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But it looked So Simple

This post will be number 701.  That is a tribute to all the different aspects one can discuss when working with wool.  Knitting, crocheting, spinning and felting are uses one can put to wool and there is so very much to learn about each of these wooly activities.

Since I do spin there is a far amount of wool roving in my stash and it can be used to needle felt.
"Needle felting is a process which uses barbed needles to interlock wool fibers to form a more condensed material. Wool fibers have scales which when rubbed against each other catch and lock into place to create this denser material called felt. Felting needles are used to entangle the fibers. As the felting needle is moved up and down, the barbs on the needles catch the scales of the wool and entangle them into place."  (From https://www.wistyria.com)  Today's post looks into a recent adventure into that realm of wooliness.

I have become enamored with the Sarafina Fiber Arts, Inc videos. Check out some of the creations made by Sara, a talented fiber artist here.  She is the on camera creator of the videos that show beginners how to make three-dimension characters.  Most of her creations are animals, both real and fictional.  Sara's tutorials offer step by step instructions and she makes it all look so simple.  So of course I thought I'd be able to make something that would look much like her creation because Sara made it look so easy.  (Haven't learned that lesson yet, an expert always makes a skill look like a snap to achieve.)

The sleepy bunny video looked simple enough.  Make a sphere here, some oblong legs there and add color, piece of cake.  I do have all the tools she uses in her videos and roving generally leftover from some spinning project.  But I didn't have all the proper colors nor did I have anywhere near the same type of skill Sara has with my needles.  You may remember the Brandon Farris vlog where a beginning knitter is watching a video to learn to cast on and knit.  Brandon starts and stops the video several times and comments on the speed of the instructor.  Had I recorded my attempt at the bunny, it would have looked very similar.  There was mental comments like:

Whoa, slow down I am still working on the first leg.
How on earth did you get that shape with so few needle strokes?
Wait, wait the leg goes where?
My rabbit's head is not attaching like yours did.  Stop I have to go back and check how you did that again.

You get the picture.  Sara finished her bunny in about 50 minutes; mine took close to 2.5 hours to complete.  And much like Brandon when I was done I wondered why my bunny looked so very different from Sara's.

Photo credit - Sarafina Fiber Arts

Look how cute and cuddly these four bunnies are in brown, white and gray with their little eyes shut and so adorably curled up sleeping.  You can see the toes on the white bunny closest to the bundle of roving, the mouth, nose and eyes of the brown one closest to the camera.

Now this is my version.

Sleeping in a very small birch basket

The back

Another POV
Needless to say my sleeping bunny leaves some things to desire.  First the color splotches don't work.  One accent color would have been enough, or better yet they could have all been removed.  Second the ears are too big.  I struggled to get those fine little ears small enough for the body of the rabbit.  The face was difficult for me to get structured the way I wanted it to be; the mouth is there but one can't find the nose and eyes.  My version looks more like a mutant that a cuddly little bunny.

Much of this could have been fixed, but I decided to leave it overnight before making the improvements.  My roommates, M&M (Mike and Mara, the cats) thought I had left out a new cat toy for them to play with during the night.  Needless to say by morning my sleeping bunny looked even more mutated and it remains as a toy today...

Speaking of M&M, we got lots of sun over the weekend and my two knew just what to do with it.

I love how both managed to get their entire bodies in the sun, but their heads are shaded.

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