Banner Sponsors

sanibear May 21, 2009

i saw that many of you needel feld the paws..but i just cant imagen how to do it. so that u cant see the stiches and how you fill them so
that they really like a 3D look
maybe someone can help.
i make mine just plain- but i would love to try something new- and how you all do it it looks much better.
sandra

teeeej May 21, 2009

Sandra there are heaps of techniques you can do on toes. Needle felting uses special felting needles to apply wool to your bear. There are also pulled toes and trupunto paws as well. Try the Library it has lots of topics under Paws/Claws/Toes. Another good resource is Ebearz - lots of online workshops (http://www.kranbearys.com/EbearZ/index.htm). Its has mini-online workshop with Judi Paul that does needle felted pawpads .

----
Therese

Andrea May 21, 2009

Hi Sandra the basics of needlefelting are very simple, it uses a special barbed needle which tangles the wool fibres as you stab at the wool with the needle, this helps to give the pieces some shape and substance. shaped pieces can then be applied directly to the bear when you use the needle to attach it and shape it, the longer you work on a piece the firmer and more compact it becomes. There are lots of good needlefelting sites to give you an idea of what you can do but all you really need to get started is needles, a foam block and some wool. Once you understand the principles you are only limited by your imagination!
Hope this is of some help and not too confusing

Andrea x

sanibear May 22, 2009

thaks for the tip.. sound little bit difficult. i will look into other website so that i can get a better picture about that all.
sandra

rkr4cds May 22, 2009

Hi Sandra,
Andrea said it all in a few short succinct sentences; I took a few more pages to explain some of the basics.
Please read some more here (Sorry for the self-promo; I'd present others too if I knew of them with this much technical info):
http://www.beyondbasicbears.com/bears_freebies.html
But nothing will take the place of just taking a needle in hand and repeatedly pushing it through the fiber for yourself. Theory can be spoken about forever but it won't replace experience.
Get a 36 Triangle needle and a good, standard, easy to use fiber like NZ Romney and begin to work the fiber for yourself. that is the only way that you'll see what happens when the needle drives fiber from one side of the mass through those on the other side.

Just needle! Don't aim for some complex shape in the beginning - often something entirely different emerges in the beginning of your experiences until you learn how to control the needles and fibers, which again comes from getting experience under your belt.