue poking all over the round surface until the ball feels reasonably firm but not hard. If you feel that your ball is not staying a nice round shape, use your needle to poke at the areas that are bulging out of line, and they will go inwards. In this way you can control your shaping, poking different parts of your piece to make them go in. Page 1
Page 2 Once you have a nicely formed round ball, softly felted, you need to try to form the shape of an egg or oval. Remember as you form the oval, to keep paying attention to the ends, as well as the middle, or your piece will become too elongated. The ends of the oval will need just as much poking as the middle. When your shape is beginning to feel about half-firm and is a definite oval shape, you can change your needle to a #40 and start to apply more individual shaping. Look at your head and decide which end of the oval is to be the nose, and try to make that end a little finer and more pointed than the other end which will be the back of the head. It is very important that the nose is felted firmly, as you are going to stitch the nose with thread later and you need a firm base in which to work. Before the head gets really hard, you need to begin shaping the forehead. To give the bear a distinct forehead, make a line of pokes right across the top of the muzzle, about half way along the length. You will have to work on this dent and the areas above and below it for a while to get the shaping that you desire. Now that you have the dent in place, keep working all around the head firming it up, but you will have to keep coming back to the forehead indent and re-working it to keep the definition there as the other areas are gradually felted down around it. When you feel that the bear s head is firmly felted all over and is a nice teddy shape, choose the position for the two eyes. They should be just above the indent for the forehead. Poke each eye area repeatedly with your needle until you have a small indent there for the eye to rest in. The #40 needle is ideal for this fine shaping. The Ears The ears are made from a circular piece of flat felt, which is cut in half to form the two ears. You will be surprised how little wool you need to make the ears. Take a very small wad of white wool and place it on your foam, roughly in a circle shape. Poke it a few times to attach it to the foam. Now take a coin about 2.5 3 cm in diameter (1-1 ¼ ) and place this on top of the wool. Very slowly make a row of pokes around the outside of the coin, being careful not to hit the coin or you may break the needle. You need to poke enough so that you are making a dent in the wool. Go right around the coin and then lift it off. You should be left with a circular dent in the wool. Gently fold the wool that is outside the dent line, back in over the circle and felt it down to hold it there, using the dent as a mark to keep your piece circular. Go right around the piece like this, and you should end up with a flat circle of felt. Pick the piece up off the foam and turn it over and needle felt from the other side to prevent it embedding itself in the foam. Don t poke too deeply or you will end up with wispy bits coming out each side. I use the 40T needle for this work, as the barbs are closer to the tip. Keep turning the work over to felt both sides, taking care to poke the wispy bits back into the ear on each side. When your disc is holding its shape nicely and feels firm, but still a little bit larger than you want it to be when finished, you are ready to cut it in half and attach each ear to your bear s head. Position one corner of the ear near the top of the head, about halfway between the nose tip and the back of the head. Holding the ear in place with one hand, carefully poke the needle down through the ear corner and deeply into the head. This will take the loose fibres from the ear and mat them down firmly in the felt of the head. You will need to poke the corner quite a few times until you feel it is holding. Then position the lower corner of the ear where you want it and felt that into position until it is just holding. Now carefully poke down right around the back edge of the ear, and a little at the front, paying particular attention to making sure the corners are firmly felted on. Continue felting around for quite some time until you are satisfied that it feels very firmly attached, and the ear is about the size that you want it. Then felt the other ear on, making sure that it looks even in size and position with the first ear. You may have to work for a while to get both ears looking the same. The Nose Now you are ready to embroider the nose. I use No.8 DMC thread. Start by making a knot under the neck area, as this will be covered up later when the body is joined on. Embroider a rectangle or a triangle shape, whichever your prefer, using satin stitch, and make an inverted Y shape for the mouth. When you have finished, knot the thread under the neck area and lose the end back inside the head. Page 2
Page 3 The Eyes Use a half hitch knot to attach a 38 cm (15 inch) length of dental floss folded in half, to the wire loop of one eye. Once the floss is attached you will need to squeeze the wire loop closed, using small pliers, so that the wire can be pulled down into the head and the eyes are held tight against the eye sockets that you have made. Thread both ends of floss from one eye on to a long needle, insert the needle in an eye socket and come out at the bottom of the head where the neck will be and leave the thread hanging loose there. Now do the same for the other eye, coming out about ½ cm away from the first thread. Pull both threads to firmly embed the eyes. When you are happy with the eye positions, tie the ends together tightly and leave them there at the neck. These ends will be used later to attach the head to the body. again, starting with your larger needle. Work as you did for the head, first making a ball shape, then working it down to an oval. Change to your smaller needle when you feel ready to, and continue to work your piece down to a firm, egg shaped oval. Attaching The Head To The Body When your body is ready, you need to attach the head to it. Take one of the double threads that you have left hanging under the neck of the head from inserting the eyes, and thread it on to a long needle (one that is longer than the length of your body). Insert the needle at the neck end of the body and take it straight down through the body and out at the lower end. Pull the thread all the way through. The Body Now insert your needle back in the same hole as you just came out of and take it back up through the body to exit at the top, just ½ cm away from where you first inserted the needle. The idea is that you want the thread to disappear back inside the body at the lower end, but to grab some of the felt inside the body to hold on to when you pull tight. Take the needle off, pull tight and tie a knot at the neck with the remaining double thread from the other eye. Thread the remaining ends back into the body and cut off. The Legs The body for a basic bear is also an oval, but I prefer to make the neck end a little more pointy and the lower end rather fatter, like an egg shape, so that teddy doesn t look too skinny (see the basic shapes diagram). It also needs to be about twice the size of the head you have made. You will need to begin with a larger wad of wool (green) than you did for the head. Begin felting Page 3
