ONCE UPON A TIME ... there was this little girl call Red Riding Hood....

                                                    

Below you can see the Satukirja  that I made to tell the story about how these fairy tale puppets came to life.  Also in the post below the picture I wanted to share with you the reason I went on this journey. 

I will be sharing six posts that tell the story of how these puppets came to life. I hope you enjoy reading these posts as much as I have been in creating these puppets.

 We are still in etä-opetus ( schooling from home) and can't go back to school due to the Corona Virus. So, when life gives you lemons you make lemonade, and that is what we had to do.

 The teachers were scrambling to find assignments for us to do at home, which posed to be a big challenge when so many of the tools we needed for our projects were at the school. Anyways, our teachers finally decided that we could start planning what we are going to make for Valonkaupunki. ( this is a event that the city of Jyväskylä puts on every fall to bring some fun and light into the growing darkness of Autumn.) Our school has been actively involved in this event for the past few years. 

I racked my brains for what I could make. This years theme was going to be "satuja" which is fairy tales. Last year when our class participated in Valonkaupunki we were encouraged to dress up in theme clothing. So, with that in mind, I thought that I could make a piece of clothing using the nalbinding technique for this event.

 I had really enjoyed the little red riding hood tapestry that I had made, so then came up with the idea that I could make a cape for a student to dress up as " punahilkka" ( little red riding hood) using the " nalbinding" method. I looked and looked online for ideas for different styles. However I soon realized that making a cape in nalbinding would be a huge undertaking. Nalbinding is a very slow form of needling. 

So... I had to change my plan. I thought of all the events and happenings that were going to be planned for the occasion at our school, and I remembered that last year there was not a lot for the children to do at the school. Eureka! I know what I will make. PUPPETS... the children can play our fairy tales with the puppets I make for the event. 

So... now the planning and fun begins.I decided that my first puppet would be ... Little red riding hood, and I was going to Nalbind her cape

In this first picture I started by knitting a red mitten for the hand to go into.

In this next picture I knit a grey dress that is going to go over the red mitten.

                           

 In the next three pictures you can see that I am felting the head of little red riding hood. I stuffed it with felt, and sewed it onto the wool dress in the above picture. I did not want anything other than red lips on her, so I felted ruby red lips on her face.

 Here I am shaping the nose and head. The plastic is meant to protect the wool below.

Her lips are still not red enough, and I need the nose to be a bit more pronounced.

I made Little Red Riding Hoods hair black rather than the typical blonde that is in a lot of the fairy tales. I wanted her to look a bit " Edgy".. She kinda looks like a gothic version of Little Red Riding Hood.

As you can see in this picture the cape is done, and I have felted a grey dress for her, and I embroidered a black edge on it. Also I have crocheted mittens for her, and I darkened her lips by embroidering them in red wool. 

In this photo you can get a better picture of the end result. I will still need to make her a basket for her. She doesn't look like the typical Red Riding Hood which I intentionally did because I wanted her to have attitude...  

 

The techniques used in making Little Red Riding Hood, was Nalbinding, knitting, felting, crocheting, needle felting, embroidery, hand stitching, and braiding.

Here she is with the "big Bad Wolf " in a display case in the school lobby.

                      BIG BAD WOLF

After having such success with my first hand puppet Little Red Riding Hood, I decided that there needed to be the villain of this fairy tale " The Big Bad Wolf".  So, off I went to make a big bad wolf. I wanted him to look mean and scary, but yet somehow endearing.

 

 

In this picture you can see that I first knit the body and the jaw of the wolf. I filled the snout of the wolf with felted wool, and then started on crocheting his teeth. I wanted the teeth to be big and scary. They needed to be "in your face".

Once his teeth were done, I started working on his eyes. I crocheted quite a few pair, but unfortunately none of them worked. They all looked to kind and gentle. 

   

 Okay.... try not to laugh..... Its back to the drawing board for me.  He looks like an eager puppy dog, rather than a vicious, sneaky, scary wolf.  This is going to prove to be a challenge.

In this photo to the right, you can see my completed my Big Bad Wolf... I think he turned out exactly how I wanted him to. He is hairy, and scary and mean...

In this shot you can really see his big teeth, and scary eyes.

To the right you can see the Big Bad wolf is having a rest. Oh... dear.. What has he eaten to make him so tired.. 

In this puppet the techniques used were knitting, felting, crocheting,needle felting, hand stitching,and knotting pile. 

 

 

 

 

 

                                                                Scary Dragon

 Well I have now made two puppets. What fun it was, so now I sit here wondering what should I make next. Well.... in every fairy tale there has to be a big scary dragon... So, let see where this takes us.

