felted balls

[sofysmommy]

Do felted balls bounce? (i hope i am posting this in the right place)

[mehndi mama]

Minimally but satisfactorily. Bobby likes to throw his and yell "BOING!!!"

[antannie]

They bounce best if they are firmly felted. They are also great for bowling with the recycling (bottles) I discovered while teaching a felting class for young kids.

[sofysmommy]

wow that is cool! thanks so much, now i have to figure out how to make one:

[mehndi mama]

Wind wool yarn into a firm ball a bit bigger than what you want your finished ball to be. Then take it to the sink, get it wet & soapy, and squish and rub it with your hands until it's as felted as you like. Keep wetting and soaping as needed - hot water helps open up the scales on the wool fibers better, speeding the felting.

[isaberg]

Originally Posted by mehndi mama

Wind wool yarn into a firm ball a bit bigger than what you want your finished ball to be. Then take it to the sink, get it wet & soapy, and squish and rub it with your hands until it's as felted as you like. Keep wetting and soaping as needed - hot water helps open up the scales on the wool fibers better, speeding the felting.

For a smoother and a bit prettier ball, wind yarn like Mehndi Mama says, then needle felt a layer of roving (hardly takes any at all, maybe a half-ounce) to the outside. Then continue to follow M. Mama's nice clear instructions about felting. (For those fiber geeks among us who just happen to have felting needles and roving about in frighteningly large quantities).

[mehndi mama]

I did one like that a year ago, because I wanted an excuse to needle-felt something. I put a cute little lamb-in-a-field scene on it, with a sun, and a bush with berries, and a butterfly, and flowers in the grass.....it turned out gorgeous! And it wet-felted down really nice and smooth and firm, too.
Unfortunately, one of my kids left it in my mom's yard, and my dad ran over it with the lawnmower

[Erinok]

how would you needle felt roving? and how can you put a design on the outside? I'm fascinated!!

[sofysmommy]

soo cool! I took some yarn and did what Mehndi mama said but I must have done something wrong because it is unraveling though it is rather hard and bouncy so maybe i need to work more on it or get different kind of yarn, I believe the yarn i used is bartletts? but am not positive since it was a thrift store find.(i found a bag of yarn and some are bartlett)

[Kari_mom]

I use strips of cut up sweater for the core of wool balls, since I have so many scraps from sweater pants. Then I tack a layer of wool batting on top with needle-felting, and wet felt it in the washer. I've added needle-felted designs after I make the ball too.

I've also run wool balls that are fuzzy or pilly through the washer again, tied up in pantyhose like I do the first time. Makes them look like new!

[isaberg]

Originally Posted by Erinok

how would you needle felt roving? and how can you put a design on the outside? I'm fascinated!!

You use a felting needle, which isn't a needle in the sense that you're probably thinking. It's a thin pointy piece of metal (needle-like) with little barbs on the shaft that catch the hairs of the wool and tangle them up with each other. You can use it to sculpt wool, or embellish knitted fabric with yarn, or, in this case, tack down roving so it won't go shifting on you when you wet-felt it. Felting needles are only a dollar or two each, or .30 apiece or less if you buy them in massive bulk from e-bay.

So you would pull a thin layer of roving, say 2"x3", lay it on the yarn ball, and poke at it with the felting needle until it's staying put pretty well. Then add more on another area of the ball, and repeat. Keep it up until you can't see the yarn. Then wet-felt. (Keep in mind it takes AGES to dry - mine have been 4 days on my windowsill and are still damp. Maybe I'll stick them in the dryer. That might be interesting. :-)

[Think of Winter]

I just tried this, and my ball keeps unwinding while I roll it around in the soap and hot water. Any more advice?

[mehndi mama]

Make sure it's wound very tightly. If you can, tuck the yarn end in under some other strands of yarn, or use a yarn needle to poke the yarn end through the middle of the ball.

[Think of Winter]

Thank you Mehndi Mama. I'm so excited by this idea. I have a big bag of moth-eaten Lopi and lots of little ones on my Christmas list.

[goldfinch]

I've just made my first felt ball, and have broken my first felting needle! What happened, you ask? Well... I wet-felted the yarn ball, then tried needle-felting the roving over it. .. the first ball looks great, but when I started the second one... I bent, then broke, the felting needle. I knew I wasn't doing it the traditional way, but it seemed to be working...

Will follow the instructions from now on.

Thanks for all of your help -- this forum has really inspired me!

[alisonsage]

bumping up an old thread! would this method work for felting shapes other than a sphere? say like a strawberry??

[antannie]

Don't know. Why don't you try it and let us know! I alsways use roving or batting all the way through, unless I amd putting a ball inside.

[Zoeanne]

If you use roving all the way through, is it necessary to needle felt it? Or can you just roll it with the water and soap? I am thinking of using a tennis ball as the base--would that work? Thanks!

[mehndi mama]

I think it would be pretty hard to needle-felt into a tennis ball....so in your case, you'd have to wet-felt exclusively. It's doable, bit just a bit more messy (i.e. wool fibers get stuck all over your hands) than when you needle-felt it first.

I think, if I were felting wool over a tennis ball base, I'd wrap roving over the ball as tightly as I can, in as thin of layers as I though I could get away with, and then I'd tie it into a nylon stocking and felt it in the washing machine instead of doing it by hand. It'll take a few cycles (just keep tossing the ball back into the washer after each load is completed), but it'll get you a nice smooth ball without the fibers-all-over-the-hands icky mess of doing it by hand.

[newmainer]

i'm curious about why you need to wet-felt the wrapped yarn ball first... i tried that this morning and it didn't seem to be doing much. i figure i would definitely needle felt the roving over it, then wet felt for good measure.... yeah?

some part of me is thinking that i am going to have some done for ds by easter!