Making Felted Friends by Sue Pearl

Making Felted Friends by Sue Pearl
Buy Making Felted Friends by Sue Pearl at Amazon.co.uk or Amazon.com
Category: Crafts
Reviewer: Sarah Cooper
Summary: A book of ingenious designs of toys made out of felt and including step-by-step intructions for making the felt. It's a simple introduction to an ancient craft which produces some unusual toys.
Buy? Yes	Borrow? Yes
Pages: 128	Date: October 2007
Publisher: Search Press Ltd
ISBN: 978-1844483044
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Twenty-five funky, fuzzy and fleecy felted toy projects feature in this book. It’s not just the making of the toys that this book covers but also the process of felt making. I really enjoyed reading the introduction in this book, which provides us with a background on felt making. Did you know that it dates back 8,000 years and it may be one of the original textiles people used? It was discovered before weaving and spinning. So when you start felt making after reading this book you will probably get a feeling of earthiness – being able to make something fantastic out of something so basic.

The cover of the book and its brightly coloured felt animals immediately drew my five year old son’s attention to the book as he wanted me to read through the book with him to show him all the different characters – oblivious to my lack of skill in felt-making he asked me if I could make him some felt toys. I spent the whole weekend devouring the book and reading up on the ‘Getting Started’ chapter, I was unsure whether I would be any good at this craft but from the clear instructions I purchased the materials needed. The materials included wool, soapflakes, wire, pipe cleaners, pliers, wool carders (like a dog brush) and a bamboo mat.

Next weekend I progressed to following the chapters ‘how to make flat felt’ and ‘how to make pre-felt.’ This was great fun and I never realised how easy it was to make felt. My son loved felt making. I’d definitely recommend it as something to keep kids really occupied. The instructions were really easy to follow and I felt very proud of myself and very grateful to the author by the end of the day. I felt as if I had learnt a very ancient craft.

On the Sunday we decided to attempt to make a creature from the book. We had 25 options – some of these being: • Alphabet panel with pockets

• Fancy Fish
• Shaker Snake
• Simple felt picture
• Bird
• Exotic Bird
• Village Duck
• Groovy Cat
• Spotty Dog
• Sausage Dog
• Percy Pig
• Funky Monkey
• House Mouse
• Spotty Spider
• Porcupine
• Dinosaur
• Armadillo
• Butterfly Mobile
• Spider mobile

There were variations on many of these projects that you could choose but we opted for a brightly coloured dinosaur. I must add that my son spent about 20 minutes looking at all the pictures as he thought they were all so wonderful and couldn’t choose. I was very happy making the project, as the instructions were so clear. Every few sentences was combined with a step-by-step photograph, so at no point was I left wondering what to do.

There’s nothing I would have changed about this book apart from a whole chapter dedicated to needlework as my sewing leaves a lot to be desired but I think I managed quite well despite my lack of ability in that area. We were really pleased with our first attempt at felt-making and are looking forward to creating some more felt wonders from the book shortly!

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You can read more book reviews or buy Making Felted Friends by Sue Pearl at Amazon.co.uk Amazon currently charges £2.99 for standard delivery for orders under £20, over which delivery is free.
You can read more book reviews or buy Making Felted Friends by Sue Pearl at Amazon.com.

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