 As usual I first knit the body. In the  picture to your left I knit the arms and left a hole for where his head is going to come out of. The picture on the right is the head I knitted for the dragon. I  stuffed it one again with felt.

In this picture I knit his tail, which I am going to sew on. He is starting to look like some kind of animal. What animal, nobody knows, but I am hoping on making him into a dragon.

On your right is a close up of his face, here I have started forming the nostrils, and his mouth.

In this photo I am starting on working on his breast plate, I need it to be full, but not fat.

His chest is now ready, I hand sewed ridges on the chest, to make it look for life like, and have started to hand sew his scales on. Every second scale has a shiny bead sewn on it.

Here I am sewing his spikes, and scales in place. Sewing the scales was the most tedious job. I kept running out of scales so I had keep felting more felt.

I am felting his back bone, which I will fill with felt, and then sew down his back to his tail.

He is now ready, I got his eyes to look scary, and big sharp teeth. I am really happy the way he turned out.The scales on the dragon took me a few weeks to sew on. It was small intricate work, and I kept running out of felt, so I had to continually make more of the felt material.

In this picture you can see the wings that I made for him. It took a lot of small sewing, the wings were intricate also there was also wiring that I had to do to for his wings and tail, so this puppet is really not meant for little children.

I felted the felt so it was very thin and transparent. 

Here is another photo where you can see his spine better.

Here is the dragon in a display case at the school. 

When I made him the techniques used were knitting hand sewing, embroidery, felting, wiring, and needle felting.

 

 

 

PRINCESS

 Now that I have made Little Red Riding Hood, the Big Bad Wolf, and a ferocious Dragon, I'm thinking that the Dragon needs a princess to rescue or capture. I am not a princess kind of person, so I had a hard time putting my "all" into this puppet, but I will give it a shot.

 

As you can see I started off in my usual method. Knitting the puppet, then I felted a head on her.

Next I embroidered her face. I am not especially good at doing small intricate embroidery, but I was rather pleased with how her eyes turned out. Her lips however still need work.

Here is a closer view of her face. The lips need to be darker and more defined, also she needs eyebrows.

In this picture to the right, I have added hair. She is already starting to look better.

 

Here you can see her face is finished.. I gave her eyebrows, and her lips are darker and fuller. I am quite happy with how her face turned out. 

Her you can see the finished princess. I sewed for her a pink ballgown, with a lot of glittery beads on it. Also a fur wrap ( I had actually wanted a white fur wrap) but I couldn't find the kind of material I wanted for this, so the black had to do.

I love this side shot of the princess.. The tulle in her dress is very full and it gave the dress the body that I wanted. To be honest, even though I wrote earlier that making the princess were not my thing, I think I enjoyed making her more that I thought.

The techniques used in this puppet were knitting, felting, needle felting, embroidery, and hand stitching.

 

 

         

                           FROGGIE

 I never imagined that I would be so enchanted with making these puppets, and I can't seem to stop myself for making more.  My imagination has gone wild and I am constantly thinking of different puppets to make. I tell myself, that this is for the children to play with at the Valonkaupunki Event. I think I am kidding myself. 

Well, I actually do have to make more for the princess, I feel her story is still not completed. Where... oh where.. is the prince to rescue her from the dragon?...but, wait.. there is a small twist to this story. First the prince has to become one... if you guessed from a FROG you are right.

Here he is... Unfortunately, I did not take pictures of him being created. He was created so quickly. I had the idea, and away I went with it, and presto.... he was done. I am very happy with the big bug eyes he has, and his mouth.. 

Here is a great shot of the Frog... I displayed all my puppets at school in display cases. Here you can see him is sitting on a rock, just chillin. 

Here is another picture of him "chillin" on a brick shelf at the school.

I have to say that this photo to your right, is my favorite one of the frog. What a relaxed guy he is. Little does he know that he is going to kiss a princess and turn into a prince.

The techniques used in making him was that I first knitted his body, and then felted the body, and did needle felting on his face.

 

 

 

                              HANDSOME PRINCE

   If you read my last post you will be aware that the Frog puppet in my last posting was going to be kissed by the princess and then turn into a handsome prince...

 Well, today is the day that the Prince puppet will be posted, and this will be my final puppet project.

 In a sence I felt saddened that the puppet making was coming to a close, but I finally felt at peace, and knew that I didn't need to make anymore. My part of this was done. So... with no more deliberation I will now share with you the creating and making of The Handsome Prince. What I failed to mention was that I wanted a really "masculine prince".. someone who could save you from the Dragons, and all the bad guys, someone to sweep you off of your feet. Dark, mysterious, masculine...yet a gentleman.

