You never know until you try....

or alternately "not everything is a winner."  I always post all the things I've done that I'm happy with but this time my grand idea fell a bit flat....  The long overdue wool blocks finally arrived ...about 3 months late.  When I signed up for that RR I figured by the time fall farm chores started I'd be long done... Instead last week I received not one set but THREE...half of the entire RR is in my UFO basket. 

What I really wanted to do is to embroider a stumpwork cardinal in my usual manner... But since time is now a factor and the blocks  are wool, I decided to make the cardinal from felt.  Something I hadn't done before.

It took a bit to decide on the focal color and finally decided on the cranberry color because it is in three of the patches..  It might have worked better had I used wool felt and shrunk it until it was quite thick.. It just seemed the felt needed more body... I think though I will just stick to embroidered stumpwork birds from now on.... 

Luckily the weather has been lovely and I've been able to do outdoor work all week... I need a new U-bolt on my tractor tiller and waiting for it to arrive.  It will probably arrive  with the expected rains....  Beth has asked for no beads but this cardinal just needed a few...

Text on felt tutorial and name tag!

This post is a HUGE thank you to Shirlee Fassell who suggested I put my name on my chatelaine.  I did it after the chatelaine was finished as I wanted it to actually look like a name tag pinned to it.  I would have never thought of doing this myself and love it.  And here is how I did it.

When I did the rabbit poem recently and when I did all the lift-up flaps in my Morris book I did a lot of experimenting.  The first thing I learned is when you just use the 2-way fusible to attach the printed text, the felt texture and fibers as well as the adhesive of the fusible  bleed through the printed fabric.  And this is so even though I use a poplin photo fabric which is pretty dense.  It would be even worse with printed silk.  I solved this problem by first using a fusible tricot on the photo transferred text.

Here are my usual supplies for this technique.

First I apply the fusible tricot to the printed text which is untrimmed.  I find it easier to trim it after the fusible is bonded and then there are no loose threads.  I add the 2-way fusible now and trim to size and remove the paper backing.






Then I use the 2 way fusible to attach it to the felt and trim so there is about 1/16 edge of the felt showing.  I usually use this bit for stitching it down and adding beads.

Sometimes in the Morris book I used 2 and even 3 layers of felt to get the effect I wanted.

But  my name tag I wanted to be REALLY firm BUT flexible and  under the felt layer I added another layer....crinoline.  Crinoline is a lightweight buckram which looks like starched cheesecloth.  I had this scrap left from a ribbon flower class.  In the olden days when I was in high school all the girls wore long gathered dirndl skirts with crinoline petticoats.

This crinoline layer was perfect and I'll use it again for certain... The finished piece is very firm (not brittle) and still flexible and sewable.

So I did a little beaded ruffle around it and there you are.  The only other thing I wish I might have tried is an oval shape.. but too late for this project...

Again a big THANK YOU to Shirlee!!!!