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.

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.

Totoro Is Smiling To You!

This Totoro is more popular than any other buddy now. I posted it on my MakeWoolBuddies Facebook page three weeks ago and according to the crowdsourcing, this smiling Totoro was the big winner in the “beauty contest”. Haha, I'm so happy here, because I AM the maker of this perfect, vivid, fantastic, incredible Totoro ^0^!

So, if you want to learn the process of making a Totoro like this, you are on the right truck! Today, I'm going to write down the secrete process of making it. You can do it too as long as follow every step carefully! Ok, grasp some wool, a needle, let's do it!

1. Take a small handful of white wool, roll the wool tightly to make the base for the body shape. By compressing the wool together, the needle helps you speed up the felting process. Continue poking the wool until the shape is evenly round and like an egg.

2. Stretch a layer of gray wool to fully cover the body shape, then tighten it with felting needles.

3. Roll a small handful of white wool into an oval shape for the bust and tummy. Poke the white wool onto the front of the body, leaving half of the height for the head area.

4. Using small amount of gray wool, make one tail and two arms. You can just make three rounded balls. Poke the tail onto the lower back of the body, poke the arms on each side, and felt them together. 

5. Add more gray wool to help connect the edge of arms with the body, keep poking until they connected naturally. Now it's time to make its head part.

6. Stretch proper amount of while wool and poke it onto the face part, shape the teeth part by using your felting needle while poking. Likewise, poke two soybean-sized eye areas and black-soybean-sized nose area. Eye areas should be white and nose area should be gray. For Totoro's ears, make two black-soybean shapes and poke them on its head. 

7. Make some gray spots on the bust (like what I added in the picture above).

8. Eyes, nose and teeth. Roll two pinches of black wool and poke into the center of the two eye areas for pupils. Stretch a triangular nose on the nose area, make sure the base of the triangle up, then add two brown nares on it. The teeth part is the finishing point. For this part, remember the more you poke, the tighter the wool going to be? So my secret is using NO more wool but ONLY felting needles to poke them out! Be patient to poke hundred times for all the lines, lines must be absolutely straight since it affects the energetic smile directly! 

Wow! You just finish your own smiling Totoro! Congrats!

2 Minutes To Learn To Make A Wool Penguin

Come on, let's do it for real. This is my home-made video, hope you will like it.

Comments are welcomed.