After the sun had set on the first Tuesday of summer, I took the two halves of the future dodecahedron and began joining the last 8 short seams that remained to be joined.
Here is how it looked before I got the ends woven in:
and here is how it looked a bit later turned right side out and with all of the ends woven in and trimmed:
All that was left to do was to weave a strand of plastic through the stitches I would need to go through to secure the last two seams after the project was felted.
So I did.
Here is how that looked:
At long last, the dodecahedron was ready for felting.
I soaked it in a solution of vinegar and water to set the dye, and then threw it in with my laundry (and a half-dozen Shout color-catching sheets). Two loads of laundry later the piece was felted.
Wet, but felted:
I stuffed it with a combination of towels and plastic bags to help it hold a shape while it died, and then I put it in “the yarn annex,” a part of the attic that gets very, very, warm, and which proved to be perfect for drying a wet, recently felted dodecahedron.
With the newly felted piece ready to be finished, I removed the plastic bags and towels, got out the fiberfil and began the process of stuffing and fluffing and stuffing and fluffing. The process was faster than last week’s soccer ball, but it still took some time.
Eventually, however, it was stuffed.
I then secured a strand of yarn to the inside of the dodecahedron and joined the two remaining seams. In relatively short order it was all done except for the photos.
I tried to take a picture that accurately captured what it feels like when you see it in person, but my efforts fell short until I got out a mirror:
The result was a definite improvement over my earlier attempts, but there was still something missing, so I stepped back and got these shots which, to my mind, more accurately convey the experience of seeing the object in real life:
Because it is a dodecahedron and not a sphere, there is the occasional odd angle, but the purpose of this project was to determine whether or not crocheting and then felting a soccer ball is at all doable, and it would seem that the answer to that question is yes; yes it is.
