Follow Your Nose . . . A Felted Toucan!

The other day I sat down in front of the tv(an unmotivated choice)and I grabbed my felting supplies.  I randomly felted a bit of wool together.  It turned into an odd kindof crescent shape. Maybe it was because “What Not to Wear” was too distracting or maybe taking care of 5 kids had completely wore me out, but I looked at that strange felted object and had no idea what to do with it!  Many other projects have been started and finished, since creating that weird shape and FINALLY I realized it looks like the bill of a toucan!

I don’t know much about toucans and creating one from the top of my head seemed intimidating.  So, I did a google image search and found a very beautiful toucan. It was a rainbow-billed toucan(also known as a keel-billed toucan or sulfur-breasted toucan).  I duplicated the coloring of this toucan in my felting project.  I’m very happy I didn’t toss that weird shape in the trash becauseI think this felted toucan turned out very well.

Turns out the rainbow-billed toucan is the national bird of Belize. It can’t fly very well and it sortof hops from tree to tree.  I thought that sounded perfect.  Children typically pick up any figurine style toy and make it hop from place to place.  This action really suits any rabbit or frog, but who knew that this form of imaginative play was perfect for a toucan toy.

So, to all my fellow needle felters out there, who create a strangely shaped felt piece and want to throw in the towel.  Don’t; just set it to the side and one day you’re sure to have an idea.  Maybe it will be a Resplendent Quetzal, an Andean Cock-of-the-Rock, a Blue Crowned Trogon or a Sunbittern!

A Felt Toy for a Handmade Doll

Usually, I only show my handmade needle felted projects here; however, today I’m going to share something a little different(but don’t worry, a felted cutie is here as well!).  My daughter is about to have a 6th birthday and I’m making a doll with clothes, pretend food, a diaper, and, you guessed it, a felted animal toy for her babydoll.  My daughter has this white teddy bear that she carries all over the house and I decided to make a tiny version of this bear for her new babydoll.  Toys need toys too!

I made the babydolls hair from a flat piece of felt;  It took me forever to needle felt this flat piece(I probably should have wet felted it).  I was getting so tired that my husband offered his brawny arms to finish it up!  Then I used a blanket stitch to attach the felted blonde hair to the doll.  It is super short hair because it is supposed to be a BABY. I wanted to practice embroidery for the eyes; but my daughter loves the movie Coraline and button eyes were a must!

I love how versatile felting is.  My favorite thing to make with felt is 3-dimensional figurines; but I don’t want to forget the usefulness of flat felt either.  Making this gift, allowed me to use the wonderful medium of wool in multiple ways.  Of course, these were only a handful of my ideas as how to incorporate felting into this gift.  How about felt shoes for the doll, a beautiful felt flower in her hair, or pretend felt food to feed the doll.  Unfortunately, there are only so many hours in the day and eventually I had to narrow down my list.  On to my next project!

Felting Needles: Sorting and Storage

I have had a hard time with my past few needle felting projects.  I couldn’t locate the correct size felting needle easily.  I had ordered four packs of different size needles and through use I eventually destroyed the flimsy paper containers that they arrived in.  In needle felting, you start with a large felting needle to really get it going and then you size down as you work, in order to get the most finished product.  And yet, my needles were all mixed up in the bottom of my container; making these last few projects very inefficiently produced.  “Is this the right needle, poke, poke, nope!”, I couldn’t take it anymore.

I have seen color coded felting needles online but I had perfectly fine needles if only I could identify the size!  So I began my mission to identify and sort my 20 or so needles.  First, I grabbed two needles and poked them into a previously created felt ball(don’t use a super dense ball you will not notice the differences as well).  I noticed which of the two needles did the most damage to the ball.  I set the one with the most damage at the top of my foam pad and the one that did the least towards the bottom.  For the second two needles I compared them the same way, and then compared them with the first two needles.  Obviously, if they similarly dented the felt ball, I set them side by side.  Eventually, I had 6 rows of different size needles.  I double checked to see if the triangle ones and star-shaped ones were altogether, this is easily done by sight with a strong enough light and perhaps a magnifying glass.  Finally, my needles were sorted; but I couldn’t put them back into their paper containers and I was afraid they would become lost or broke in the bottom of a plastic container.  So now, I had a new challenge.

Solution? I decided to create a pincushion for my felting needles.  I’ve seen people do this for straight pins and I thought this was my best option.  So I grabbed a small felted ball(I have a stash to help me jumpstart some projects) and I used some scrap wool to make it a little larger.  Then I split it into six sections, and felted a different color on each one; I didn’t felt it super dense, so that the needles could still do a little push into it for better storage purposes.  Now I had a vivid wheel to place my felting needles on; the last step was adding a small dot to a section and a large dot in the section right next to it.  I started by placing my largest needles on the big dot and worked my way around the pincushion until I was placing the smallest diameter needles on the tiny dot.  It was a success.  It reminds me of a “circus clown” or a “beach ball”, but it’s highly functional.  I can tell what needle is what.  Now I have to place it on a super high shelf away from little eyes and hands.  Success!  Now my next toy should be much easier to create!

Wet Felted Balls plus IMAGINATION!

A few posts ago, I mentioned that I had made  three felt balls by wet felting them in the washing machine.  The first ball that  I embellished,  turned into a happy bumblebee.  I worked during the next couple of days to turn the other two white wool balls into creatures.  The second ball became a penguin, and the third morphed into a turtle.  This was all simply, yet patiently achieved by  needle felting details and perhaps a few wings to add on.

The turtle was the only creature to remain basically a ball(but all three are fun to toss back and forth).  He also has a jingle bell inside of him because my husband was feeling experimental.  I think the bell would have made more sense with the bumblebee, say as a buzzing sound. But I really wanted to make a turtle, and the only ball left had a jingle!  But truly, when it comes to kids anything can jingle and it’s more fun.  That extra sensory element really delighted me.  I think I might incorporate it into future toys as well,  see husbands can be very useful when it comes to crafts!  The good thing about a jingle inside of wool is that it muffles the noise; making just enough sound for the child playing with it, but not enough to disturb the parents while the child is shaking it over and over again!

Turning felt balls into toys has been really fun with these past three creatures.  Because they were wet felted somewhat mechanically,  I only had to focus on the details and not the sculpting.  And honestly, the details are my absolute favorite part.  I will probably make a few more toys with this  method before moving on to new territory.  Feel free to give it a try too,  it’s a fun way to be creative and great practice for mastering the details.