Silk Scarf-dyeing at SECU house

I always enjoy visiting SECU house and sharing my skills with the out-of-town patients and their caregivers there. They are so appreciative of the opportunity to do something creative with others and escape into an artsy environment for just a little while. And it's truly a wake-up call for me, my problems pale in comparison to what some of them are going through. Silk scarf-dyeing is one of our favorite activities, too, it's so much fun, fast and easy! I love seeing what my students create, you never know how the scarves are going to turn out. Last time there we had a fellow who dyed a scarf for his wife, and came out with butterflies! So proud of all of my students, here is some of their gorgeous work.

 This artist was so happy with her beautiful ocean hues!

 I love how some of the colors separate in the dyeing process, what a nice surprise!

 This artist dyed this vibrant scarf for his wife, and got a bevy of beautiful butterflies!

I love the soft, happy colors in this scarf this young lady dyed, gorgeous!

Wool Geode Zipper Necklace class

We had such a fun time making these Wool Geode Zipper Necklaces at Maleku Jewelry a couple of weeks ago! The students learned how to make a wooly geode, how to wet-felt the wool beads, and how to assemble this artsy necklace. They got to choose from some pre-felted items too, coordinating colors with their own felted wool beads, so that we didn't spend all day felting but much of the time creating. I love how they all turned out, and I think everyone was happy with their work too! Here are a few pictures of their gorgeous necklaces.

 Diane ready to assemble her beautiful necklace, above. Love these earthy hues she chose!

This piece will look great with black, white, or even denim!

 Ileana added a bit of bling to her hand-felted purple beads!

 Some of my favorite colors, love those teals and greens!

This artsy student added lots of bead embellishments to her gorgeous piece as well as an asymmetric look, so unique!

Beautiful shades of amethyst and plum harmonize perfectly with the wool geode here!

 In the afternoon these hard-working gals felted wallets! They did an amazing job, the pictures don't do justice to these beautiful pieces.

I really enjoyed teaching this fun group of gals! Looking forward to going back to Greenville and teaching at the shop again sometime. And a special bonus - I get to visit my son and dil while I'm there too! It's a win-win for everyone.

Felted Soap!

Felting soap is one of the easiest classes I teach and results in a pretty and practical little work of art! I like to add a few novelty fibers at the end to add a pop of color and visual texture. We had a felted soap class at Sawtooth right before Christmas, and the students enjoyed making 2-3 bars of soap for themselves and/or Christmas gifts. Not only do the fibers keep on felting around the soap, they are like a built in loofah sponge! We had a great time making these, here are a few pictures of my students' work.

 All colors and shapes, love all these happy colors!

 This one is like the planet earth, blue, green, brown, so soothing.

 The one above is like a miniature landscape with its blue sky with clouds and cliff above the sea. I can see needle-felting a couple of tiny black birds in that sky to really add a nice detail!

Love that purple!

Felted Christmas Ornaments/Dryer Balls

When I teach felting classes, I often let students choose their own fibers from my "fiber buffet" - wool fibers and embellishments spread out on tables and sorted by color and fiber content. At the end of the class is clean-up time, and there are always a lot of little bits of this or that left. Eventually I have a bag full of these colorful balls of wool fluff. So when my daughter mentioned that they might not decorate their Christmas tree this year, as they have a new kitten, I offered to felt some kitten-friendly Christmas ornaments! I felted these from my wool bits, then ran narrow ribbon through them so they could be hung or tied on their tree. I think both my daughter and the new kitty enjoyed them! And later they can also be used as dryer balls to reduce static and soften clothes in the laundry.

 I felted a bit of catnip in the large red and white ball, bet that was kitty's favorite!

These came out with pretty flower patterns felted in them, a happy accident!

Wool Beads as Art Therapy

I always enjoy visiting SECU house, our local place for out of town patients and their caregivers to stay during an extended medical stay. Sawtooth provides artistic activities for the residents here several times a month and we always have a great time! One of the classes I teach here is making jewelry or bookmarks with wool beads we felt from wool fibers. Students felt a bead or 2 in their choice of colors, then string it onto harmonizing ribbon, adding coordinating novelty beads to create a beautiful necklace. Here are a few of the students and helpers wearing their unique creations.

Silk Scarf-dyeing as Art Therapy

I'm so blessed to be a part of Sawtooth's Art & Wellness program, and I love sharing our silk scarf-dyeing class with patients and their caregivers! This is such a fun and creative class, and there's nothing like making something beautiful that you can wear to boost your spirits. Here are a few of the beautiful scarves we dyed at the cancer center last fall, everyone was thrilled with their creations, and we had a great time!

SAFF 2019

The Southeastern Animal Fiber Festival last year was, as always, amazing! There's nothing like gathering together with hundreds of fellow fiber-lovers to energize and inspire us to new heights of creativity, and SAFF did not disappoint last year. I loved shopping the many vendors with their huge array of richly colored fibers and yarns, I'm always able to stock up on hard-to-find class supplies there. And I hope my classes were inspiring to my students too! They felted some gorgeous things, here are a few pictures of some of my students' work.

 This student wanted a neutral toned scarf she could wear with everything, we were able to dye her pre-felt right in the classroom! She seemed quite happy with the outcome.

 The students learned a variety of techniques including both needle-felting and wet-felting in this creative class. You can see in the scarf above the student enhanced her blue flowers with a bit of amethyst needle-felting, it added a nice depth of color to her piece!

 Love these autumn hues!

 This scarf was full of happy colors!

The pink lotus blossoms in this piece were gorgeous!

 This lovely girl had never felted! I love her choice of white for her flowers, so unique!

 This lady's clever cutting of her blue blossoms really enhanced the stained glass look, it was almost like a Tiffany piece!

I love how this scarf turned out, and the student seemed quite happy too!

Our hand-dyed and nuno-felted windowpane scarf class, stunning results!

Teaching at the ASG National Convention

Teaching at the ASG National Convention in Boston last summer was so exciting! I met some amazing people there, and saw so many beautiful things. One of the highlights for me was entering their fashion show. I entered a 3-piece ensemble: my "Cut-up Kimono Jacket" worn over my "Quick & Easy Ladies' Vest", and paired these with my "Paper Bag Skirt". I had some rave reviews, and had such a good time with the other ladies there! One of my classes was the ladies' vest, the girls did an amazing job using pre-cut kits in a nice variety of colors. They really kept me hopping, and I'm afraid I didn't get many pictures of their beautiful vests, I was so busy. The first day there we did nuno-felting on my hand-dyed silk chiffon scarves, and the students did some spectacular work! I did manage to get a nice group shot, everyone was very pleased with their scarves as they should have been, they were gorgeous. Another fun class was our Marbling on Wool, so much creativity shown! And the Wool Bead Earrings class was fantastic, it was like one giant party. All in all we had a great time - and I was even blessed to be gifted with a ticket to a cruise in Boston by one of my students! It truly was a special weekend - I even managed to fit in a little shopping.

 The fashion show, we had such a great time!

These awesome angels helped me clean up after our Wool Bead Earrings "party", they're wearing their creations!

Our phenomenal Nuno-felted Scarf class, these gals worked hard and made some beautiful scarves!

 Beautiful art pieces created by marbling on wool!

Our cruise ship, here we go!

 Leaving Boston behind in the sunset, what a beautiful, peaceful view.

My awesome roommate Jean, we had such a good time!