FREE SHIPPING FOR USA ORDERS OVER $150 – applied automatically at checkout.

131203 Jzin's Christmas Angel Needle-felted oval picture 1 wine label logo

131203 The Highwayman 2

131203 Jzin's needle-felted picture of a fluffy big toadstool mushroom home square cropped

131203 Jzin's wool needle-felted picture of mermaid with green tail on a rock in the moonlight.

A cold Tuesday morning, December 3, 2013

On this cold December morning, our craft group huddled in the back storage room of The Company of Angels school store at about 9am to prepare little treasures for our upcoming (this Saturday December 7, 2013!) Winter Festival’s Elves Workshop. Some of us  made beeswax-decorated candles, others made Needle-Felting pictures on prefelt backing as Christmast Ornaments for Winter Festival Elves Workshop. I love working with the lightweight prefelt that Christine brought in. What a joy to create on them!

Thank you Christine Newell and Rachel Skelly for organizing our Waldorf School of Orange County weekly craft group get-togethers! – Jzin

Menu

Gallery of Past Projects from The Waldorf School of Orange County Craft Group

Click on the image below to view our craft group projects from the past.

121202 Vintage Life photo show girls crafting inside trailer at war times. Post button for Wednesday Morning Craft Group

Click here to jump back to the menu on the top of the page. Whee!

Preparing for this Saturday’s Winter Festival 2013

131118 Peg doll winter gnomes in front of Cathy's house with logo

Winter Festival is a much anticipated school wide celebration. The seventh graders will working with this. Many busy handwork elves have been silently working on handcrafts to supply this magical Elves Workshop.

Here are the little elves in my home doing their share. You can click on this link to see more pictures of my children making Winter Gnomes for this event.

131116 Nunu and Vivi busy crafting Winter Gnomes dyptich

Here are some beautiful sights from our magical Elves Workshop from 2013 Winter Festival…

131207 Blossom Fairies with vertical bokeh

Click on the picture below to see pictures from 2012 Elves Workshop at Winter Festival that year.

Two elves by the Elves Workshop Exit.

Click here to jump back to the menu on the top of the page. Whee!

Felted pictures on prefelt backing as Christmas tree ornaments for Winter Festival Elves Workshop

We created needle-felted pictures using prefelt, instead of felt pieces as backings. I love this fluffy prefelt! They are much easier to needle-felt than the dense regular felt. When we completed our pictures, we sew on colorful felt backings for a more finished look. We added a ribbon or yarn to enable these pictures to be displayed on a Christmas tree or on the wall.

White undyed 100 percent wool prefelt, used as backing for needle-felted pictures

Christine told me she bought her prefelt from Northeast Fiber Arts Center online. I also found that New England Felting Supply sells them for $18.95 ($12.95+$6 shipping) for 1 meter pieces.

This is a wonderful and freeing and quick project. We enjoyed making these very much.

Here was one of my wool roving sketch below.

131203 Sketching with wool fibers roving on my needle-felting foam pad

This method of “painting” becomes very easy once you selected your wool roving. You can immediately see what color scheme you have by looking at the wool on your foam pad.

Blocking in my “painting” with the background layer of night sky and green sea.

131203 Painting with wool roving. Blocking in background color areas.

I like to use my triple needles inside my Clover felting pen, while having a single needle floating around for working on details and areas that I do not want to over-needle felt.

Needle-felting is like painting with oil pastels/crayon plus sculpting at the same time. It is also forgiving. You can always pull off and reuse the wool and re-compose  your picture.

131203 Jzin's needle-felted mermaid in the moonlight oval picture on felting board

The prefelt (base of my picture) is stretchable. I started with a circular picture but stretched it into an oval shape to accommodate my mermaid in the end. Yet another feature of prefelt that I love compared to felt backing.

Click here to jump back to the menu on the top of the page. Whee!

Josephine composing her wool picture.

131203 Josephine composing her wool needle-felted picture of a castle in the moonlight on prefelt disc

The wind was a torrent of darkness among the gusty trees,
The moon was a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas,
The road was a ribbon of moonlight over the purple moor,
And the highwayman came riding—
Riding—riding—
The highwayman came riding, up to the old inn-door.

The Highwayman by Alfred Noyes.

