Rope Bowls

 

This is my latest fad - rope bowls made with cotton clothes line or pulley rope, using a zig-zag stitch on the sewing machine. These are satisfying and strangely soothing to make as the coils are added and all you have to concentrate on is keeping the zig-zag stitch on the right line. 

They can be round, oval, shallow or deep. They can have handles, and the rope end can be finished off in a number of ways. 

One way to add colour is to use different coloured thread. 

Another way is to dye the rope. Here I experimented with making a dye with daffodil flowers, and dip-dying the rope. 

They are surprisingly strong and hold their shape well, and they make nice gifts with a few home made biscuits or toiletries. 

Tea cosies and pods

My daughter asked for a tea cosy for her new kitchen in her new flat. She likes polka dots, and a bit of glitter, She wants it finishing with a felt bobble on the top, which I still have to do. 

And I thought I'd make another one for some friends we visited for the weekend. They thought it looked a bit like planets on the night sky. 

I like to finish them with a cotton lining. Felt has fantastic insulating properties, and keeps a pot of tea piping hot for ages. 

I had some fun making these pods.

What are the for? you may ask. Isn't it obvious? Suspend them from the ceiling, and they make perfect little homes for air plants! 

Bowls of colour

I am making a few small objects to sell for charity at our village fete next month. Here are 3 felt bowls. Useful for holding bits and bobs, and I love the way they hold their pod like shape, yet are so light. I made them with different bright colours on the inside, and a mid grey wool on the outside, Again, I followed the great tutorial from Rosiepink.

I like the way the bright colour fibres have worked through the grey and give a haze of the inner colour on the outside. I did incorporate circular resists in them all, but this only really worked on the yellow bowl. On the others they ended up in the wrong places, so I did not cut them out - that's their little secret! 

I added some simple running stitch.

Talking of colour, just look at these amazing irises that we saw at Helmingham Hall today!  

From little acorns . . .

I have some great oak trees near me, which produced lots of acorns this autumn. I've seen that several people make charming felted acorns using the real "caps" but replacing the acorn with an elongated felt bead.  I discovered a fool-proof way of making felt beads in issue 7 of the wonderful Australian Felt Magazine. You put the wool into a small container, add water and soap, close it up and shake vigorously. Then remove the loose ball of felt that has formed, and roll between your palms under running water gently at first and applying more pressure until it's a tightly felted ball. Rinse, squeeze out excess water, and roll in one direction to elongate a bit for acorns before drying. I used a glue gun to attach them into the (cleaned) acorn caps. 

I wanted to give these as small gift to my special friend Dawn who likes all things autumnal. But what to put them in? A little felt pot of course! I followed this great tutorial from Annie and Lyn. I used yellow felt on the inside and green on the outside, with little wisps of silk to decorate.  

Here's the gift feeling at home among some other seasonal objects on my friend's table.