Just Need ID and Money

Sunflower smily face I made at floral class yesterday; that is Joe Lizura, our local meteorologist, predicting higher temperatures in El Cajon....supposed to be back in the 100's in a few days, sigh....

Here's my latest creation, needle felted design on felted sweater, a lightweight evening bag for your ID and money......oh, and a lipstick of course!
Started with a picture of a pretty floral arrangement I made, copied the design using needle felting method.

Fulfilling a Promise :)

A few weeks ago, and a couple of failures later, I decided I was ready to make the simple purse I had been promising myslef I would complete. I had some free Saturday morning time, so went to work and within a few hours, I was done......Since I already had somewhat of a master plan; I knew the basic shape and design and that I just needed to hand sew the outer felt, and machine sew the lining, then hand-stitch it in place. I was deciding on embellishments, so I needle felted a design to coordinate with the colors and pattern of the lining. It came out so cute!! Anyway, I am using it as a sewing/felting kit and I just love how it looks and functions so have been re-inspired to keep experimenting with my techniques. As previously mentioned, I have now studied my book a little more and have new information, such as using dissoluble stabilizer when machine sewing felt....for now, I intend to mostly hand sew with embroidery floss or silk ribbon and I know my machine will appreciate that =^..^=

Then I made stuffed mini sweet peppers I purchased at the 99 Cents Only store. They had the nicest produce yesterday, stocked up on beautiful celery, carrots, onions, raspberries, and limes...I couldn't resist these colorful peppers and I remembered I had made stuffed peppers like these once and wrote the recipe down because it was easy and good. I don't really even like sweet peppers always, but I like them prepared this way and they smell really good cooking. I am serving them later, re-heated, with some leftover sauteed kale with ham and garlic, and some frozen stuffed potatoes, also from 99C. It is too hot still to cook at night, so I have been busy cooking this morning, to last us a few meals. Red beans with ham hocks are boiling away now, to have for a nice late lunch with Steve tomorrow with fresh cornbread.

I imagine most folks know how to make beans, and cornbread using Jiffy mix is so easy, but you may be interested in the stuffed peppers. Here's how I wrote out the recipe, since I only had half a dozen or so peppers, I halved the recipe, for the meat, and breadcrumbs...I did use a whole egg, and whole can of soup, and didn't change the seasonings, except a little less salt. They came out really good and I had a little extra filling, so I just baked it in patties next to the peppers.

1 lb lean ground beef or turkey

6 medium green bell peppers (I used mini Hungarian sweet peppers)

1 cup soft breadcrumbs (rye is good)

1/2 t. salt

dash pepper

1 egg

2 T. minced onion (I used red)

1 can condensed tomato soup, divided

Cut off tops, remove seeds from peppers and steam shells for five minutes (in microwave steamer). Let cool till you can handle them.

Combine stuffing and mix with HALF a can of the soup.

Fill peppers, then bake for 30 minutes at 375 degrees. Spoon rest of soup over each pepper and bake an additional 15 to 20 minutes, no longer than an hour.

Note: if you have leftover filling, shape into patties and bake and serve alongside the peppers.

If At First You Don't Succeed LOL and Try, Try Again

Cut out slipper tops, decorated with needle felting, beading, embroidery

Slipper pieces ready to sew

LOL My feet do not look like these!

This was my first attempt to make slippers out of my brown felted wool sweater. I got the directions off the Internet. The process was pretty straightforward, trace your foot, cut a pattern, cut four pieces, sew, etc. Well, I decided to needle felt a butterfly on each top and added some beads and outlined with embroidery. Good plan, but the instructions indicated not to add seam allowance since the wool would stretch....wrong...this wool did not stretch right and they turned out terrible, unwearable. I will cut the design out and use it in another application such as a bracelet or embellishment. LOL and try again. These other pieces will next be turned into a lined purse. This time I bought an instruction booklet with a lot of cute ideas and another slipper pattern. Now I just need another sweater to felt. I combed two thrift stores yesterday and came up empty-handed except for some wool yard swatches.

Try, try again!

Here are snaps from the book I bought, Vivian Peritts is the artist:

Stay tuned.....

Felting is fun

Lately, I've been hearing a lot about taking old or thrift shop sweaters, felting them in the washer, then making cool stuff like purses, slippers, potholders, coffee cozies, stuffed toys, quilts, really endless possibilities. Apparently any yarn made from animal fur will felt, but best to have 100% wool, cashmere, angora, alpaca, or even mohair...........anyway, I went to Goodwill yesterday and looked at every label on every sweater and came up with these three, all 100% wool.....the creamy white knit was a special find, made in England. The brown one and the blue and white one were made in China, and had Chinese labels, and were very beautiful as well......What I really wanted was a full sweater, no zippers, (to make pillow covers) but these will work fine and were all very inexpensive, I got these sweaters, plus the silk ribbon embroidered purse (to inspire me; it was brand new for only $1.50), all for under $10.00!

Not being experienced with this fascinating craft, I just threw them in the washer on hot water, and they shrunk over 50%, aren't they cute looking? Anyway, I washed them twice, then dried on hot and now they show no weave and are felted, supposedly they will not ravel when cut into pieces. I'm trying a slipper set for the brown one...a combination of sewing and crocheting techniques...and what to do with all those arms I will be cutting off??? I'm very afraid of cutting them yet....I think I need some more inspirational ideas, but at least I already have all the materials on hand now......I want to do some silk ribbon embroidery on the pieces, I have a lot of silk ribbon and I love making pretty flowers.

The more proper term for this process is called "fulling", making felt out of already woven or knitted fabric; but a more modern version using the washer and dryer. "Felting" is done to fibers making them into fabric, and is actually the oldest form of fabric known to humankind, predating weaving and knitting...fur has directional scales and kinks and when agitated and rubbed together, join and shrink up into a strong fabric........I can already tell you that I see a trip in my not-to-distant future to Joanne's to buy a felting kit. I've seen this done on TV and can't wait to make some felt.

As for the old sweaters, next time, I will first cut off any zippers, so they will shrink more evenly, and enclose them in a pillow case before placing them in the washer; there was a lot of shedding! Also, I have been reading more about felting/fulling and some reports say that as long as the fabric is at least 80% animal fur, if should felt. I need to find a lightweight one for embellishments........I would love a cashmere or angora one.......thrift shops look out, I'm coming......

I know how I'll spend the next rainy day here in paradise.....

Make that sunny day! It is going to be in the 100's today in paradise, so I added this bounty of supplies to my felted sweaters. Miss Kitty took to them right away so I have to wait till she moves off to inspect them.

Good time to go make more kimchi pancakes....then I will have some sort of project done with felting before the day is done!

Miss Kitty approaching my bounty with keen interest

Immediately plops down and sniffs everything

Liking the wool packages, good biting material

I think I'll stay here awhile longer....

Three hours later.........

Cut the collar and sleeves off the felted brown sweater, sewn together with silk ribbon and embellished with a round cut-out felted by needle felting tools and sewn on with more silk ribbon. Very ametuer for first attempt, but I think it's kinda cute and I want to learn more.