A Small Catch of Felted Fish

Enjoyable! Pure fun, that is what these fish are. I actually have no idea how many of them I made, because I gave so many away. All the stages involved in making this fish are delightful. This project started because I wanted to learn to knit with more than one color. I figured that a knitted toy would be a safe project because even if it wasn't perfect it could still be loved. So the pattern was bought, the needles found, and the 100% wool yarn chosen for its felting ability.

                              

The total freedom to mix and match bright colors in the fish was exhilarating. Added to that was the ability to change colors whenever I felt like it. I tried many different two color patterns, liking some enough to use again and only doing others once. I even made a mistake when doing the tail that I reused in designing other fish. It made the fish tail much fuller and more fan like.

Because you felt these fish they are knitted bigger than you want.  You then add them to your washer with a load of towels being washed in hot water. I loved letting the children put the fish into the washer themselves, and also letting them find the fish in the load of wet towels that was taken out of the washer. Their eyes would grow big as they realized the fish had shrunk in the felting process. Many big fish were knitted and given away to friends so they could have the fun of felting the fish themselves with their own children watching.

The last step is stuffing the fish. Usually this job went to the children. Their small fingers work perfect for poking stuffing through the fish's open mouth until it went from a flat fish to a plump fish. Usually much giggling went along with feeding the fish in this manner.

A optional step was to add eyes so that the fish could see the child who love it. Buttons worked for this as did just some yarn and simple embroidery skills. Whether the fish had eyes or didn't seem to matter to the children who loved them. They would often run off with them before I had a chance to get the eyes made.

My goodness, I think of have talked myself into digging out this pattern and making some more fish. I wonder if my children would think they were to "old" for felted fish fun. Ah, maybe you are interested in making some too. The pattern can be found here. http://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/felted-fish

Though I bought mine through a yarn shop so you might be able to find it in one too.