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Posts Tagged ‘wool felt’

One year ago I started this blog, to accompany my equally young craft business, to keep far-away friends and family updated, to keep myself inspired and motivated (and tell you about it) and to be able to look back on my hand-made journey – to name just a few reasons. In a recent article I found the following:

Crafting is, above all else, a source of pleasure – and pleasure in a number of forms. First, turning the mundane (a piece of wood, a hunk of clay) into something beautiful or delicious provides the maker with a sense of accomplishment, which activates a pleasure center in the brain known as the nucleus accumbens, says Maurer. (…) If you then give your creation to someone else, you experience a second form of pleasure. “Doing something for others can light up the posterior superior temporal sulcus,” says Maurer. Like the nucleus accumbens, that region is also a pleasure center: When stimulated, it signals the release of the happiness-producing neurotransmitter dopamine.

With this in mind I would like to thank all of you for my happiness, faithful readers and occasional drop-ins, first-time readers and people who have followed Klara Luna from day one. I selected three prizes you can win by doing the following: please leave a comment with this post within the next 10 days (until January, 19). All names will be thrown in a hat and I will have an unbiased little person draw three winners. Please indicate your preference for prize #1, #2 or #3. Good luck!

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#1: A Water BottleHholder with crocheted bug embellishment and a Small Yellow Pincushion

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#2: A Dream Pillow, filled with soothing herbs and a Pink Flower Brooch made of plant-dyed wool felt

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#3: A set of two sand-filled Meditation Weights (or Pincushions, or Paperweights, or..)

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I am looking forward to your comments…

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These are some wet-felted vessels made out of two very different types of wool for our school event at the beginning of this month . For the top one I used a Polwarth roving, the lower one was Merino. The Merino was way too soft and fragile to keep its form well, so it got a make-over with plant-dyed wool felt circles and I actually like it better that way. I imagine their down-to-earth job to be car-key holders, practical swallowers of small things on your way out of the house or on your return home.

In real time I am busy working on Christmas presents for my own and my extended family, or else I am gathering beautiful things that I will use as presents – I would love to show you some of them, but I will wait until the week after Christmas. Don’t want to spoil a surprise.

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My youngest son (who was born with Down Syndrome) is very interested right now in the days of the week, asks which day it is, what the day is called, when it is the day his babysitter comes etc. He is also definitely a very visual learner and it helps him to remember information by anchoring it to one (or more) visual cues.

On Saturday, my daughters and I went to the fabulous Harvest Festival hosted every year by one of the local Waldorf schools. Apart from a lot of fun activities they have a vendor area with mostly hand-made things. This is where I purchased the perfect tool for my son to understand the concept of the week, learn the names of the days and have something beautiful to play with and look at at the same time. (I can’t even link you to the lady who made this, since she did not have a card. All I know is that she is a Waldorf Kindergarten teacher on maternity leave and her name was Alissa, or Alisha – or actually Alyssa!)*

This is a typical Waldorf Kindergarten concept for young children. The days of the week have a color (which actually goes deeper than “just” a pretty color, it is based on the planets linked to the days, the certain energy of the days etc.), this way the children obtain a first  understanding of how we divide time into days and weeks.

At home I had a postcard holder/candle holder that fitted perfectly, and I made cards with the names of the week (as an additional tool to recognize the written names eventually – after all at some point I expect/hope that he, too, will learn how to read). Every morning we will put out the appropriately colored gnome and his name tag and place it on the dining table, where it will remain until a new day starts. Isn’t this beautiful!

 

* Alyssa, the maker of this set, contacted me. She and her business partner Sara indeed do not have a business card or websales yet, but you can contact her under mamaluna2006@yhaoo.com, if you are interested in a set. Please put “gnomes” in the header, so she knows what your mail is about.

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…is what the main organizer of our winter school event said yesterday after posting the schedule for the next six weeks of crafting get-togethers. These are pictures from last year and these are just my (and my daughter’s) private donations. Can you imagine the wealth of good things when you add so many other families’ donated gifts? To see all the (often unexpected) talent and commitment when people drop of boxes after boxes of beautiful items – I love it every time.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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A gift of for a special baby born to very close friends of ours in Germany. The booties are wet-felted; to keep baby’s feet happy I used a very soft merino wool on the inside. I added a cuff knitted with a cashmere/wool blend to keep the boots on the feet.

Welcome to this life, little one!

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Finally I can reveal the secret project that I worked on in July. As I said, the request was to come up with something that would make the banister in my sister’s house a little prettier (they had to take off a wooden railing, so that a closet would fit into a space on top of the stairs). See what I mean?

You know what I like best about this? Every time my sister, or a member of her lovely family, walks past these felted objects they are bound to think of me!

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During our stay in Germany I took a day off and spent it with two of my dearest friends – felting! I had read about this day in the German felting magazine FUN  a few weeks before heading over to Europe and both my friends spontaneously agreed to share the day with me.

The workshop was entitled “Felting and Plant Dyeing” and run by Barbara Eichhorn and Ute Gellenthien in Barbara’s beautiful home. Everybody could make whatever they wished to try out, dye it or not, dye it beforehand or after. Help (uncomplicated, unjudgmental, humorous, pragmatic help!) was offered to make any idea a reality.

the felted and felting yurt

our teacher Barbara

some of the finished objects (I made the purple tea cosy, top left of the picture…)

…which went into the dye pot looking like this!

If you are ever in the neighborhood, I can recommend taking a class with Barbara, she clearly loves teaching and has an abundance of experience to share. I really enjoyed seeing other felters in action, their approach, their shortcuts – learnt a lot – and had a great day with my friends. Perfect!

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Today is the first day of the summer vacation! Nearly three months of finding and playing to our own rhythm, open-ended days, fluctuating bed-times, spending time with each other…oh, yes!

A few of the things that I postponed and now can’t wait to dive into…

play around with some beautiful craft supplies…

work on felting projects…

finally sew some garments…

finish some unfinished objects…

read some books…

do a daily visual journal entry…

cook fresh and nutritious food with an attitude of space and time (and not the rushed work-week last-minute dinner preparation)…

a daily dose of yoga…

…oh, happy days!

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Please stroll on over to my Etsy store and have a look at the freshly listed items. I hope you enjoy them as much as I enjoyed making them!

There are felted and embroidered Wish Stones in all colors of the rainbow…

There are stones dressed in delicate crochet lace, to simply enjoy or to use as name tags for weddings or other family celebrations…

*A special thanks to Sarah’s support in the process! Wish you were here..*

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This is how the tree wall hanging looked outside the classroom door during Open House last night. We got plenty of positive comments and the students were proud to show their parents.

Due to the wind I had to come up with a makeshift solution to weigh the piece down. Matches the subject, don’t you think?!

Now it is back in my house waiting to get its final fabric  backing and hanging loops. I want it to be done by the end of the summer vacations, because the tree is going to adorn one of the walls in the 6th grade classroom next year.

Have a happy last day of May!

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