A few months ago I decided I wanted to make a rug out of felt balls for the nursery, after seeing one in a shop window. I researched how to make one and found very few tutorials, as it seemed to be a pretty enormous undertaking that few people had attempted. The rugs in stores all seem to have been either made exclusively by women in small workshops in Nepal, or at the very least, the felt balls were made in Nepal and then fastened together in Australia.



I decided I wanted to make mine from scratch and started rolling felt balls that would eventually be stitched together into a round shape. I knew it would take me a long time, but I figured, what the hey, I'm pregnant and about to finish work, I have loads of time on my hands! Each ball took me about five to ten minutes to roll and I would sit and roll them while I watched a lot of Twin Peaks. It was pretty fun but really gave my hands a work out and all that dish soap made my hands so dry - not to mention - wool roving is not very pleasantly scented! I would lay all of my balls out in front of me and Atticus would sneakily come along and bat them all off the table and onto the floor and then start ripping into them. Cheek! I ended up making one for him to play with.



The wool roving to make the balls was costing me a small fortune (I found some places that sell locally for about $7 for a 100g bag - each bag would make about 20 balls) and when I researched a bit, trying to find competitive prices for the wool roving, I found that buying the wool was more expensive than buying the balls pre-made (from Nepal). Then, when I compared the price of buying the pre-made felt balls with actually buying a rug completely made, well.... buying a rug was less expensive again.



After a few weeks of nightly felt ball rolling, I laid out my balls and saw I had about enough for a 50cm rug (sounds big, looks small). I did some calculations as to how many more I'd need for the 1m rug I was planning and realised I was a bit out of my depth (and would never get enough made before the baby is born!). Wanna see my working out? No? I'll show you anyway!

- Total rug area (100cm in diameter) : π x r2 = π x 50cm2 = 7854cm² (to nearest cm)
- Each individual ball (3cm in diameter) : π x r2 = π x 1.5cm2 = 7cm² (to nearest cm)
- Divide the total rug area by the individual ball area = 1122 balls (approx. not taking into account the small spaces between the balls).

(Take that grade 12 general maths!) 

I realised I could continue to roll my own balls, spending a fortune, buy them pre-made in bulk online (still fairly expensive) or just buy a rug outright.



So, I gave up. This has been a very long post to tell you I didn't make a rug. Haha.

I would really like to buy a rug and I have spotted some 1m rainbow ones on Etsy for around $200 including postage, but I'm hesitant to make such a splurge (even though I know how much time and effort goes into these things and it would totally be worth it!).



At the very least, this was an exercise in the nature of craft - often it is far more expensive and takes a lot more time and effort to make things yourself. Sometimes, those things will be really amazing and worth the time, effort and money and become something that you feel proud of and might one day pass on - and other times the task you've set yourself is too big an undertaking and you should support some crafty Nepalese women instead.

So, what to do with my 150 felt balls? Here are some ideas I toyed with:


1. Felt Craspedia 2. Christmas Wreath 3. Felt Ball Trivet 4. Felted Window Drapes 5. Felt Ball Necklace 6. Felt Ball Mobile

I've been feeling a bit indecisive so I decided to make a garland with them - that way if I somehow come into possession of another 900 balls to make the rug, or think up some other use, I can unthread them and use them again. I just used a large darning needle and some coloured embroidery thread. You can move the balls up and down the thread and there isn't too much movement when they're hung. Here's my garland (using about a third of the balls I made), hung up in a temporary spot:




Please do make me feel better about being a quitter by sharing an anecdote about something you got part way through and never finished! :D

Ps. Every time I see felt balls I think about Bob from Twin Peaks. Creeeepy.

I am now acknowledging that my belly could be categorised as huge and is exceptionally round. I have now reached the tights-as-pants stage of my pregnancy. By that, I mean comfort completely wins out over society's fashion rules. Who am I kidding, I don't prescribe to the notion that tights can't be worn as pants even when I'm not pregnant! The shirt in these photos belonged to my mum. I'm not sure in what decade she would have been wearing it (probably the nineties), but it says seventies pretty loudly to me. Its label is written beautifully in gold font on the tag; 'Gaylord'.

I finished up work last week (such a relief!) and have had a lot of pelvic and hip pain these past few days. Sleeping is a horribly uncomfortable exercise, but the end is near! I am going to spend the next eight weeks nesting and resting and crafting I hope.

My older sister had her baby this week. She and her boyfriend didn't know the sex before the birth (I am so not patient enough for that) and out popped a little boy they named Connor, a couple of days behind schedule. I am dying to see photos.

Ps. Apologies for iPhone quality photos! I need a new camera asap!

march 2013 from mushab00m on 8tracks Radio.

Some songs I've been listening to lately. I have been pretty much listening to these eight tracks over and over again for a few weeks and am in need of some new tunes. Care to recommend anything?
+ dwld
+ image credit

My sister asked me to draw her a family portrait for she and her boyfriend's one year anniversary yesterday (my birthday!) - they recently adopted a cute little ginger kitten named Charlie and moved into a big house together. I thought I'd share a little bit about my drawing process. It's pretty basic but I've been enjoying learning new ways of doing things over the past few months. I'd like to play more with textures and varied brushes and adding additional layers. I only had a day or two to finish this drawing, so I kept it pretty simple.


I started by making a fairly basic sketch in Photoshop using the paintbrush tool in a single layer on a white background A3 sized image.


In a separate layer and in a darker colour, I refine the lines of the drawing, zooming in on each section and adding in more detail. Sometimes if I am having difficulty drawing a particular section freehand (eg. shoes) I'll use study some Google images to get a better idea.


I then hide my original grey layer and am left with the simple, black outline.



When adding colour, I use the paintbrush tool for small sections and use the selection tool and paint bucket tool for larger blocks of colour, adding them in a layer underneath the black outline. If I've added a colour that then doesn't suit, I select the colour section with the magic wand tool and select Image > Adjustments > Hue/Saturation and see other options for the the colour of the section. This stage always takes the longest amount of time. Sometimes I add a texture layer underneath the colour layer and adjust the opacity of the colour layer, which gives the image a bit more structure.


My sister had the drawing printed and put it in a cute frame and gave it to her boyfriend yesterday. He sent me a message saying he liked it and thought it was cooler than traditional family portraits.



Do you use a graphics tablet? Care to share any details of your process?