Poppy Penguin!

This little penguin has just popped in hoping you are all enjoying the Christmas holiday time!

With a modified crocheted cylindrical body and needlefelted features she is stuffed with short ends of projects gone by and a present for my niece with a penguin passion!

The beautiful curly locks are mohair...and she has needlefelted feet too! 

A little posterior needling gave her a tiny tail!

She would like to share my December stashbusting totals with you 

including her 10g ...

the total is  265g.......

........there may be some more if I get a couple of items finished over the holidays.....

Hope you are finding some time to relax and create!

x

Merry Christmas

Wishing everyone 

A

happy, 

healthy, 

and peaceful 

Christmas time

xx

A Round of Robins!

At last.... the big Christmas project is revealed!

It all began this time last year when I hooked this little chap...

followed by my Springtime birds.

Each Robin began as a circle of crochet...everyone different

 

Each has a yellow beak, sewn onto the back made from wet felt and a tail from offcuts of wet felt used in this Christmas project!...

....a customary needlefelted eye....

 and rosy red buttons

or a needlefelted red breast of Teeswater or Wensleydale curls.

Some are smaller than others...

...many are winging their way around the country...wrapped in stripey paper bags!

130g of browny wool busted on Christmas tweets!

Christmas Presents

Its really exciting to be able to show you a few of the presents that will be finding their way under some Christmas trees next week....

This chunky cowl has a mobius twist and is hooked in Sherlock stitch..with half trebles...

 ...another half treble Sherlock stitch strip ready for the twist and to be sewn into another chunky cowl.
This is the Artesano Aran yarn highlighted here.

A hanging ornament..based on a Tie Fighter for a Star Wars fan

 was restyled and adapted from a square washcloth pattern

with a dc border and some surface embellishments.

This doughnut began as a pincushion pattern 

to which a needlefelted frosting of chocolatey Teeswater curls was  added

and a filling of toy stuffing with short ends (from my big Christmassy project!) !

All the above were stash busting projects:
2 cowls - 90g
Tie Fighter - 8g
Doughnut a hefty 27g
Total 125g

As even more of a tease...(the 'trifle' of scarlet buttons  had you hooked)...
 I'll leave you with one of the Big Christmas projects all wrapped up!

 

Preparing!

Lots of things are in progress at Random Wooliness towers!

The latest project involves these...

Thought they looked so bright and cheerful!

I'll be back with some completed presents soon!

Hope you are enjoying your seasonal creating!

A short yarn....

.... a few weeks a go when browsing in a local charity shop I came across a colourful, squidgy yarn cake on sale for just £1!
It was expertly wound and seemed to contain layers of complementary colours. I was intrigued, and with the perfect project in mind it came home with me. 

Unfortunately despite lots of squashing and gazing at the beautifully formed multicoloured cake I eventually dived straight in and forgot to take a photo! 

However this is the end result!

As it was so well wound I hoped each yarn would be attached to the next - 

I was not disappointed - and what beautiful joins there were!

Using the end from the middle, the end from the end and a chunky hook , I worked rows of trebles and half trebles, some in the back loops only to form a short length.

Inspired by the mobius twist Jennifer of Fiber Flux put into her Cloudy Sky Mobious Cowl,

I followed her fab photo tutorial and put a twist into the short scarf I had made. The twist makes the cowl sit straight and as this one is quite wide it will turn over for a double layer if required!

The ends were sewn together using Tamara's quick and easy mattress stitch tutorial.

So a quick and easy cowl created using great surprise yarns from someone elses stash!

It will be joining this scarf  being donated at Christmas to someone who needs to keep warm this winter.

To summarise the yarn... surplus wool donated to charity,
bought,
hooked,
and donated to another charitable cause.
As the wool was from someone elses stash, and destined for a specific project
 I thought I would cheekily add it as a stashbuster project!

It weighs in at a chunky 78g...and there's still some left over!

November's totals are:
Chunky Cowl - 78g
Pompoms - 32g
Randomeanderings - 60g
=
170g.
There are lots of festive makes and presents in the pipeline....see you next month!

Pompoms!

How fabulous is blogland? Sharing ideas and projects across the miles is such fun.

Ali over at The Creations of Crazy Daisy has already made some colourful pompoms, 

 and others have said they hope to too for this great project.

Mine certainly feel better than they look!

Sharing the good news about the pompom challenge!

 

32g of stash busted too!

Tiddly om pom pom!

Christmas creating is very much in full swing! 

Theres a variety of projects on the go...

looking a bit brown but some colour will be injected soon!

However I have found a little distraction...

...making pompoms for The Great Sense Pompom Challenge!

The details are all on the website - how fabulous to tune into your sense of touch -

 to be part of a huge tapestry travelling the country raising awareness of sight and hearing loss.

Great for stash busting all those short ends too!

I have seen somewhere that the challenge runs from November 18th until December 2nd so

I'm off to unwind, winding some colourful woolly pompoms!

 

Randomeandering

Ever since my adventures in scrumbling I have been itching to dive into some more. 

Over the summer, knowing that the theme for National Poetry Day and International Day of Felt was water, some ideas began to spring and flow!

However they were blocked a little, by time and organisational procedures. 

When creating I take over all available space...and in order to use a variety of colours and textures a large area is needed, along with the time to sort through several bags of tiny bits and pieces.

Eventually I piled high my largest tray with the necessary equipment and took my hook for a relaxing walk!

The first pieces were bluey tones:

The backs are almost as fun as the fronts!

The rounder ones have a more three dimensional quality..

As I'm not sure of the technical terminology I'm naming these taking-my-hook-for-a-leisurely-stroll pieces as random-meanderings - or randomeanderings for short!

I use all sorts of yarns, wools and threads and many hook sizes - 

and LoVe the freedom to go with the flow.

Having grown up in the North East of England, crossing the majestic River Tees many times I remember the distinctive colour of this and many other local rivers.

For birthday gifts for two fellow former north eastern residents  I used more browny tones:

front:

..and back..

Both these started as circles, but changed shape significantly due to the pulling and pushing of the added yarns and  stitches. 

Although nearly finished, the second needed something else, and I began hooking round the edge in a random fashion. It was only when I spun it round that I realised it resembled an autumn leaf.

The two rusty river autumnal coloured pieces were made from this tray of goodies.

This stream of watery randomeanderings

busted  60g..

a small drop in my ocean of stash!