Felting

Six enthusiastic individuals gathered in Bodega for a felting workshop organized by fibershed and taught by the talented Katharine Jolda. Bags of different types of wool were there to choose from. Dark brown and black, creamy white, grey were some of the color tones that I saw peeking through the bags. After choosing our wool, we started carding it.  We used hand carders, a drum carder and Katharine's cyclo carder. The wooden picnic tables were used as our work tables. Once you start carding, your fingers would get sticky in a few seconds because of the lanolin or wool wax. But the sensation of touching, smelling, felling and carding on the very land from where it came is something remarkable. Then on the second day, after the patterns were made, we began felting our vests by layering the wool. That process continued until late afternoon. It's so magical that how human hands can turn a wonderful natural material into something very  cozy, warm and sustainable! We left with great satisfaction, happiness, and a precious wearable made by hand.

Lovely wool

Brown

Hand carders

Carding wool on the cyclo carder

Making patterns

A good learner 

Lisa

Lisa 

Heidi

Katharine Jolda

Deborah's vest  

The other half is missing

Very curious

Woodsy