Lovingly Felt Wedding Bouquet

So your having a wedding and your a creative soul. There is nothing so lovely as handmade felted posies with pearl centers nestled into a beautiful handtied bouquet. Gather your gals together and create a garden of felted blooms to sprinkle around your special day!

Simply cut out 2 inch teardrop shaped petals from 100% Truefelt, pinch the petals together as you thread them. As soon as you have five on a thread, go back around all of them pulling them tight, then sew a lovely pearl in the center....simple.

Use these lovely blooms in your bridesmaids flowers, on your gents lapels, on the invitations, and the cake.....they will give a handmade detail to the wedding along with a lovely keepsake to sew on your first childs christening gown.

I also made a wonderful halo to be worn in the hair instead of a veil and used felt around the bouquets handle to make it more comfortable to hold

http://www.iheartpapers.com/.......

Kate from I {Heart} Papers

I'm sure we all start our work day pretty much the same....cup of coffee, boot up computer, flip through emails. That's the way Tuesday started for me.....usually this is a pretty sedate process, do this, remember that, file and delete. Not this Tuesday...our very precious customer 'I {heart} Papers' dropped us a note to let us know her newest blog and April Challenge was up. She gave her design team the challenge of working with our TrueFelt 100% wool and as I went through each one of their blogs I got more and more excited. Justin Beiber must have felt this way the first time he heard his song on the radio. These wonderful designers created the most inspiring collection of projects...each one unique. We can only sing the praises of these women and extend our heartfelt appreciation for making our Tuesday so fun and infusing our week with their creative spirit. Don't we live in a wonderful time when sharing to the universe is so encouraged....so now I hope to pass this feeling on to you. Please enjoy http://www.iheartpapers.com/and their design team...Pass It ON!

Karolyn from Paper Therapy

Lynn from Stamperosity

Loretta at Love to Create

Gretchen from Happiness Is........

Lori from Inking Out Loud

Carolyn BKLYN Stamper

Tracy from Who is Tracy

Deb from With Song and a Stamp

I LOVE jewelry, who doesn't?

Felted beads, copper and ribbon collar...Oh so lovely

My next ribbon/felt ball project is a evening cuff

 I especially love wearing a piece of jewelry that is handmade and uses mixed product you would not generally see as jewelry. My inspiration for this collar came from Pollika's fabulous wool felt balls. Their yummy colors screamed to be worn around my neck. Initially I was simply going to string them together, but it wasn't showing them off enough. I decided to take a wired ribbon as the backing, pulling the wire on one side to ruche it, I then took the felt balls, cutting some in half to show the surprising color inside, binding some of the others with copper florist wire. OK, this next part is a little confession, you'll never guess how easy the whole collar went together. I took my glue gun....yes glue gun....and simply glued the felt balls on. I then glued some trendy copper beads to give a little texture and some contrast to the fibers in the felt beads. The hardest part of this whole piece was wrapping the copper around the ends, then attaching the chain. If you want to avoid this part, I would recommend sewing a nice velvet ribbon to the collar to have a tie to go around your neck

Pull wire on one side of ribbon to ruche it.......

100% wool felt balls come in 30 fun colors...
imagine the possibilities

Soooo, what is the difference between Woolen and Worsted?

Gorgeous worsted lace weight BFL........mmmmmm

Okay, enough 's enough...what is the difference between woolen and worsted. To be honest with you I haven't paid much attention to the question until we attended a trade show in Germany, and I realized that it makes  a huge difference to the finished product.
So here's the scoop....woolen yarn is created with fibers of all different lengths, 1 to 3 inches, which are carded so they don't  go in one direction, hence the spinning process creates a finished yarn that is fluffier with a softer twist. Worsted yarn is created with fibers that are more than three inches in length, that are combed to lay beside each other, in one direction, this gives a finer, smoother appearance when spun. In North America, they use the term worsted to define a weight, such as Aran weight.....I think this is where the confusion starts.
So why do we care whether a yarn is woolen or worsted....well, Woolen spun often creates a bulky uneven yarn with a medium twist that has a lower tensile strength than worsted yarn. It does have a softer appearance but can pill more and does not wear as well. A worsted yarn, the Cadillac of spun yarns, has a tighter twist, that is stronger and holds it shape. It also has a finer appearance, think worsted suits, and is lighter in weight. In the past worsted yarns were chosen for weaving fabric over knitting, that's not necessarily true today. If you were wanting to knit a fine wool cardigan, socks,  jacket or skirt, you would definitely want the lovely appearance of a worsted yarn. You would also choose worsted over woolen to insure your finished garment didn't pill as much, after you spent hours making it. I would love to hear from you if you can add any info to this age long question. Look for us on facebook,  pollikayarn



Lovely 4 ply worsted Merino