felted crochet slippers

I can't take any credit for these awesome felted slippers but realized it was just taking to long to knit them and figured "why take extra time to make something that is going to be felted down anyway?" so I frogged and did them in single crochet.

Now that being said, I have never felted before so I only made 1 slipper. Seeming how I was not following the pattern (crocheting instead of knitting) and I was "winging it" for size and had nothing to reference it to (never felted before) so I couldn't even guess if it would fit. I figured it would be safer to make just 1 slipper, felt it and see if any adjustments needed to be made. But it turned out to be a perfect fit. These are defiantly mens sized though, I have a rather wide foot and I actually wear an 11 in mens. I ran them through the wash on hot/cold 2x to felt them down.

I wanted to try these because my uncles are coming in and I thought it would be fun to make them felted slippers but send them home w/the slippers not felted so they can shrink them to fit. All my family is really crafty so I think it would be neat for them to do. And I had one uncle a long time ago ask if I knew how to make slippers that didn't wear though because he loved home made slippers but wore holes in the bottoms to easily.

When I was knitting them per the pattern instructions, I was making the mens size. So when I started to crochet them, I compared my square sizes and I made sure my square was the same size as it was when I was knitting them.

Yarn: fisherman's wool
Hook: I (5.5mm)

My mens size squares are 18 stitches wide (single crochet) and 20 rows each

I'm thinking that for womens size I will likely make them 15-16 stitches wide and 17-18 rows per square.

I followed the same construction directions as in the original knitted pattern crocheting it in one long strip and than crocheting the 2 "flaps" onto the strip. Also I found the construction a tad confusing so I made little tags and tacked them to the edges that needed to be sewn together to help keep things straight. At 1st I didn't do this and I sewed the A seams together and realized that it would going to be confusing to try to match up edges so I made the tags. When I seamed them I did so rather loosely. The seam yarn is at the same tension as the rest of the yarn, I figured this was a good idea and it turns out I can't even feel the seams ♥

To better understand the construction and square placement, I printed out the diagram after filling each square with a different color and cut it out and taped it together per the pattern instructions.

Oh, I didn't like how shaggy the outside of the slippers looked after felting so I took our electric hair clippers to them and shaved all the fuzzy off the out side.

Now I just have to make the other one... and many more♥




I finished the slippers! Here are some various shots of them in diffrent stages.

I did find that I liked the fit much better if I sewed the cuffs together in the front for about 5 stitches. it just feels snugger. I'll probably go back to the 1st slipper and stitch it closed in the front just a bit.

this is what it looks like before I seamed it

Here's a good size comparison, the 1st slipper is laying on top the new one before I felted it. You can see how much it shrank!

And this is before I took the clippers to it. This is how it looks straight form the wash. Incredibly shaggy! I only shaved down the outside of the slipper and the underside of the cuff flaps. I left the inside and the folded down portion of the flaps shaggy.


3-25-2012

Another slipper update.

I have made another pair of these slippers. I gave them to my step mom and would concider them a childs/large childs size as she has rather small feet and can actually wear boys shoes.

But with these slippers I modified the heels. As the pattern is, it is composed of full squares. but when you seam them together like that the heel ends up with a pointed flap sticking out the back. I simply cropped the corners off the squares that will be seamed together for the heel.

On these slippers each square is 14 stitches x 16 rows.

What I did was on the 2nd square of the strip which would be the heel, I crochet 8 rows at 14 stitches wide. than I reduced 1 stitch per row untill I reached my row height of 16 rows. I attached the next color and worked one row, stitch for stitch. And than I increased 1 stitch each row until I had worked back up to my stitch count of 14 stitches and finished the square to a height of 16 rows.

This does not result in any new seaming directions. I seam them from the toe up as the diagram states. I seam up to one cuff and than start at the broken heel and seam that and work around to the other cuff. This just makes a more rounded heel and eliminates the heel flap.

Here are some photos of how the modified heel is worked.


This is just about finished. I like to have the dark end be the cuffs so that is where I put my modified heel.
And here is a close up of it seamed together. I just think this looks neater.

I do not have a finished, felted photo of these as they were gifted for the wearer to felt.