131203 The Highwayman 2

Josephine’s little dancing elfin…

131203 Josephine's jolly little dancing elfin needle-fetled picture

 The wonder of this craft is, it is really quick to make… and so much fun to create!

My fluffy little toadstool home. I love this medium! It’s so fluffy you will want to jump inside and sleep in this bed of fluff!

131203 Jzin's needle-felted picture of a fluffy big toadstool mushroom home

Puffy, fluffy and three dimensional. Needle-felted pictures are soft like marshmallows!

131203 Puffy fluffy 3 dimensional Needle-felted wool mushroom toadstool picture X'mas tree hanging ornament

I was in the mood to convey the holy aspect of this season to the children at the Elves Workshop. Therefore this was my first piece from this morning …

131203 Jzin's needle-felted holy picture of Winter angel on foam pad flocked by Josephine's handstitched felt white doves

Guarded from harm
Cared for by angels
Here stand we
Loving and strong
Truthful and good

131203 Jzin's Christmas Angel Needle-felted oval picture 1 wine label logo

(Thank you Kurt Faerber, our Eurythymy teacher for introducing me to the verse above, which I love, love. I think it is wonderful to recite with small children.)

Meanwhile, I am also working on my Snowflake Babies for our Winter Seasons Nature table. As a scientist, I have traipsied far from conventional ways of depicting crystals of water.

131203 Jzin's handmade snowflakes babies for Winter Seasons Nature Table

Christine’s Christmas tree ornament decoration: Little dwarf dancing by a fire.

131203 Christine's Christmas tree ornament decoration of needle-felted picture of little dwarf dancing by a fire

These were quick projects done in a morning. Christine painted her airy angel with wispy white wool top brush strokes.

131203 Christine's needle-felted angel in a starry sky

This was Kathy’s first time needle-felting a picture. Here, she made a cardinal nesting in tree. All needle-felted pictures including Kathy’s were donated to 2013 Winter Festival Elves Workshop.

131203 Kathy's first needle-felted picture of a red cardinal nesting in a tree

131203 4 needle-felted pictures as Christmas Tree ornaments completed at craft group this morning

Felt pictures on prefelt, ready to be blanket stitched onto colorful felt backings and hung on Christmas trees.

131203 Needle-felted wool picture X'mas tree hanging ornaments

Click on the picture below to look at our craft group making needle-felted pictures last year.

Cathrine's needle-felted guardian angel masterpiece, finished. With stitched loose iridescent sequins. needle felted painting Christmas tree ornament. Costa Mesa Wednesday Morning Waldorf craft group. Steiner Waldorf School of Orange County. CastleofCostaMesa.Com

The picture above was made last year by Cathrine Ji.

You can always needle-felt wool pictures onto your wool Christmas stockings or “ugly” Christmas sweaters. Here is a spectacular one! Put that on, and go Christmas caroling. “Is this jacket insulated?” “Well, it’ll keep ye Lukewarm.”

It will keep you Lukewarm

Source

Click here to jump back to the menu on the top of the page. Whee!

Making Beeswax-Decorated Candles

Some candle-decorating elves, 2013.

131203 Hugo Marie and Cathy decorating winter candles with beeswax

Here are some of the (many, many… Christine counted about 800 or so items) items handmade in preparation to enchant the children at the weekend’s Winter Festival.

131203 Some items handmade for the Elves Workshop at this weekend's Winter Festival including mermaid felt picture tooth gnome and decorated candles

Candle decorating last year (2012) at craft group …

Women crafting together

Click on the picture below to see our candle-decorating last year.

Decorated beeswax candles

Click here to jump back to the menu on the top of the page. Whee!

Please Support Handmade This Holiday Season: Castle of Costa Mesa on Etsy shop

Clicking on each picture will take you to more pictures of that item’s listing on my Etsy store.

My felted mermaid and her cozy home. They are available for purchase on Castle of Costa Mesa Etsy store. Click on the picture below to enter my store.

131201 Little needle-felted mermaid sitting in front of her mermaid cave.

Also recently added to my Etsy store… Miss Upside Down Surprise Pink Rose flower fairy modeled by my 9 year old daughter. You see a rose. When you flip it over, it’s a flower fairy!

