Felt Family Portrait

Hello. I wanted this up for the first day of spring, and it was supposed to have been a video... But we've all been down with a bug, so please bare with me. In continuing with our felting series, this is a wet felted family portrait. This is a fairly simple project and was done without the use of a felting needle. 

 Start with a blank piece of felt. (This one was cream and approximately 8"x10"). Then slowly and loosely start layering thin pieces of wool roving on top.

 Start to create shapes, but try to keep the roving fairly thin and wispy.

Continue to build till your picture is where you want it to be. Felting is like painting. Try not to force the felt to go where it does not want, but flow with it. 

When you are ready to felt you will need, warm soapy water, a bamboo mat (or bubble wrap), a towel, a sponge, and some tulle.

 Put the bamboo mat (or bubble wrap) on top of the towel, 

put your picture face up on the mat.

 Gently lay the tulle over your picture. 

Using a sponge slowly start to wet the felt working from the middle out.

When the felt is all wet, tightly roll everything up in the towel.

Roll it up from the bottom.

Both sides

and then the top.

You want to work from every angle because this keeps the felt from warping off in one direction. 

 This is what your soapy picture looks like. Keep adding warm soapy water and rolling till everything is felted down tightly.

 Carefully rinse the soap out in a bowl of cold water.

Lay it out to dry. If you want to correct something wait until it is dry (I corrected the gap in Bear's arm). Then frame and enjoy.

Be well and have fun!