Needlefelted Flopsy Bunnies

On Thursday my friend, Lezley, and I took a course at Higham Hall with Joss Wrigg.

The course was to make Flopsy style bunnies from sheeps fleece using the Needlefelting method.

It was held in conjunction with Woolfest that happens once a year - more on that in a later post.

You may remember last year I took a Needlefelting course with Sue Allan from Sewsister, we made Fantasy Birds, which was loads of fun.

This time we were using fleece, straight from a sheep, a native Lake District Herdwick sheep no less, and although it had been cleaned and washed there was still the odd bit of 'natural history' hidden amongst the fluff  :)

Using a batting we formed a basic shape as a starting point.  

No rude comments about the shape now!

When we had a basic shape we added Herdwick Sheep fleece, trying to arrange the shades of the fleece to be where limbs and bulges might be.  Not being much of an artist I found it difficult to place limbs at first, but with the help of Joss's own big bunny (below) I worked it out.....kinda!

Isn't he a beauty?

I decided on a moon-gazing hare, so pointed his little head to the stars. (No, it's NOT a duck!)

Adding some darker fleece as detail for the muzzle and eyes made him (I decided it would be a him) come to life.

Looking up at ya!

And gazing at that big fat moon (or even the fluorescent strip light in the studio!)

He's called Colin  :)