For the Christmas lights, we will start by making a white cylinder. Break off a length of white wool about the length of your palm.
Roll it between your hands as you would roll a ball of playdough into a snake.
Once the wool is in the snake shape/ cylinder shape you can start stabbing it with the large felting needle.
Be slow and deliberate with your stabbing in the beginning, and concentrate, working to compact the wool into a pear shaped piece, with a knob at what will be the base.
Working with the base, stab deliberately where the base meets the larger base of the bulb. This will give the base definition. Don’t worry if the bulb looks like it will need more wool, you can add it later.
Working with the base, and carefully using the needle, continue to stab it and give it definition into a squat cylinder, as tall as it is wide. When you are happy with the base, start moving up into the base, and shape bulb, so that is wide at the bottom and tapers at the top.
You can add more wool as needed to get the shape right.
When your shape is right, start covering it with your choice of the colored wool. Taking pieces, pull them apart and start tacking the new wool onto the bulb. Keep felting the colored pieces until they are smooth and covering the bulb part of the light.
Take your choice of the base of the bulb and use small amounts to cover the base of the bulb. Take care to keep the two colors separate, so that the base and the bulb do not look like they are merging in color. (don’t let the colors mix)
If you have holes from your felting needles, you can switch to a smaller finer needle as you finish up. Also, use your fingers to smooth out the wool and get it smooth for a professional look.
When finished with that one, make a whole bunch more! When finished with those, take the striped string and a yarn needle, thread the string through the base of the lights and hang to show it off.