I think it’s wonderful that so many people are actively remembering in this centenary year of the First World War. Today I’ve been teaching children felt making based on poppies which I’ll show you tomorrow but first I wanted to show you what I’ve been working on.
It’s a table runner. My initial thoughts were to have large poppies but when I drew it out I went right off it. Instead I’ve gone for lots of smaller ones and I began by laying out the background.

Two layers of Olive Green followed by a smattering of dark leaf along the edges.

In the centre is a carded mixture of Old Gold, Saffron and Olive Green with a tiny touch of Lime. The two sides are carded Navy, Maroon, Forest Green and more Dark Leaf.

Beginning the laying out of the flowers.

The more I added the better I thought it looked.

Midi thought he should come and supervise proceedings and wasn’t very happy to let go of the wool.

Maroon(wrested from Midis’ paws) followed by black in the centre.

Little highlights of Old Gold on the black plus some Bright Orange and Bright Pink on the petals to give them a little lift.

Lots of rubbing and rolling and finishing off with my wonderful Palm Washboard. Now I should be ready for the big reveal but it’s dark! I so want to show you this as I’m really pleased with how it’s worked out, but the weather has been grey and wet with terrible light and now it’s too dark. As soon as I’m able I’ll show you the rest.
In the meantime, if you want to create this at home, all the colours mentioned are available from Adelaide Walker which also sells the palm Washboards. If you’d like to come along to a workshop and make this or another design there’s still spaces on the table runner workshop on 6th December at Otley. You can book online here.