My first felted item!

Just a basic bag with a flap. Made the strap way too long, oops. Hopefully I’ll figure out a way to shorten it or it’ll shorten during the felting process.

I’m planning on lining it with the only scrap fabric I have laying around, which coincidentally works very well with the colour of the wool.

5/7/15 - Finally updating this project. Bag was finished months ago then sat around for a week until I decided to wet felt it. You can easily felt things in the washing machine, but since our washing machine is a front loader with no way of opening the door during the cycle, I ended up felting it in the bathtub with near boiling water and a potato masher. Do not recommend. Good work out though.
The inside of the bag felted much nicer (i.e you can’t see the stitches any more) than the outside but I felt that it may be a bit more structurally sound with the handles on the outside of the bag. I added a photo where the handles are sewn on with the seams clearly visible. Sigh.

After sitting around for a while, I then got around to sewing the lining. Now, I don’t have a sewing machine myself and I’m too impatient to go hunting around trying to find someone who does. So I just hand sewed it. The stitches look like a dogs hind leg, but it got the job done. I’m not one for perfection anyway.

Then the bag sat around for a few more weeks (sensing a theme here?) until I dropped into my LYS and got some super soft magenta roving, a felting needle and the instructions: ‘stab the pointy end into the wool until magic happens, then cut to your desired shape’.
Well, she wasn’t wrong.

So the pink blobs felted onto the bag are supposed to resemble dragonflies - to go with the fabric inside - but the general consensus around here is that they look more like ‘squiggly flowers’ until you know what they are.

So it’s finally more-or-less completely done. Knitted, felted, lined, needle felted. It was a lot of firsts for me: first felted item. First lined item. First needle felted item.
I have to say, I actually really liked felting and needle felting things. (The needles are bloody sharp by the way) I’ll have to try my hand at felting more things in future.

Oh, and the strap is still way too long. Damnit.