8 Steps to Make a Pocket Smiling Snake!

The Detailed Making Process Of The Eyes

What? I didn't show you how I make those cute and silly eyes?! Forgive me please. There are steps for making eyes, and it always a repeat part for most buddies. If I show the details every time I make a new buddy, my blog will be too long to read. So, some beginners around me said they want the details. OK! Here are specific steps for making an eye.

 Step 1

 

Take a scrap of white wool for the eye ball and start rolling.

 Step 2

 

Keep rolling the wool hard until it become a firm ball shape.

 Step 3

 

Like this. If it's not that perfect, do not worry. You will be able to improve the shape after you poke it on you buddy's face.

 Step 4

 

 Place the eye ball on you foam block or any other soft surface, and needle it to an evenly firm ball.

 Step 5

 For the pupil, take a pinch of black wool and roll it into a tiny ball. Actually you can add the pupil after you fasten the eye ball on buddy's face.

 Step 6

 Use your felting needle to poke the pupil into the center of the eye. Feel free to play around with the location to change the expression.

 Step 7 (optional)

 

You can wrap a few strands of dark-colored wool around the eyes to add the shadow for their eyes.

Step 8 (optional)

 

Take our Seal for example, add the strand of gray wool around the eyes and poke it. You get a vivid expression from his eyes.

Making a Clean Line Between Two Colors

Make a clear line between two colors is a very important skill in wool felting. It determines how vivid and clear the craft's looking is. Now, I will tell you a easy way to felt all the wool fibers in the right part of your toy.

When taking the amount needed of the color you're adding on, you will always find the fibers are disorder and go everywhere. So, you need to use your hands to fold it over to form a straight, even line. Then cover it to the right part of the body or wherever is needed. Take this black wool as example.

Like so. Place this black strand on the basic body and gently poke along the fold to set into place. The magic weapon here is your needle. Use your felting needle to round up your edge, then poke it. Beginners might need more practice on this skill. But you will find it's so easy when you make most of your needle out.

By the way, good felting needles usually with long service life and can help shrinking the time you spend on you craft. The last picture shows my favorite brand of felting needle. They are my magic tool.

Don't You Dare As Cute As Me! I'm A Guinea-pig.

Chocho, the Guinea-pig is a new friend here, everyone loves his cute looking, soft and chunky body. But Chocho here is to tell people he is absolutely one of the top friends to people to keep accompany with. Chocho loves lying on your stomach while you are reading on your couch. Don't worry, he will never eat your Twilight of limited edition like a mouse usually do. Ok, are you ready to make a new friend for yourself?

Step one: Take some white wool, roll it into a ball. Then, use your felting needles to poke it repeatedly until it becomes an egg-shape body.

Step two: Take a small amount of light brown wool and roll it in to four mini balls as his feet. Attach the four balls on the body shape and poke each of their bottom to fasten them on the surface of the body. Like so. 

Step three: Take some brown and black or yellow wool if you like to your guinea pig pattern by needling in different spot shapes and sizes on the back and head area. The amount and shape are up to you. Just make it natural.

Step four: Take some black wool and roll it into a mini ball as his nose. Poke it on one end of the egg-shape body.

Step five: Use white wool make two balls as his eyes. You can make one bigger than the other. Use a tiny amount of black wool as the pupils. I like to poke them in to the center. But you can change the position to change the expression.

Step six: Take a small amount of brown wool, roll it and poke it on your foam block or any soft surface like wool pad. This time, you need to make two semicircular ears. Be aware of using felting needle when you dealing with small amount of wool. 

Step seven: Poke the bottom of the ears on the back apart and behind the eyes. 

Tada~! He's ready to lie on your stomach! Let's be the best friends to each other!

How To Felt Basic Shapes?

As you start to make basic shape for your buddy's body or head, you must learn to sculpt your wool into any shape you want by using felting needles. When you start it, you will see how easy it is to work with felt. The more time you poke on a certain area, the tighter the area is going to be. That also means this area will look sunken when it compared with its surround areas. So it is a basic and the most important skill to learn in the felting art. You will find you usually spend 1 hour to felt a firm and perfect shape you want. 

The process of felting a basic body shape is right here. You will use it in almost all the projects for your toys. Go back to this page anytime you need a refresher.

1. Take certain amount of wool and roll it.

2. Use your hands to roll the wool tightly. The tighter, the easier and faster you will spend in the next step. Because the tighter, the more of the shape that your needle will pass through at once.

3. Place the wool piece on your felting foam block, or other softer surface like wool mat. Poke repeatedly into the wool. You will find you averagely poke a thousand time for a firm perfect body shape by using 2 felting needles. 

4. Multi-needle tool is your best friend to help you speed up the felting process. 

5. Continue felting the wool until the shape is been evenly poked and round. To make it even, you don't have to poke deeply each time, just find the right strength you need to make it even. Like what I said use the felting needle to sculpt the shape you want.