This wonderful shawl would give you an interesting addition to your outfit.
Have a look in my etsy shop: http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=23332694
I started with dyeing the wool with fiber reactive dyes and than felted the main image, fishes, starfish and some of the coral included. I did use a bit of needle felting to secure some of the pieces in place and the rest was done with wet felting.
I wanted to add some more coral, so I tried some crochet until I was satisfied with the texture.
Quilting was a good way to give the whole piece a bit of relief. When I was happy with the result, I did sew the crochet pieces onto the rest.
I than hang up the whole panel onto a beautiful piece drift wood. 
This wall hanging would look lovely in your beach home.
Are you familiar with how to make felt? If not, following is a very basic felt making tutorial for beginners and suitable for adults and children, exited about learning a new technique.
Felt making requires a few tools, already available in most households:
-a table
-plastic to protect your table
-an old towel
-a piece of bubble wrap, at least 40cm x 50cm or a beach mat or bamboo stick window blind
-50g wool slivers merino wool or other good felting wool
-a piece of fly screen at least 40cm x 40cm
-a spray bottle with hot soapy water
-tape measure
-some rags
Mark off an area of 30cm x 30cm.
We are now ready to lay down the wool for our piece.
Take the wool sliver into your left hand (left handed people in right hand).
With your right hand, gently pull a piece of wool and put it in a corner of your square, the side that you hold in your hand goes on the edge, except if you want very irregular edges.
We are now ready to start a new row. This time we let the loose bits overlap the first row. Every piece we lay down is now overlapping the wool of the first row and the previous piece.
When we have covered the total surface with wool, we spray water over it.
We repeat this whole process in the second layer, which is placed at an angle of 90 degrees on top of the first. We keep going with 2 other layers, each time changing direction and wetting with the spray bottle after each layer.
If there is water coming through the screen, when you push down the wool means that it is too wet. Now the rags will come in handy, use them to soak up the water.
Roll up and down for approx. 5 minutes for a start and than check. If the wool is still very loose, keep rolling. You can test that by carefully lifting the fibers.
Roll again for 5 minutes and do the previous test again. If the wool is still a bit loose, keep rolling. Turn the piece on an angle of 90 degrees and roll again for another 5 minutes.
When the wool has felted enough, this means the whole piece holds well together, we can go over to the next stage, called the filling. This can be done as long or as short as you want. The longer you do it the harder and stronger the felt becomes.
The filling can be done by more rolling in the bubble wrap or the bamboo roll. Another method is by rubbing it over the sink, which goes faster and makes it harder as well.
Happy felting!
The pink felt art handbag "Find the Centre"has been sold yesterday. This lovely handbag will be sent to the UK today.
This nuno felted shawl, "Intense Love", was my februarychallenge for the Fibre Art Etsy Street Team. The monthly team was emotions.
The flowers of yellow cosmos are not only a beauty in the garden, they also yield a variety of vibrant colours.
I'll give a short overview of a few colours you can achieve with this wonderful flowers.
The yellow and orange flowers both give the same results. I haven't tried other cosmos.
The wool is first mordanted with alum. A mordant is needed to fix the dye to the fibers. I use the natural rock alum, I am lucky to have a supplier in this area.
After boiling the flowers in water, I put the wool in the dyebath and let it boil until desired colour intensity. This will give a yellow colour.
Now the fun starts. We can modify the yellow colour in many different ways:
-soak in water with vinegar: the colour will turn more into a lemon yellow.
-soak in water with soda: this yields a bright orange.
-soak in rusted nail water (this is obtained by putting rusted nails in water and vinegar for at least a few days): you'll get an olive green.
-soak in rested nail water, rinse and soak in soda water: the wool becomes rust brown to dark warm brown.
I only use natural and non toxic ingredients in my natural dye techniques. This keeps it safe for me and for the planet.
One of my result with yellow cosmos dyes:
This work is a sunset at the sea with a few coconut palms in the foreground.
I felted this wall panel to depict the silence and peace on a quiet evening on the beach with the only sound the waves and the wind in the palm leaves.
The wool has been dyed with onion skins and yellow cosmos flowers, both mordanted with alum and some have been treated afterwards with soda or iron water (rusted nails in water) or a combination of the 2 methods to give a range of different yellows, oranges and browns. The finishing touch was done with stitching.
silence detail
It is getting hotter here, in the tropics of Far North Queensland and working with wool makes it even warmer.
Visitors at the market tell me that it is too hot to even look at wool.
So, I started to list winter items in my etsy shop, hoping they will find a new owner in a cold country, while focusing on other local projects.
Time for a change! I am ready to change direction with my business, so it's all fitting in perfectly.
I will still be making felt clothing and also extend my creativity in other areas, something I have been willing to do for years.
I will upload some photos of my wall hangings that I made in the past in a next post.
The challenge with clothing is often the sizes. And because I make mainly one off pieces, I need the right person with the right size who likes the right colour and in in the right season and possibly in the right mood!....
Here are some of the pieces that are in my etsy shop:
http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=8432857Featuring EnchantedGypsy
Wet Felted Boots -- Plant Dyed (Photo below)
These wet felted, were made using organic, locally purchased sheeps wool, dyed with natural plant dyes. They are extremely durable and amazingly warm. They can be worn outdoors in dry or even damp woodland areas much like leather mocasins.
The outer edge of the design is trimed in handspun and dyed purple yarn.
Wet felting is a traditional and ancient artform, used by nomadic people to make tents (gers or yurts), rugs, carpets, shoes and clothes.
