Felt, Felt and AWAY!!!---Whiplash Entry**--

Yesterday, I took a small step for knitters and felted a giant leap for me. I finished knitting Rocket #2* and then I....gasp....hold breath....felted it. And I totally freaking LOVE it!! It was a bit of a mad scientist's project this time around, because I really wanted to avoid all that time spent seaming the body panels. I also wanted some extra details, like the color spikes on the body and the ridge above the engine section. So this time, I knit the body in the round with DPN's.

Once I finished it, I turned it inside out and decided that the intarsia loops were going to be too tight for the felting process (not that I really have a clue, mind you, as this only the second time I've felted anything), so I channeled some Eunny's steeking vibe and attempted another new process. Looks frightening, but oddly, it worked. The threads loosened and the body opened up like an orange peel. Some day it might be interesting to felt something like that inside out. Hmmm....

So anyway, because I hadn't planned the steeking thing from the beginning, I didn't leave myself extra loopage to cut and ended up some very short threads holding a critical portion of the body together. Once the whole thing was assembled, I thought the best thing to do, would be to hand-felt the whole thing a little, to see if the joins would even hold. Here's a photo of my sad, wet rocket lying in limbo before being put in a pillowcase and thrown to washing machine gods. When I pulled it from the machine and pulled it from the pillowcase, it was the eeniest, teeniest version of itself...in a pefect felted state. I couldn't help laughing out loud. It feels virtually indestructable, which I was going for, since it's going a little boy of 5. I just hope he likes it as much as I do.

*Yes, it is my pattern. I free-handed the body, but I actually remembered to write down the pattern for the leg parts as I knitted the first one, so that they'd all match this time. They were garter stitched short rows. Worked great.

**I wasn't going to enter, but here goes. Whiplash Entry, if they'll take it.