I have been needle feting for quite a while now and always looking for new challenges and new subjects (because I get bored very, very easily!)
So, I make different things, such as this Elf Doll walking her Dachshund. She is all needle felted and is attached to the log slice plinth she stands on. Her hair is dyed lambswool, her dress and knickers are wet felted and her little elf shoes are needle felted. She has pointy elf ears and a sweet face. She is taking her little miniature wire haired dachshund for a walk on a rainbow cord lead and holding her flower head garland in her left hand. All the dachshunds are needle felted using a range of wools. Once the body shape is firm, I mix 4 or 5 colours to get the variegated colours in the wire haired coat.
I follow a very talented Russian felt artist who does lots of mice dressed in clothes and doing “human” things. That got me thinking about Dachshunds and how they could be used in the same way. My first project was this “father and son”, both wired onto a plinth, with the youngster looking up at daddy. I knitted a little jumper for the boy and wet felted scarves for both of them. I then added some doll’s house accessories – a top hat and an umbrella for daddy. They are quite dinky, 6 inches and 5 inches respectively.
Next, I made a “girl” dachshund. I knitted her a tiny woolen sleeveless jumper with a roll neck and used a pretty quilting square to make her flared skirt. Her balloon is bright pink Perendale wool needle felted and attached to a wire that looks like string that she is holding in her hand. She is also wired onto the plinth. I felted her around a wire frame and drilled the plinth to insert the wires into 2 small holes so she “free stands”. She is about 6 and a half inches tall.
The final one for this post is one of 2 little boys, one on a winter sledge and the other one pulling him. I knitted 2 little red scarves, to keep them both warm. I glued some glittery white pre-felt onto a plinth, drilled the plinth for the standing boy and glued the sledge on to the white pre-felt. The one on the sledge is sitting with his tail hanging over the edge of the sledge ……. This has a real winter / Christmassy feel – I might take the photos and use them on my Christmas cards this year!
I am carrying on with a tiny doll’s house size pram, which will have in it a needle felted blanket and a sleeping dachshund baby ….. with a “mum” stood up pushing the pram ……..