Tools and accessories for felting

Felting is a big workout, but old masters have a lot of right tools to help the process to make it shorter and easier. When surfing internet and watching youtube videos a few times I'd seen a very useful tool that I remembered from ethnographic museums and my childhood - mangle board for "ironing" bed sheets. In  my childhood that tool you could find just in rural villages, but any way I remembered that tool and the process itself. So a few weeks I had an idea in my head to purchase or to make myself the mangle board. I checked ebay and understood that this is out of my reach, so hey .. I'm handywoman I can do that:o))) What you need? Home depot near you and mitre saw or other handy power tool:o) Of course would be nice to have handles as in original version, but for now it will do;o)

Also I tried to use or let's say accessorize one pair of slippers. Some hole puncher, eyelets, coarse thread. Here you go... before and after. It looks more finished, doesn't it?

Non ending experiments

As I had said a few posts below - "it's my way, or.. clays ways". Well.. almost, this time the experiment with hardware and not thinking forward interfered greatly. Who would think (I should, but I didn't) that some forms are soldered. And before going to kiln piece looked nice and strong.

 

 

But ... after kiln.... not so much.

 

 

 I'm trying to be here positive and look for good things, the clay part came out nice, but the hardware.... the bottom part apparently were soldered to get that shape and all solder just ran down and bottom practically separated from cylinder. The bad part is - that all this process documented and was suppose to be tutorial with already 70 pictures ready to use. I told myself- think positive -  and remembered nice saying -“There are no failures - just experiences and your reactions to them.” Tom Krause quotes ( motivational speaker, Teacher and Coach, b.1934). So I decided, this tutorial will be with troubleshooting part:o) and I'll show the result (hopefully) in the next post:o)

 

Meanwhile... experiments with felting continue and this time I've tried another form and more possibilities for decor. This time the piece of coarse canvas was suppose to look like mending, but looked like worn out or that my dog tasted the slipper:o) but I liked that shabby look and decided to leave as it is:o)