Splish Splash at Stash

Where else can you learn how to knit socks AND how to felt them like a manic?
 Things were relatively sedate while the knitting was taking place in the first two sessions at Stash, www.stashlounge.com.  We had 5 students in the class, and ran them through the rudiments of sock knitting.  The socks looked like they were fit for the friendly giant when they were finished.  They were all anticipating the last class.

Of course Saturday, Calgary was in the midst of a snow storm.  One of our intrepid students couldn't make it in  because of the road conditions,  but the other four were ready, willing and able to play in  hot soapy water.  It seemed like a good thing to do on a snowy winter day.

I had plungers, buckets, the flour tarped, and towels laid down on the Stash Classroom floor by the time Monica, Kat, JC and Sarah  arrived.  Our Stash team had been boiling water and saving it in thermos's.  We were ready.  I had my fingers crossed.   I think the ladies were a bit shocked to find their Christmas Stockings  unceremoniously dropped into the buckets, and covered with boiling water and soap but they were game to roll up their sleeves and start the work of distressing their precious knitting with the plungers to make them felt.

Things got a bit wet as the plungers splashed the water up over the sides of the buckets but everyone soon got into a rhythm and got the bucking buckets under control by holding them between their feet. 
Fulling is an inexact science.  We weren't sure how long the process was going to take.  Sarah brought rubber gloves so we could pick the socks out of the steamy water from time to time to check the felting progress.  That was my job.

Kat's stocking was the first to felt...she was sure it was because she chose blue, her favourite colour.  Monica's red sock took the longest to felt - red can be like that sometimes.  JC's green sock fulled beautifully, and Sarah maroon and red creation looked great too.
Once the socks were felted we rinsed them  in the buckets refilled with cold water, and then rolled them in the towels to squeeze out all the water. 

Then it was time to tour the Stash shop for embellishment ideas. It was a fun afternoon.

This kind of felting works beautifully for small objects and single items.  Bigger things should probably be fulled in a washing machine.