Page 4 The legs are made as two cylinders, and it is best to work them side by side so they both end up the same size. Pull off two wads of green wool the same size, put one aside for now and work on the other one. Shape the wool with your fingers into a rough cylinder, about the length that you want the leg plus enough extra length for the foot. The cylinder needs to be quite fat at this stage, a lot fatter than the finished leg will be. Use one end of the cylinder (the foot end) to hold on to, and work the other end with your needle by rolling the cylinder over and over on your foam and needling it along the length as you work. Don t let the leg get too long and thin. Keep poking your needle into the hip end, poking back in the direction of the length of the leg, so that your needle is pointing towards the foot end at each poke. This will help firm up the hip and prevent the leg from getting too long. Also it needs to be firmly felted so that you can thread joint there later. Jointing The Legs When both legs are firmly felted down the length to where the foot will begin (the foot at this stage will just be a lot of loose wool), you need to make an angle at the heel area to turn the foot. Fold the loose wool over at the heel area so that it is at right angles to the leg and needle felt this loose wool, poking your needle up into the length of the leg a few times. When you have the heel turned, you can start working on the foot, shaping it all over by working on each side, on the top, the bottom and from the toe end Don t make the foot too thin. Keep working the sides and toes back towards the leg until you are happy with the foot shape and it is firm enough. Adding Paw Pads Now we are ready to join the legs onto the body. Take a length of dental floss about 38 cm (15 inches) and thread it onto your long needle, just a single thread. Insert the needle near the top of your first leg, on the inside of the leg, and take it out the other side, leaving a length of thread hanging out at the beginning that you can use to tie a knot later. Now go straight back in the same hole as you came out of and come out beside your first thread, about ¼ cm away. This will allow the dental floss to grab some of the wool in the leg but hide the stitch from the outside leg. Sit the bear s body on the table and place the leg against the body so that it looks to be in a nice position when the bear is sitting down. Work out where the needle needs to be inserted in the body to keep that position, and go right through the body and out the other side, keeping the needle level so that the legs stay the same height. Take the needle through the other leg, from the inside to the outside, then back in the same hole and out ¼ cm away. Now take the needle back through the body and come out close to where it went in. Pull the thread tightly and tie a knot. Then take each thread back through the body, pull tight and cut off so that they don t show. Take a small wad of your red wool and felt it down gently on your foam block until it is roughly holding together. Now place it over the bottom of your foot and needle felt it on with your small needle. Keep in mind that you only want to add a thin skin, not a thick wad to the bottom of the foot. Attach the heel area first, then the toe. Now make a line of pokes up the middle of the paw pad. You can now work over the rest of the pad paying particular attention to where you want the edges to be, pulling in the odd stray fibre with your needle, to make a neat edge. Make sure the pad is attached very firmly, so that it doesn t come off. Page 4
Page 5 The Arms points evenly spaced around it. Make a slit in the back of the star and slip it on to teddy s neck. Overlap the collar ends at the back and needle felt them together. Overlapping will help make the collar sit down nicely at the front of the teddy. The Hat Pull off two even sized wads of white wool, one for each arm, making them slightly smaller than the wads you used for the legs. Form a rough cylinder shape as for the legs. This time it will be simpler because there will be no foot, just a cylinder shape, bent slightly in the middle for the elbow. Work the arm down with your large felting needle first, and change to the smaller needle when you feel ready. Work along the length of the whole arm, paying attention to both ends, as the paws and the shoulders need to be firm, not wispy. When it is about half-felted, begin making a bend for the elbow, about halfway along the arm, by poking repeatedly into one side until it begins to form a dent, and then continuing to work around the whole arm, and the sides and back of the elbow too. Attach a red paw pad as for the foot, if desired. Jointing The Arms Join the two arms onto the body in the same way as you did the legs, but don t join them too close to his head or the collar won t side down nicely. To try the arm positions out, put a pin through the arm at the shoulder and pin it to the body. That will give you an idea of what he will look like. Remember to pull the threads very tight when knotting them so that the arms don t hang loosely, and then lose the ends back inside the body before cutting off. The Collar Cut a 5.5 cm diameter circle of flat red felt (this can be shop bought or made yourself). Cut this so there are 8 star Make a short cylinder of green wool for the hat, and work one end to a point, leaving the lower edge as a circle. When it is well felted, attach the wider end to the head, poking deeply through the hat and into the head to make the join strong. Do this all around the outside edge and also through the middle of the hat. Pull off a long thin piece of red wool and wrap around the base of the hat, then needle felt it in place. And now your little Christmas elf is complete. I am sure he looks very cute! If you need more wool or needles for further needle felting projects, you will find a complete List of Supplies on my website: www.cobwebcottage.co.nz I have also written two needle felting books, both of which are available on my website. These books will help you take your needle felting even further, and also show you how to use the technique for flat-felting pictures on clothing, quilting, or just to hang on your wall. If you would like to know more you can email me at: cobwebs51@xtra.co.nz Happy felting! Page 5