Where is the Brown Bunny?

Our newest little bunny has been in progress for over a month now - way longer than expected. The holidays definately created some delays - but that was not all. Unfortunately, I fell and broke my left elbow (oowwwwwie!) and that has slowed me way way down. Here is my poor little arm, in the u-g-l-y sling. :(



But our bunny really wants to be here, and so we have kept making progress. These pictures were taken by a variety of folks with a variety of cameras, but they will give you a good idea of how we have been progressing. One of the more complex activities is making the bunny's hind legs. Here I have begun the hind leg process. You can see that the circular part of the leg is much larger and flatter than we want on a bunny (or any creature!).



Here are the two hings legs, ready to be attached - and then, the attaching - and after that, the working of the legs into the actual leg shape. All this needling makes the bunny much stronger and keeps the legs from pulling off for ANYTHING. Take a look at this baby now, with his strong back legs! I added some more down wool to really firm things up and make the legs nice and long.

Then I created the front legs out of down wool - and covered them with the White New Zealand Corriedale Wool before attaching them. This makes it possible for me to give them a really good coat of the fine white, with fewer sticks of a needle into my fingers!

You can see that our bunny still looks pretty rough, with lots of visible joins of fiber. There is a lot of felting yet to do.

The next step is covering the bunny all over with the white Corriedale wool. This fine wool is perfect for a natural white, and really begins to give our bunny some nice fur. I start with one all over felting, and the bunny looks super soft and fuzzy. Then I follow up with two more feltings all over. Here is our fuzzy bun, and then a picture after the second felting. One more yet to come.

I should have that third felting completed tomorrow, and then I can REALLY have fun and move faster, as we add color, definition to the bunny's face, eyes, nose, mouth - and FINALLY, the ears! Now, in addition to one more all over felting with the beautiful white wool, I have started to card the browns together for the bunny's coat. The resulting color is more golden than I would like right now, so I am going to add some chocolate corriedale wool and see if I can get just the right beautifully textured woodland brown that this dear heart deserves. The hand carding is a bit rough with the arm, but I am planning to prevail upon Mr. Bryant for some assistance! I know he will help me - he is SUCH a sweetie! :)