Clogs

Last year, I made a bunch of Clogs, nice felted slippers.  I never showed off the last couple, because I was going to do a small how-I-did-it on them.  I made another pair this year, so I will finally show my felting process and the FOs that I've felted, or more correctly, fulled, in my cold water only front-loading washer/dryer.

First off, I dunked them in the sink, in hot water, so that the temperature change would help to kickstart the felting process.  My washer has only cold water.  I found that this step wasn't really necessary with later clogs.

Next up, toss in the clogs.  Preferably with towels and/or jeans, items that are somewhat rough that will help the process along.

Ooooh, a closeup of my high-tech washer/dryer interface!  I set the wash and rinse cycles for as long as they'd go, to give the machine more time.  I found that this isn't totally necessary, just tossing the clogs in for two or three full wash/dry cycles works as well.  Before/after shots:

Pattern: Fiber Trends Clogs (Rav)
Size: Men's L
Yarn: Japanese wool in black and blue
Needles: US13

Timeframe: January 2 - 5, 2011
Mods: Used Judy's Magic Cast-On for the soles.
Problems: I doubled instead of tripled the slightly thinner Japanese yarn for this one and it felted a bit more than I wanted.  Bah!

Pattern: Fiber Trends Clogs (Rav)
Size: Men's L
Yarn: Patons Classic Wool, Taupe and Japanese wool in white, with a bit of leftover pink on the middle sole due to running out.
Needles: US13

Timeframe: January 22 - March 14, 2010
Mods: Used Judy's Magic Cast-On for the soles, knit a third sole for extra warmth.
Problems: None!

Pattern: Fiber Trends Clogs (Rav)
Size: Women's L
Yarn: Patons Classic Wool, Taupe and Red from stash
Needles: US13

Timeframe: January 6 - March 14, 2010
Mods: Used Judy's Magic Cast-On for the soles, knit a third sole for extra warmth.
Problems: None!

I also made felted panhandles using the same methodology for my all-metal pans, my little crepes pan (mmmm, crepes) and my large skull-splitting cast iron pan.  It's annoying if you're using it for awhile and have to keep checking the handle before grabbing it, even worse when you forget to check and really, really should have.

I could have made the handles smaller, in fact, I really should have looked around for the free patterns I now know are out there.  They're a bit larger than they should be.  Still fully usable, but would be nicer if they were more form-fitting.

Pattern: Nonexistent (Rav)

Yarn: Knitpicks Wool of the Andes in Fern, leftovers from Rogue

Needles: US9/5.5mm

Timeframe: December 25, 2010
Mods: No pattern, so none!
Problems: Still a bit big - but oh well, they'll do.