131201 Nunu holding upside down pink rose flower fairy PicMonkey Collage with logo

131109 Jzin's Felt mushroom gnome home at Tanager Parksquare cropped

131113 Pansy Flower Fairy ready to do a cartwheel logo

131113 Upside Down Pansy flower close up view of her crimpy hairstyle bob smart little bonnet square cropped

A little baby faun and more. Please support handmade and shop at Castle of Costa Mesa handmade Etsy store this holidays. Thank you! – Jzin

131201 Little woodland fawn boy at floor of Tanager Forest

Click here to jump back to the menu on the top of the page. Whee!

Please “Like” us on Facebook

Please “Like” us on Facebook (top left sidebar of this page). You will be connected to what we do here, plus you will be notified on our up coming handmade giveaways. Thank you! – Jzin

Click here to jump back to the menu on the top of the page. Whee!

Local Happenings

The Nutcracker Ballet at Irvine Barclay Theatre, December 2013

This year again, many of our Waldorf School students, including my daughter (who will be performing as a “Little Party Girl”) will be dancing at The Irvine Barclay Theater’s Nutcracker. This will be a lavish ballet performance with over 200 dancers! Do not miss it!

Here is my daughter’s ballet teacher, Mr. Askar (the man in the middle couple, on center stage), he will also be dancing in the ballet…

131204 Nutcracker Mr. Askar minuet scene

Every time I see a costumed ball, my heart palpitates! After all, I first met my man when he asked me from among the crowd for a Viennese waltz! We danced as the chanteuse belted songs of Edith Piaf in that crowded café and never parted since.

The Nutcracker Ballet: 12/13/2013 – 12/24/2013

Tickets: $40 adults; $37 seniors; $35 children

Tickets can be purchase by clicking on the image below.

2012 Festival Ballet. Nutcracker Ballet. Irvine Barclay Theater.

Click here to jump back to the menu on the top of the page. Whee!

Don’t forget to come check out our school store, The Company of Angels, it is particularly beautiful this time of year.

131113 The Company of Angels store name needle-felted. square cropped

Jenny’s Fabrics Annual Sale 20% off!

131126  Jenny's Fabric 20 percent off sale 2013

Piecemakers Christmas Village

December 7, 2013. Costa Mesa, California

131031 Piecemakers Christmas Event

Click here to jump back to the menu on the top of the page. Whee!

Support Our Local Waldorf Community/ Place a Free Ad

If you are interested in placing an ad on “Support Our Southern California Waldorf Community” (free if you are a member of Southern California Waldorf community) please e-mail me a good picture and a link.

Meanwhile, please support our local peeps! Thanks! – Jzin

Click here to jump back to the menu on the top of the page. Whee!

Waldorf Seasons Table Dolls by Castle of Costa Mesa

130924 African Merprince Summer post pretty

130925 Windswept hair, red lambswool sweater, yellow kite blonde handmade Nova Scotia Kite boy Fall Autumn Waldorf Seasons Nature Table post pretty.

130924 Waldorf Season nature table dolls for all seasons.  All Seasons The Wanderer post pretty

Castle of Costa Mesa’s Etsy Store

Please support my crafting mania by shopping on my handmade Etsy store on the link below. Please do! – Jzin

Click on the image below to enter Castle of Costa Mesa Etsy store

130127 The Sailor prince and Mermaid Merah mirage on Corona Del Mar Little Beach

Just for fun, click here instead view a gallery of my handmade dolls.

Castle of Costa Mesa Handmade Doll Giveaways

Fall 2012 Handmade Doll Giveaway mermaid by CastleofCostaMesa.Com

I give away my lovingly handmade dolls periodically. If you “Like” my Castle of Costa Mesa Facebook page, you will be notified of upcoming giveaways. Click here to view the list of my past giveaways. Perhaps the next winner could be YOU?

Like Us on Facebook black and white. Fairy Tale Dolls, Handmade With Love. I want you to love learning mandarin chinese!CastleofCostaMesa.Com

Photos from Waldorf School of Orange County Craft Group

121202 Vintage Life photo show girls crafting inside trailer at war times. Post button for Wednesday Morning Craft Group

Click here to jump back to the menu on the top of the page. Whee!

Leave
a comment

X