House of Pugish

 next I've rolled out about half of the pkt of clay ... probably about 1-2mm thick..then I've cut 2 pieces of wire and folded them in half and twisted it folded side till it's about an inch long... then I cut the wire to the length I wanted by holding up to the side of my wee horse..

here's a pic of one piece of wire cut on top of the white rolled out clay...

once you've cut both the wing wire to match lay them on the clay making sure the twisted end is hanging over the edge of the clay... this this then end we will insert into the horse so needs to be as clay free as you can get it!... trim the clay so it's about 1/2cm away from the outer edge of the wire ... rub a little baby oil or liquid clay over the wire and overlap of clay... then fold that clay edge over the wire and press it down so that it's well attached to the clay... then slice down the middle of the wings .. like below...

Right with your knitting needle begin to press and drag it through the clay from the wire to the cut edge... press harder as you get toward the cut edge so that your tool goes through the clay all the way to the plate...my plate you can see in the picture is a tile I use for making then baking on.

Now after you've done that you should have something that looks a bit like mine here...

 

Once you have both wings done lift them off your surface as gently as you can ...we don;t want to rip them or pull the wire out...once you have lifted bend the wire into the pose you want ...then repeat on the other...they don't have to be exact so don;t try else you'll be at it all day and frankly I really love that mine don't match...makes for a more interesting piece!

Righty then place them on some fiber fill ready to be baked soon as we've done the horn...

For the horn all we do if take a small length of wire and twist it  to the top ...this only needs to be about an inch at the most so don't twist a huge length!... roll out a bit of clay to look a bit like a carrot then insert the wire into the carrot... now to finish it off I rolled out a very skinny piece of clay then wrapped it around sort of like a spiral ...

Next pop everything in the oven and bake as the direction tell you on the packet...

Okay when cooked and cooled it's time to decorate as you'd like... for me I brushed some glue over just the spirals of the horn and sprinkled with glitter... then because I'm a bit of a fire bug I lit a candle and just gently burned it just enough to take the brilliant white and cut down on the sparkle of the glitter... now I chose to do this as my wee guy has a lot of gray in him and the white was just too white ...for the wings I just burned them again just gently to take away the "white"!

For attachment use a needle tool or a doll needle and poke it into the place were the wing will be attached... wriggle it around and make sure it's wide enough to insert that wire on the wing... if the wire is too long trim it off so it's shorter but not too short as we want it to be firmly in there... when your happy with that use a drop or 2 of superglue on the end of the wire and also the bit of clay at the top of the wire... re-insert and hold till it's taken... then bend the wire to the angle you like... please don't try and bend the wings themselves else they will break!... repeat for the other wing and also for the horn...when your done you should have something like mine here :o))

 

 

Well we are all done... I hope you enjoyed and will send me some pics :o))

mysticalbears@xtra.co.nz

Hugs,

Sharon

Next using a good tacky glue brush some on the top of one of your cut pieces..

Now wrap this around the knee area... yep this is a messy job so do your best...

Do this for each of the legs but only the front of the leg that's bent...

 

Okay that done allow to semi dry... now before it's fully dry usually about 2-3min ..start to felt the top in where the glue is ... use you needle at the same angle I have here... this will help aid in avoiding your fingers... also remember to go in straight so you don't break your needles!

Once you have done that to all 4 of the legs we'll trim them a bit... note the direction of the scissors... if you trim off the bottom then when your feathering the hair always cut down the hair using just the tip of your scissors... remember to snip little by little we dont want to take chunks out just sort of layer it a bit... now if your happy with the layering stop there... if your not happy with the layering as its a bit thick on the bottom ...that is easy to correct by taking you scissors and snipping upward to thin it out a little... idealistically I aim for just a hint of hoof being visible through the hair... but again this is up to your taste :o))

Pic of all legs trimmed...

Okay... lets get to the mane etc...

But first lets highlight some bone areas... best way to describe it to you is have a look at the pictures... I've used a black pencil quite strongly here so you could see it clearly ...but you would do yours a bit lighter ...just a hint... so follow what I've done ...

Felt this piece between the ears..

 

Mane now... using the techniques as above pull out a couple of lengths of fiber and spread it out as I've done here... please note you dont need a thick amount as it will be folded...

now if your making a big Unicorn then hold your fiber lengths up to your horse to see if you like the length.... if you do then choose what side you would like the mane to fall and felt the ends down on the opposite side... fold over and finish as for the folded mane...

