Felted Eyeballs- Here's lookin' at you kid!

Do you find yourself needing more fun little Halloween decorations and you're a fan of felting?

Well, me too!

I've been making things with all the traditional Halloween motifs, but I will have to say I am a big fan of the "eyeball"

So here is what I came up with:

I took a little of the techniques I used to make these little guys from two great books. The first:

Felt Inlays
Making Textured and Patterned Felt for 23 Creative Projects
By
Nancy Hoerner

It’s not just another felt book. Besides teaching this unique wet felt inlay technique, it includes 23 projects.

Felting has always captivated the yarn and fiber craft audience. Whether you know how to knit/crochet or not, you can do this kind of felting. Wet felting gives the crafter/designer complete freedom and control from the beginning. Hand-painted and solid-color roving--wool that has not been spun into yarn--is arranged on a surface and subjected to hot water and agitation to create felt fabric. With Nancy’s freeform methods, wool yarns, novelty yarns, bits of felt (called prefelt), and other fibers are worked into the felt to create highly textured and patterned fabrics—felt inlays. Each felt inlay (individual piece of hand-made fabric) is unique and creative. But what’s really great about this book is that Nancy takes it one giant step ahead by including 23 projects to show what you can make with your felt inlays.

Nancy Hoerner is an accomplished artist and designer developing her artwork for the past 30 years. She has published art dolls and bead projects in nationally known magazines and studied doll making and beading with renowned artists. Many of her art dolls and bead work are held in private collections. Nancy also works with manufacturers in the craft.

and the second:

Wool Pets
Making 20 Figures with Wool Roving and a Barbed Needle
By
Laurie Sharp, Kevin Sharp

Anyone can make cute and cuddly creatures from a handful of fluff and a barbed needle!

Needle felting is a new craft and is gaining in popularity. There are only a few books written on the subject and most of those focus on 'flat' needle felting on a surface. This book is about sculptural needle felting--creating 3-D animals and figures using the felting needle to sculpt wool.

This book shows the techniques and describes how the felting needle works with wool fiber to create felt, while explaining the differences between this art form and other forms of felting. You will learn how to hold the needle, what sort of materials to use, and why.

There are 20 complete projects including various birds, bugs, four-legged animals, and people--each one unique and irresistible! Laurie also shows the reader ways to display their felted creations as mobiles, ornaments, or arranged in shadow boxes.

Laurie Sharp is a full time artist and has been needle felting for over 5 years. She raises her own sheep, shears and processes the wool for most of her projects. She has been featured on HGTV’s 'That’s Clever'. View her web site: www.woolpets.com. Her work has been shown in a number of galleries in the Pacific Northwest, where she lives with her husband and business partner, Kevin Sharp. Kevin is a professional photographer, and provides both beauty and how-to photography for this book. His work can be viewed on www.sharpphotography.com.

The base of the eyeball was wet felted by following a great how-to page from Felt Inlays.

I started with some reverse spun roving (I carded back some wool yarn back into fiber)

Here it is just starting to be wet and soapy in the first stage of rolling.

And here it is all wet felted up into a nice ball.

OK, now onto the needle felting. I followed the directions from Wool Pets.

I cut a small circle of green flat wet felted roving and then needle felted it onto the eyeball.

I then cut a small piece of the black and rolled it into a tiny ball (wet) and then needle felted it onto the center of the green area of the eyeball.

Designer note: I realize my eyeballs are not the same size. I am OK with that. I think that makes them "spookier"

Comments

[Rachel]

Those are so cute!

[Devita]

that's cute!

[~drew emborsky~]

So freaking cute!!!

[Tammy]

Since I live in such a warm climate, I've never played with felt before, but it looks so fun!