Get Well Soon

Our dear friend and felter Robin is not well so we send her our good wishes for a speedy recovery.

GET WELL SOON ROBIN

Alice Springs Beanie Festival

Congratulations to Jacqui on winning the Cultural Stories section of the Old Stories New Yarns 2012 Beanie Festival Competition.

The Day the Parrots Ate Mum's Roses by Jacqueline Gibson

Welcome Back

Welcome back to Helen who has just completed her Tasmanian Tractor Trek.  That's 9 weeks on a tractor seat travelling from Perth to Tasmania - top speed 50 kilometres an hour!  Hope you took your felt cushion with you Helen!

Here's Helen's view as they take "Break Me Neck Hill",

Photo Courtesy Chamberlain 9G Tractor Club Blog

Note all the cars desperately getting past – there are quite a lot of tractors in Helen’s tractor club and they were travelling in convoy.

To read more about Helen’s travels you can visit the Chamberlain 9G Tractor Club blog that Helen runs by clicking here.

And thanks to Val for bringing in the Sal's Wool Den supplies while Helen’s been away.

Felt Magazine

The latest issue is out now.  Run to your newsagent to get your copy and get felting.

Happy Birthday Victoria

Photo Lyn Pix

Wishing you a very happy birthday and many thanks for patiently modelling so many of our creations .

Best Wishes for the Year Ahead

The Bunbury Felters

June Show and Talk

Thank you to everyone who brought something in for this important part of our monthly meeting.

Star of the day was Kim in her absolutely gorgeous nuno jacket.

Designer Kim Pearce

 Gorgeous back detail too.

Designer Kim Pearce

Brenda's cape with collar created at our Marjolein Dallinga workshop.

Designer B Warner

Designer B Warner

Designer B Warner

 Lorraine told a wonderful story about the inspiration for this jacket.  It came when watching a television program on the endangered Snow Leopard and the hazards it faced surviving in its harsh climate.

Designer Lorraine McArthur

 The two sides of the jacket are different representing the terrain it had to cross to get to new water supplies as the seasons change. 

 The pink pieces represent trees and the fallen leaves around them.

Designer Lorraine McArthur

The other side of the jacket is the cold white and greys of the winter landscape and between them the hazards the leopard must cross.

Designer Lorraine McArthur

It was a great example of how you can get inspiration for your work and it makes the jacket so much more interesting with the story being integral to it.    Thanks Lorraine

The snow leopard is a magnificent animal sadly on the endangered species list.  To learn more about them click here.

Needle Felting

This little chap is by Joan Kent who's become a needle felting addict!!

June's Ten Minute Tip

A big thank you to uber stitcher Penny for giving us a wonderful ten minute tip on hand embroidery.

Penny's not only a talented artist and needlewoman but she's a great teacher.  Embroidery a la Penny is to be free and fun and not too tied up with techniques and method.

As we can see from her samples a few simple stitches can make a huge impact on your work.

Artist P Elliott

 Here's her felt art embellished with hand stitching.

Artist P Elliott

Artist P Elliott

Not surprisingly Penny has won many prizes for her work.

Wild Weather

We hope everyone is ok after our wild winter storms and that you have your power back on.  Isn't is wonderful when the lights go on and you can stop camping in your house.

Lots of activity at the blog mistress mansion over the weekend -

Hurrah for the SES

Amazingly no real damage done.   And if you are still sitting in the dark remember that fortunately felting is a low tech activity, so get the old style rolling gear out and make something!

Softies

Many thanks to Colleen for sharing her gorgeous collection of softies with us at the June meeting.

It was all huge fun choosing our softie pattern and sorting out the felt fabric we had made. Octavious the Owl was a big favourite

Octavious the Owl by Colleen

As was Polly.  Here she is with a skirt made from felt in the Annie Foy method.  How clever is Annie??

Polly by Colleen

 Cutie monkey -

Monkey by Colleen

And because we're an older bunch, Kerry designed this heat pack softie (her words not mine)!!!  It's very cute, very simple and was a favourite with our members.

Wheat Warmer by Kerry

Sew looking forward to seeing all your softies at the next meeting.

New Growth and Noongar Artists in Focus

Congratulations to our friends at FeltWEST who have an exhibition opening today 8.00 pm at the Mundaring Arts Centre.

In preparation for this exhibition FeltWest artists have been working with visiting international and national felt tutors; Charlotte Buch (Danish), Anita Larkin (ACT), Vilte Kazlauskaite (Lithuanian) and Marjolein Dallinga (Canadian) in a series of knowledge-sharing workshops. These visiting tutors have shared their techniques for wearable nuno-felt design, integrating found objects into sculptural pieces and creating light and textural felted fashion to bring a contemporary look to an ancient craft. 

Bunbury Felter and FeltWEST member Val Hornibrook has a piece in the exhibition so make sure you go and see it.

Reflection by Val Hornibrook

Val's piece is titled "Reflection" and is inspired by the workshop she completed with Canadian based Marjolein Dallinga in March this year.

Here we are with Marjolein -

And these are some of the things we made during the three day workshop -

 The New Growth exhibition runs until 8th July.
Click here for more information.

Softies

The first of our softie pictures are here.

This is from Colleen's "Polly" pattern from the softie books.  It was made by Penny and posted off on Saturday to the new grandchild.

Sew cute!!