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Busy Buzzy Bees - Finished or Work In Progress?

Busy Buzzy Bees

Annie

A few weeks ago I went out in the garden with a cup of tea with a plan to clear the patio and spruce it up a bit. But then I stopped and sat there with my cup of tea for a while and decided that it was actually really pretty in all it's weedy overgrown glory, and thought I'd leave it alone - especially as the chives were attracting lots of bees! and as they say, weeds are only plants in the wrong place.  As my garden has been neglected for a while there are lots of weeds - and lots of them are really pretty.  In fact my vegetable bed has completely given over to nature and is now a mini-meadow!

I thought the bees and chives and daisies would be a nice idea for a felted picture so I took a few photos.

Then I laid out a background, added some extra bits, took a few bits away, and added some paint, and added some stitching...... 

  

Laying Out (adding prefelts on top of wetted down fibres)

  

After felting

Some paint applied

Some stitching added

Now my dilemma is - is it finished or do I keep on fiddling with it? One of the hardest things is knowing when something is finished, when to stop. Finish too early and it feels like (and can look like) you held back. Finish too late and you can overwork it.

I do like to play and push it to see what happens. Which sometimes results in going too far! But sometimes results in a great piece and lots of things learned.

I think in this case I might leave it, and think again later after a period of it hanging on the wall. I could add some green stitching to the stems and some white fabric or some paint to fill in the bees wings.....

But most importantly it doesn't really matter as long as you enjoy the process! :)

Just trying out a smaller crop - sometimes the cropping can make or break a picture too!

Creating Felt Artwork giveaway winners

Thank you for all your lovely comments!

We borrowed Grandma's ingenious summer hat (it folds flat like a hand-fan) to put all the names in.  

The three names drawn out were Shelley, Emma and Hannah. Congratulations - we really hope you enjoy it!

Giveaway of our revised pdf 'Creating Felt Artwork'

Hello! We've just spent a little bit of time making some changes to our pdf 'Creating Felt Artwork'.

It's fundamentally the same but has some expanded text in some sections and some extra photos and ideas throughout.

We've got 3 copies to give away so if you'd like to be in the draw, please leave a comment below (note: comments are moderated so they won't appear immediately).

The draw closes at midnight GMT on Wednesady 20th July 2016 and the winners will be announced on Thursday 21st July.

Find out more about 'Creating Felt Artwork'

Good luck in the draw :)  Of course if you buy a copy then win, we'll happily refund you!

Better Late Than Never....Happy Fathers Day! :)

Mmmm.....beer! Handmade felt applique on Calico

Annie

It's a good job my dad knows me so well - he wasn't totally surprised when I handed him a Work In Progress for his Fathers Day card then took it straight back from him to finish it "at some time soon..."  I did however also hand him a nice bottle of whisky so he was more than happy with that.

So two and a half weeks later I have actually finished it.  Yay!  Life is always so busy and these things always take longer than you think they will - but lots and lots of love (and unpicking and coffee) went into it.  So I'm either two and a half weeks late, or you could say 49.5 weeks early! Bottoms up :)