Sunday 8 August 2010

How To Make A Pond Felt Playmat


This pond playmat was made using a combination of wet felting and
dry felting too. I think it's a beautiful plaything ( OK the ducks are plastic but I can't find any wooden
ones for singing 5 Little Ducks.)


We started with some hand dyed wool from a craft shop in Brecon.
It was a small amount but I think you really need double or triple this amount as it gets thin when wet.
Tear up the wool into strands and cross them over into a circle on a some plastic.

Big Seed then patted it with dishsoap and warm water, and used a sushi mat to get the fibres to stick together but as it was so thin,
we had to be gentle. There are many decent wet felting tutorials on the net.
 We laid it outside on a table to dry


I cut out some lilypads from green felt freehand, then sewed a lily flower together like this.


I made a lilypad pocket for the frog to hide in.


We got impatient so Big Seed put it on his clothes line to dry.


It was a bit thin in parts so I decided to attach it to a piece of green felt with a felting needle.
Big Seed has this plastic needle-felting contraption which holds 4 needles very safely.
Here he is needle-felting the pieces together on a pillow...with Little Seed getting ever so closer!



Here it is finished. I didn't attach the lilypads as Big Seed loves to arrange things.
Beautiful.

What happens first?
He puts the orange gnome to sleep in the lilypad pocket in the corner
...no sign of a frog anywhere!


Then he thinks it's much better to pile up those lovely lilypads in the corner on top of the gnome...
and what he needs is a big wooden mushroom to go on the lilyflower!


But that mushroom wasn't big enough.
We need a giant green mushroom to sit right on that lilyflower!


No, no, what we really need is to get rid of that nice lilyflower altogether,
and put the mushroom in a wooden bowl in the pond!
Now out comes the olympic frog...he has to jump all the way from the wall to the mushroom in one huge jump!


Big Seed starts making huge jumps as he personifies the frog and saying "ribbit, ribbit."

What is happening here is that although he hasn't used the pond in the way I envisaged,
he has used his imagination, which is the whole point of the toy.

He was having a great time making Little Seed and myself laugh so much,
 until Little Seed needed a nap, and the spell broke.

x








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8 comments:

  1. I tried wet felting a play mat for the Elf yesterday. It's for his birthday in a week and a half. I failed massively. I tried to make a base out of white roving and add color on top, but after felting the white, the color wouldn't stick. Oy. So I stuck it in the dryer and am now resigned to needle felting all the color on. Ugh. So. Much. Work.

    Next time I'll just do it all at once and not try to be clever.

    Your pond is amazing, though. Excellent job!

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  2. Good job! I've got a playmat in my near future too! Now, you have to tell me where you got that beautiful toadstool from?
    xo maureen

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  3. This is so cute and I love how the little mushroom looks on it. Thanks for linking to Craftastic Monday - would love if you added the party button to your blog:)

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  4. Love this! Thanks for sharing.

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  5. Very sweet and lots of fun!

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  6. this is so on my list of projects for the fall! thanks:)
    http://bendingbirches2010.blogspot.com/2010/08/i-am-thankful-for_13.html

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Thanks for dropping by xx

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