FELTED BIRDS WITH ROBIN MACKINTOSH

Robin Mackintosh demonstrates how to begin the head of the bird we made in our needle-felting workshop. Wool is an amazing material with interesting properties. It begins to form a dense mass when poked repeatedly with a barbed needle.

The wool used for needle-felting is called "roving". Roving is cleaned, carded and sometimes dyed wool that is ready for spinning. Betty used two tones of green wool to make her bird.

Robin shows Phyllis how to begin her bird's body by wrapping a foam ball with roving and then poking it with the barbed needle.

Here are two shots of the owl I made; one in progress and the other, finished. I used tips of pheasant feathers for my owl's chest feathers.

Maggie pulls out small strips of wool to begin the head of her red bird.

Davey and Blaze got into the action too. Blaze made a crow from natural black sheep's wool and Davey made a wren from natural brown wool. It came from the flock of Bill Jones, the very talented and gifted Renaissance man from Liberty, Mo. Bill makes the wonderful natural soaps and skin cremes we sell at our spring and holiday sales events.

Sarah is a fibers major at KCAI. She has worked as an assistant in my studio for five years and has a very promising career as an artist. She loved the wool roving that was dyed with multiple shades of green. Her bird was the hip type sporting the tie-dyed look! Linda loves red and was happy there was plenty of red roving for her bird.

If this workshop looks fun to you, check out the series of workshops offered at From the Summer's Garden. The most recent posts on the blog are the dates for the Summer/Fall Hypertufa and Handmade Paper Studios. Come join the fun!