FESTIVE  FUN AT DECEMBER FELT-in  🤶🎅🎄🤶🎅🎄🤶🎅🎄🤶🎅🎄

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Gorgeous scarves girls!

 We all had a lot of fun last week at our Christmas Felt-in.  Jayne and Pleasuance revisited some of the super techniques learnt at Jenny Pepper's workshop a while back.

We were all very attentive as the girls took us through the techniques and there were lots of ideas of how to incorporate them into our own felting practice. 

 Of course we had our usual show n tell and saw the lovely scarves some of us had made at a workshop in the Island Arts Centre  hosted by Jackie Sleator as part of the Festival of Felting.

Ann talks us through her piece

And Gail talked a bit about our programme for the New Year and how we are planning a community outreach project with a local school here in Hillsborough but more of that soon.

 As you know we've just launched our 10th anniversary year with the Community Arts Project and exhibitions of members' work at the Island Arts Centre and everyone thought it was very fitting that the work of the creative team was acknowledged by us all.  So we presented the girls with a beautiful orchid plant each.  

Before lunch we all had a chance to grab ourselves a bargain and pass on our preloved felting bits and pieces.  Lunch was yummy and we drew our ballot tickets and guess who won?  (answer at the bottom of the page!)

Next year is very exciting for us as we look forward to a jam-packed programme of activities starting with Lisburn Library for New Year New You on 10 January followed by our January Felt-in when Mandy will be sharing some of her skills in making felted jewellery.  Hope to see everyone there.

Wishing you all a very Merry and Peaceful Christmas and a wonderful New Year

Winner of our charity raffle was our very own Ann who was presented with a big bag of felting goodies!

10th Year Celebrations!!

Like all great birthday celebrations the cake was a bit of a feature.

The launch of our 10th Year yesterday evening at the Island Centre proved a great success as the

Community Arts Project was unveiled!  And what a fabulous, fantastic, fun series of hangings  they turned out to be!

Everyone was thrilled to see the final outcome of all the hard work and many, many congratulations to  everyone who was involved but particularly to the Creative Team of Deirdre, Helen and Deborah.  Each panel reflects various aspects of life in the Borough of Lisburn and Castlereagh.  The detail in each panel is amazing!  The River Lagan flows through all three panels connecting them to one another.  There's kingfishers, bees, flax flowers, fish, beer, horses, houses, ice skates and oh so so much more.  But the main theme throughout are the people which feature in the hangings and provide the root of the community growing upwards together.  

It's a wonderful piece of work featuring massive creativity and skill and the Team are to congratulated.  

Sarah, a woman of many talents, drew lots of attention as she spun some of her own homegrown flax!

A small exhibition of members' work complemented the hangings and was the perfect backdrop for the Festival of Felting at the Island Arts Centre.

 

Our very own Dorothy launched the 10th Year and gave the perfect lead in to Deirdre who gave us  the background to the Project and how it all developed over the week of felting with community groups. 

Lynda from the Island spoke about how much everyone had enjoyed the project and she praised the Creative Team and everyone for all their work and the fun everyone had working away together.

The formalities were rounded off  by Gail and then it was CAKE TIME!!!

Can't understand what happened to that big cake which Ann had organised. . . . . . maybe something to do with Shaun? . . . . 

I'm including lots of the photos of the night below but if you'd like to see the video (2.5 mins) taken by the Island Centre of the entire week's project then check out the Island's facebook page, it's well worth seeing.

Lovely smiles from Mandy and Dorothy.  And again many congratulations to Everyone!!

FELTING FUN AT THE COMMUNITY ARTS PROJECT at ISLAND ARTS CENTRE!!

LOTS OF HAPPY FACES

 There were lots of happy smiling faces last week as representatives from different community groups across the Lisburn and Castlereagh Council area took part in a week long community arts project facilitated by ourselves at Feltmakers North.

Deidre led the team of Deborah, Helen, Mandy and Sarah alongside lots of our members who had volunteered their services throughout the week. 

 Everyone learned how to do some simple shapes in felt and many created gorgeous flax flowers which will be incorporated into the final hangings.

Throughout the week there was a great sense of fun but with a serious side to ensuring that the work on the hangings was core to the whole project.

 Some gorgeous flowers being created on the very first day!

Images of people to be incorporated into the hangings

 Many of the pieces which had been made by members of Feltmakers North were sewn into the final hangings.

These sumptuous flowers were created by participants who were able to take them home and enjoy them as part of the project.

 These pieces were all designed by the group and will appear in the final hangings.

As you know the images represent various things within the LCCC area which people felt were important aspects of life in the Borough.

Sarah brought along some of her own homegrown flax and gave a great input on how its grown and made into linen thread.  Again we're so lucky as we will be using some of Sarah's own linen in the hangings.

A huge thank you to the Island Arts Centre for sponsoring Feltmakers North to take on this great project as the kick off to our 10th year celebrations and of course to all the very hard working community groups and finally to our great team of tutors Deirdre, Deborah, Helen, Sarah and Mandy and to all our volunteers - we couldn't have done it without you!!

A VERY BIG INVITATION TO YOU ALL TO COME AND JOIN US AS WE BEGIN OUR 10TH YEAR CELEBRATIONS AT THE ISLAND ARTS CENTRE ON 4 DECEMBER AT 7 -8PM WITH THE OPENING OF THE COMMUNITY ARTS PROJECT HANGINGS AND THE EXHIBITION OF MEMBERS' WORK IN THE COMMUNITY ARTS WALKWAY