Place this over the neck like here and felt it up the center very well...

 

Now play around by folding it over on each side to decide which side you like ...once you've decided which side you like hold it in place but don't pull ..you want it to be a bit puffy and not flat...have a look at the pic to see what I mean...

Next well attach it down just gently to keep it sitting on the side... note were my needle is in the next picture then just gently felt across the neck... only a few stabs with the needle as we don't want to flatten it or have a line there...

Tail... I've pulled out a length of fiber ... then I've folded the top down just a bit and stabbed the needle around to hold it in place... I did this as the top of the tail needs a bit more thickness to it...

Attach the tail by needle felting around the ball you made at the top of the tail...

Okay as you can see in the above picture his tail is just not long enough... so I pulled another piece of fiber, lifted his tail and felted it in just a bit lower down... now yes I know this isn't a pretty picture but it needed doing!

Looking much better now :o))

 

 

Right that's the horse part done... now lets turn him into something a bit more mystical :o)) ... With the length of this post I will put it up on another post ... and you wont have to wait long as I'm going to do that right now!

 

 

Legs next... here is were your going to have to have plenty of patience and work slowly and carefully as stabbing yourself with those needle are not pleasant!  wrap a bit of wool around the leg felting one side down just enough to keep it down... fold the other end over and begin felting... keep felting the wool down until it becomes a nice skin...

Now if you have made your horses legs a bit thin then felt wool only to the knee level...we'll cover the bottoms of the legs in lesson 4

 

 Next cover the whole body in wool or fiber ... I always start at the tummy and chest ...as you work you'll notice the legs will be pulled in so they aren't so splayed.

When you've covered the body fully you'll have something like this...

 

 Now is time to attach the head... play around and pin in different positions until you find one you like... now thread your black beads onto some very strong thread about 8-10" length ... thread a doll needle with the ends of one set of eyes and push needle through eye position and through to the back of the neck as you'll see below I have... slip needle off and repeat for the second eye coming out again at the back of the neck but as close to the other thread as possible ..tie both threads together pulling tightly and knot a few times... re-thread the needle with both threads and loose ends within the body.

 

Lets get rid of that gap between the head and neck join as well as the indent made by the thread... take a chunk of wool and needle felt it over the gap and indent... if you haven't covered it properly then simple add a bit more :o))

Righty ears ...he certainly needs them ... and I'm sure you guys that haven't much experience in needle felting will find them challenging... but I will endeaver to explain them as simply as I can...

Start with 2 balls of wool roughly the same size... if you printed your horse to A4 size you'll need balls of wool around the size of small plums... if like me your doing your horse to around half the size then your balls of wool will need to be about Cherry size... now to get these sizes you need to take a piece of wool and scrunch it up in the palm of your hand and squeeze it... this is the way you judge the size that piece of wool will felt down to!

Okay so you've gotten your 2 balls of wool ready ..now just flatten it down and sort of shape it with your fingers to a triangle shape...

 Now take the triangle between  your thumb and forefinger with the flat edge between fingers..

Felt that edge from top to bottom then turn over and do the opposite edge... keep doing this until it's 1/3rd the size.... felt across the bottom but not too much ... just to neaten it up a wee bit... when your felting the sides do not felt the top of the triangle we want to keep the point :o)) ... when done you should have something that looks like this here... make another one...

 

To attach to the head pin in place and make sure you have them even and in the right place... when you begin to needle felt start at the front center and then the right and left sides... then felt around the entire bottom until attached firmly and felted to the size you like...

 

Now lastly for this lesson we'll tidy up some of those very annoying fluffy bits sticking out all over the place... there are 2 ways to do this ...1stly you can take a pair of small scissors like manacure ones and clip them off as closely as you can ..or if you have a heat gun simple give an overall blast with the heatgun until those hairs shrink and disapear... if you do use the heatgun I must warn you to keep the heatgun moving at all times and dont hold it too closely as burned wool doesn't look nice ...at least not on this guy :o))

Here's how he looks after his blast with the heatgun...

 

Much tidier eh :o))

Okay thats it for this lesson next one will be the finishing one... we'll be doing the long hair on the legs, mane, tail, horn and optional wings!