Foray into Felting

Here is the photographic evidence of my new addiction: knitting!
I started off with felting. Felting is very forgiving, since the wool yarn shrinks up and hides a multitude of little mistakes... So, my first project was to make a pair of felted socks, using the fuzzy feet pattern from knitty. I guess standard procedure is to also mention which yarn I used and all that...this is Caron's "Felt It" yarn in "Rose Garden." I found that it tore easily if, say, your infant grabbed the ball and pulled while you were trying to work. On the other hand, it is very soft and pretty easy to work with (it has substantial variation in width, so wouldn't be perfect for everything). In 4 balls of it, I did come across one splice where two pieces had been tied together mid-ball. Spit-splicing does NOT seem to work on this yarn.

Here they are before felting (winnie the pooh is there to show scale)

And here they are after felting!
I have concluded that this pattern is better when made with the short rolled cuff and worn like a slipper--just like it shows on the pattern. I lengthened the cuff to try to make them more sock-like, and they are kinda snug to get on and off, as well as being so thick that it is hard to zip up my boots. So I guess felting should stick to slippers, and not try to venture into socks. Ah well, I learned how to turn a heel!


And this sweet little hat was the product of having an extra ball of the yarn! Modeled here by S, I thought it had too much pink to be a boy hat, so it's now for sale in my store