Pods and cords

We've been exploring resists at the Well Being centre recently, and one of the group said she'd really like to make a round vessel, so I thought we'd follow rosiepink's vessel tutorial. It turned out there was only 2 of us there early enough to have a go, so we did it again this week, but this is mine:

Here's the other side:

I've been looking for 'smoothing tools' for vessels for years, like Lyn's suggestions of a baby's rattle or laundry liquid dispenser, I keep checking the baby section, and dog toy section, even the kitchen section for a ladel, but still haven't found one! I did buy some foam for resists though and  I thought I'd try it out and make a new birdpod. I remembered those coconut ones, and tried to do a similar shape. It didn't get it quite right, but using lots of coarse wools did give it a hairy coconut look, though:

I need to make a cord for it to hang it up. Usually, I make cords from offcuts or make some handspun yarn and felt that, but I had an idea for some garden ornaments and thought I'd give it a go using a bamboo mat. I can't remember which wool I used, I think it was something from Wollknoll labelled just 'Scottish grey'. I had a hard time getting photos of all my things, it went too dark yesterday, so this morning I took them into the garden and tried them in a few places, when I put the first cord down on the paving stones it camouflaged itself, even the pattern seems to match!

That was just the test piece for the idea I wanted to try. The only trouble was, I needed a larger mat than a placemat. I looked at my living room blinds, just hanging there with a huge roll of unused bamboo sat at the bottom. I unrolled it and there must have been two feet of spare blind, so a few snips and a few tied ends later, I had a shorter window blind and a new rolling mat! This cord hasn't completely dried yet, but I know I need to make the next one a bit thinner, and I think that will help it be firmer too, but it turned out a lot better than I expected:

Coin Purses

I used some of my last nuno felt pieces to make coin purses. This first one was from a kind of 'nuno-collage' made from pieces of silk scarf pieced together:

 This is the back:

I usually add an extra piece of felt inside the purses, so there are two sections. Sometimes, if the piece of felt I'm using is big enough, I add two pieces to make 3 sections like I did with this one:

 This was a kind of paisley print, but the rippling reminds me of splashes in water, this is how it looks closed:

I made the felt I used for this next piece a long time ago. If I make nuno sample pieces, I try to make them large enough to be turned into something, and pieces for coin purses are a good size. I couldn't find the right button for this one, so it didn't get finished for a long time. I love the fabric, it is from a viscose scarf:

 The fabric I used on this piece was the plaid border of a scarf, it looks a bit 'hairy' because I used a blend containing silk for the felt, and the silk really migrated through:

Sticking with the plaid theme, I made another plaid inspired piece of felt and used it to make a felt book cover:

 This is the other side: