Paper and sheep

Spent the day making 11 sheets of paper from the pulp, I've added some dried fuschias and some kind of wild cereal into a couple of the pages. I also put in some thin slices of shell which flaked off the inside of what might be an oyster or something like it. Bleaching doesn't seem to have made much difference to the colour so it'll be grey paper, oh well.

Yesterday a friend, who keeps sheep, gave me a fleece. It was fun bringing it home on the bus, I suppose living round here people don't think twice about a feed sack full of smelly wool. I left it outside last night and it's been lurking in the bath most of the day. The first lot of water was totally opaque brown! It's getting cleaner but it will take a while, then I'll have to card it, anyone know where I can get cheap carding combs? I'll probably use a couple of wire dog brushes as a substitute.

This is the fleece after several washes, one with grated soap in the water. I managed to pull a little out and wash it thoroughly, I laid it into a sheet of paper, not totally successful as the lanolin in the wool has repelled the top layer of paper. We'll have to see how it is when it's dry.

I had planned to make the limbs for the puppets from copper mesh with a bit of paper on it, so far I can't get the paper to stick to the mesh. At the moment the wierd Barbie has paper coated arms to see if I can make the limbs entirely out of paper.