Off the Hook: Crocheted and Felted Cat Bag

I finished this little bag last night in the hopes that I would show it off at the Carolina Fiber Fest today. Last year at the event I demo'ed and displayed crocheted work on my own. I was approached by a local fiber group (of which I am a member) and asked to participate with the group this year. I assumed that what they wanted from me was the kind of display I was doing at that time. Silly me for making assumptions. 

Unfortunately, when I got to the venue, I found out that I would just be sitting in a circle with the group and crocheting while others were spinning and weaving. There was no table available to display any of the pieces I had assembled and brought. So I took my crochet and went home. Tomorrow should go better as I am the person in charge of the tatting group that will be demonstrating and displaying. I made sure to order extra tables and chairs so we can show off the beauty of knotted lace. Well, enough of how my day started off. Let me get to the info on this piece.

The crochet pattern is "Felted Black Cat Bag," a free one from Lion Brand Yarn. I made a few changes in my version of this cute bag. The pattern calls for Lion Brand Wool, but, as I often do, I turned to my stash for supplies. 

Somewhere in past years I acquired several vintage skeins of Hiawatha Real Needlepoint Wool (article 380, 40 yds. per skein) in dark brown. This wool isn't quite worsted weight so I used the strands from 2 skeins. The eyes and nose are crocheted in the pattern, but I decided that I would finish faster if I substituted buttons. I used 2 orange vintage glass buttons for the eyes and a red heart-shaped button for the nose. the mouth and whiskers are needlepoint wool from my stash.

The piece works up fairly fast as it is basically 2 circles (just one with the ears) and 2 long strips for handles. The felting took time since it can often be a trial-and-error project to get the wool fibers to shrink up enough. Usually, when felting a washing machine, we are told to put the items to be felted in a laundry bag and wash them along with other pieces of laundry. Something in that load shed white dots all over the dark brown wool so I spent some time with a lint roller to get all the spots off the bag. Guess next time I'll be more careful in selecting the things that get sloshed around along with a felting project. 

Although I didn't get a chance to show off the bag at the Fiber Fest, I might consider entering it in the next NC State Fair if I can find an appropriate entry category.