wooly ladies

I've been working on some more wool applique as I prepare for a class I am going to teach at Bear Patch in March.  We had been getting requests for a basic class and even though there are many people who have done a lot more of this than I have, I decided I could pull together enough info and material to make a good learning experience.  Here's my project in pieces:

 And here's a bit of detail:

A single strand of embroidery floss and a whip stitch to sew the shapes.

 Last week I was with a group of quilting friends, and we got into a discussion of the value of saving scraps.  Notice how I have positioned the pattern piece below into one corner of the fabric in order to leave a larger unused area to save for something else--

 Poor Anita was chastised for being too liberal with her pattern placement and then throwing away the scraps!  You would have thought it was the end of the wooly world!  And even though this is wool felt, which I think in some purist circles might be looked down upon, we felt the need to educate Anita on the value of saving wool scraps.  They do run at a higher price than regular quilting fabric, plus there is a more limited choice in colors.  So, like many others, I save even little bits of wool because you just never know when you need a tiny little dot for an eye for a bird or a berry on a branch or a flower center.  These were scraps left from this project, and there are some good sized pieces here that will go into something else (I hope).

As a part of the class I am going to lead, I am trying out some various products including needles.  I was actually kind of surprised at the differences in needles.  Right now my preference is the package on the right that looks like a matchbook.  Of course, that is the one that is hard to obtain, which is par for the course.  The ones at the top are labeled Wool Applique Needles, but seem really over-sized for my uses.  The jury is still out on this topic.

needles from Fons & Porter, Foxglove Cottage, Scarlet Today and Bohin