After much fussing and learning I'm finally getting this place to a point where I can start using it. I've already got plans for how I'll set up other parts of the site but for now I gotta actually put some content on here. Honestly I'm pretty bad about talking about myself and what I'm doing, but maybe making this into a thing I do will help. Expect these posts to be pretty sparse in the mean time.

This is the third thing I've felted, but it's the only one I have a decent amount of process pictures for. I'm tackling simpler designs for now (the character being a shapeshifter also helps to explain away any odd sizes/shapes I accidentally made). For now, with each new project I'm trying to attempt at least one new thing. Making a size guide and creating a wire armature were the challenges for this project. I don't have a printer at home so I had to draw the size guide by hand. Luckily I had a small circular trinket on my desk I could trace to make the head. Then I made a rough scale of the body based on the head. With that guide I tried my best at shaping the wire to fit in those diemnsions. I didn't think to use pliers for this part so ended up hurting my fingers pretty bad lol. I thought the whole process would take me like a week at most but shaping the core wool around the wire was quite the hassle. Also because of the angles I had to felt the wool, I often stabbed through to the fingers holding Teeb. I've seen other felters with these like leather thimbles online. I'll have to pick up some at some point. Until then I'll keep adding a couple drops of blood to each project (I didn't actually bleed on this dwdw). There's a special kind of joy in secretly making something for someone and being able to show them previews without actually reavealing you're doing it for them. It could be anything up until I get all the core wool packed down right.

Once I was happy with the shape, a new problem revealed itself. With how close my core and top wools were in color, It was going to be hard to tell if I'd actually covered everything. Another mistake I didn't realize until too late was I completley forgot to order black top wool. I had some rougher core wool on hand and just had to be happy that I could finish this at all. I'll probably go other those spots in the future once I get some in my next order. I spent a lot of time trying to get a nice smooth finish here. I'd tack the wool down with the same needle I built the core wool with (A 38 Triangle), then follow up with a 40 Spiral, and finish with a 42 Triangle to try and get the felting holes as small as possible.

The tail was it's own unique challenge. Preventing the wool from slipping around even after I'd felted it down was rough. The tight posture I had to keep my hands in while I worked on this bit meant I was taking lots of breaks. For the end of the tail, I used black sharpie on some toothpicks, then clipped then down to size, and hotglued them onto the bulb I'd made at the end of the tail. Another layer of core wool had to be built over the glue so that I could add the brush like hairs. I had to cut the hairs down a lot lol.

But here's the finished look! I'm really happy with how it came out despite honestly thinking it was going to look like shit up until the last day or two. It ended up not being as poseable as I'd've liked but oh well. It's still really cute. Now that you're thoroughly impressed by my skills, I can point you to to teeb's site here. Also I'd originally planned to make her genitals as well but I couldn't find the right size magnets in town. That was probably for the best considering how tough some of the finer details were here. Maybe some time in the future I can add that, though I may just redo the whole project at that point.

2025 was a pretty mixed year for me, but I think it rounded out alright. I had multiple surgeries early on that resulted in my ostomy bag becoming permanent. I got to travel to California and meet some people I'd known online for a while. Then a Colorado trip almost right after let me experience camping for the first time in a long while (even if I slept in the car every night so that I could sleep upright). Some bad brain worms hit me a few months after and I'm still kinda dealing with them. Finally diving into this craft I'd yearned to start for years and getting things I'm happy with basically right away really helped to boost my mood as I was feeling more isolated than I had in a while. I can quietly make things for myself and other people and that makes me happy. I've already got a large list of things I wanna make with felt so please look forward to them. This was supposed to be a warmup for a birthday gift I'd make right after but that was months ago now lol. I'll still make that of course. I just gotta order the wool...