Tiny Tulip Basket Tutorial

Tiny Tulip Baskets

How to Make a Spring or Easter Craft

Today, I have another tutorial!  I learnt to wet-felt when I was in university but I don't do it much anymore.  I had an idea for a tulip-shaped basket and wanted to give it a go in miniature because of my new love of all things tiny.  It would be cute for a doll on Easter or to fill with a small treasure for a child.  

For the basket, you will need:

- wool (two colors for the flower looks best, in my opinion)

 -a plastic ball (a small rubber ball would work but as I do not have one in my house, I made a ball out of a plastic bag)

-hot soapy water in a squeeze bottle or dispenser

-a bowl

-a towel

-some green felt

First, take a piece of wool of your inside color and pull it into a thin strip.  

Wrap your ball in the first color, gently pulling the wool as you do, so that the wool around the ball is very tight.  

When you can no longer see the ball at all, you are finished with this color.  You do not want to make the felt too thick. 

Repeat the process with your second color.  

When you can no longer see the inner color, your have wrapped your ball enough.

Gather your equipment for the next step.

Squirt a bit of the hot, soapy water onto the ball.  You do not want to soak it!  Just dampen it.  Too much water may make the ball fall apart and will make it unmanageable.  

Take the ball in your hands and roll it around over the bowl.  As you roll, you will feel the wool tighten. 

Lots of soap will come out.  Keep rolling it, pushing harder as the ball gets firmer.  Once it feels like nothing much is happening, wash the ball with hot water and roll some more.  Wash it again with cold water.  Repeat this process until all the soap is gone from the ball.  

It takes a while and a lot of rolling.  For really strong felt, push really hard as you roll the ball.  You may want to roll it around on a towel.  This helps the drying process as well.

Let your ball dry in a warm place.  

Once it is dry, feel around for the weakest point.  Use a large needle to poke into the ball.  Then, using the sharpest scissors you have, cut into the ball.  If you have a box cutter or an x-acto knife, that might work even better.

You are trying to cut a line that goes from the middle on one side to the middle on the other.  

It takes a lot of effort, but it will cut in the end.

Pop out the ball!

Make two cuts into the top half, dividing it into thirds.  Repeat with the bottom half.  You will have six petals. 

I made the first one with eight petals but it seemed like too many.  This is a personal choice.

Almost flowers! 

I added green to the bottom to look like the stem.  At first, I needle-felted this green on.

I felt like this did not turn out the way I had hoped.

Next, I tried using green felt  as the stem. 

I sewed it on using whip stitch and it looked much better than the needle felting, plus it was invisible on the inside. 

Finally, take a strip of green felt for your handle and sew it to the inside of the basket.  This should be pretty self-explanatory.  

I hope this tutorial was helpful!  Feel free to pin or link back with this image:  

-Colleen