A while back, a favorite wool sweater of mine was accidentally put in the dryer.
For some reason, I kept it. Probably because it was so pretty and purple. And I guess I thought I might be an 8-year-old again.
Well, I am glad I did. I found this craft on Martha Stewart that shows you how to make mittens from a felted wool sweater.
After I washed the sweater in hot water and ran it through the dryer again, I had a nice piece of felted wool to use for mittens or whatever else I wanted.
Now, I have the warmest pair of purple mittens!
Someone in the comments of that project said the sweater needs to be 100% wool. Not true! Mine was 10% something else. I cannot remember what, though.
I will post a picture later tonight. Right now, I have pancakes on the stove!
4:49 pm on February 29th, 2008
It does have to be 100% wool - just that there are a lot of different types of wool out there - with different names!
Felting is a great. I love to knit and felt - you could crochet and felt as well. The unfelted object is usually really huge - and then you felt it down to size.
I like knitting and then felting slippers. (they are really a huge sock that I felt down to size(which you can also make from a felted sweater)
4:54 pm on February 29th, 2008
Ooops - I should mention - that felting will only work with 100% wool - any non-wool fibers will not felt - but the non wool will be felted into the wool. Make sense?
It will affect the texture of the finished project differently. I’ve made felted dice bags with a strand of 100% wool and 100% nylon ribbon. The wool felts and the ribbon won’t - creates a neat look.
9:10 pm on February 29th, 2008
Thank you for clarifying that, Susan.
My sweater was not 100% wool, so it did not felt as tightly as 100% wool would have. As you pointed out, the non-wool fibers do not actually felt.
What I meant was that people can still do the project with a sweater that is not 100%. The results are not guaranteed, though.
I knew mine would felt since it already was most of the way there!
The wool and ribbon felted together sounds very cool!