 

Unfortunately... I forgot to take pictures while making the prince. So, here you see a close up of his face. I wanted him to look really masculine. I played and played with his face using needle felting, embroidery, hand stitching and with that I got the look I had wanted.

Here he is..." Prince Charming"

 I think I accomplished what I set out to make.

The cape turned out really well. I wanted a royal looking cape for him to wear. Scrounging through the fabrics at school, and getting fun fur from classmates helped me to make this cape exactly how I wanted.

You may not have noticed before but I put dreadlocks in his long hair. I really like this side profile of him. 

The techniques I used to make and create him was knitting the mitten for the puppet, felting his head, embroidery and needle felting on his face, crocheting his robe, and hands, machine sewing the cape, braiding for his hair, cutting, bending and glueing the tin for his crown. I found from a flee market some old necklace which I made smaller for his chain necklace. I think he may have had the most different techniques used. 

So.... with joy and sadness I end this journey of puppet making. Never in my wildest dreams did I ever imagine that I could make and create these puppets. I truly didn't think I had the imagination for it. It has been truly interesting to see how each puppet was created and came to life. 

I have to say that I absolutely LOVE each and everyone of them, and I have to confess that on a few occasions my husband has found me sitting on our closet floor playing with these puppets. I also have to confess that I don't know how I am going to be able to give them away. I made them for the children to play with at Valonkaupunki, but I love them so much... am I going to be able to give them up?

Well... to end this posting I wanted to say that Valonkaupunki never did take place due to the Corona Virus, so the puppets have been at display at our school. Once my school ends I will donate them to a daycare center for children to play with and enjoy as much as I did...

 And the puppets lived happily ever after.

                                                                     THE END

NALBINDING

 In this course we had to chose a textile technique.The choices were vast, tating lace, ribbon making, crocheting,embroidery,etc.etc. When I went over the list of things to choose from the one thing that jumped out at me immediately was Nalbinding. I have so long wanted to learn this old technique. My husbands grandfather used to nalbind. I would watch him for hours doing this art, and couldn't figure out how he was doing it. I asked his grandmother how it was done, but she also didnt't know how to begin doing it. She only knew how to continue it once it was started. I asked other family members, if they knew how to do this lost art, but they also didn't know how. I decided then that I will someday learn this lost art, and be the one in the family to continue making these mittens.

 I remember receiving these precious mitts that he had made, and treasured them. The funny thing was that our boys also loved these mitts, and before we moved to Finland they fought over who will get these mitts. I took a pair along on our move to Finland, and thought that maybe here I would learn how to do this lost art. 

So that is the story of why I so.... wanted to learn this art.Anyway, I got a sheets of instructions  for nalbinding from the school. I also was able to borrow the needles to use from our school, but unfortunately none of the teachers remembered how to start this nalbinding technique, so these instructions sheets did not help me much.

 So, I looked off the internet for instructions. Well, I did find instructions but unfortunately because I am a lefty, I couldn't understand how to start the work. For weeks I tried and tried. ( meanwhile, our school shut its doors due to the Corona Virus outbreak.) so, there I was all alone at home trying to figure out this technique. After many many attempts, I finally found a website for left handed people learning nalbinding. Well, after that I was off to the races. 

These are the needles needed for Nalbinding. I used the middle needle, it worked the best for me.

This was my first attempt.. As you can see... it looks like some tangled wool

 

In the above picture you can slowly see my attempts and progress of nalbinding  from the top left hand picture all the way down to the bottom right hand picture.

In these three pictures you can see that I am growing in confidence with this technique. I have not perfected it yet, but slowly I am getting better and better. In the picture below you can see that  I even attempted a fancy edge for my mitten. It was alot harder to do this than I thought.
                          

                 In this picture to the right you can see that I am getting better at the nalbinding, my stitches are more even.

The bottom of the round bag I made, is still a a bit messy. Nalbinding is rather slow to do, and unfortunately you have to constantly add on the threads, which causes breaks and unevenness in the needling. 

 

I so.... enjoyed the nailbinding that I decided to make a pair of mittens for myself or give them away to someone.

In the next few pictures you can see  a pair of mittens that I made with the Nalbinding technique. I also dressed the mittens up with some embroidery.

I finished the mittens, and now am adding the embroidered greenery on the mittens.

One the picture to the right you can see that I have started embroidering flowers on the mittens.

 

 

 

 The mittens are now finished. I am very happy with the end result. I can now say that I know how to nalbind.

I only embroidered the top side of the mittens. 

Now who can I give these to. I am not a embroidery kinda gal, and the pink is not my colour either. Someone is going to get a great gi