Wool Felt Goodness

As I've already posted, I made a lot of stuff to give as Christmas presents this year.

Two things I made that I now have photographs of are a Spring table runner for Marian, and a felt tea cosy for Marian's birthday on New Year's Eve.

The table runner was designed by JB, so I'm very proud to showcase it here, because I think that JB is very talented and was thrilled that he was inspired to do this. It took two months from start to finish, and it felt good to complete it. It is all handsewn and creating the pattern with proper dimensions took some time. The flower stems themselves took three hours to sew, if you want an idea of how long it took. So no, I will not make one for you, no matter who you are! :) It's a once-in-a-lifetime thing (famous last words), but I may make the pattern printable/sharable. I may even try to sell the pattern, but really, who wants to spend nearly two months sewing a runner?? It's worth a try:


We even got really creative and made the tongues be the dirt, with the bulb flowers having bulbs, and the other flowers having roots:


Earlier this year Marian saw a cool wool Jan Constantine tea cosy in a British magazine (love that British style!) and I tore that magazine page out, thinking I could make her one. I mean, I could have bought her one: for $164!!! No, not sixty four. ONE HUNDRED and sixty four dollars. But that's a little out of my price range.

I checked out her website and JB was really interested in her Americana ones, so we did a hybrid version of two of hers and came up with this (we didn't use pure wool, because that's where part of the $164 comes from):


which Marian loved.

And then demonstrated how it is not a hat, contrary to the popular story!




So now I'm kicking around making things to sell on Etsy, such as cool felt tea cosies. But not this one. Because it's probably considered a Jan Constantine rip off and if she can charge $164 for one tea cosy, she probably has enough bankroll to fly her lawyer across the ocean to pay me a visit.

I have one original pattern idea up my sleeve. However, I have also declared this year to take my "crafting sabbatical." Not Quilting sabbatical (because who in their right mind would give that up?) but Crafting. So the only sewing I wish to do this year will revolve around quilts. This means no homemade Christmas presents. Sorry, guys. Mama's tired.

This means that I'm not sure when I'll make these tea cosies for Etsy. But one day, when my faithful unemployment runs out, it may just happen...