Needle-Felted Bear

 I wanted to do another needle felted animal and decided on a bear.  Bears have an extra step because I first have to make the claws from polymer clay and then glue them to the toes on the armature.

Then I can begin adding the wool.  I began with the feet and used my finished color because there isn't a lot of wrapping there - probably not enough for a core wool inner layer followed by an outer layer of the finished color.

From there, I added quite a bit of core wool.  I've been primarily using roving, but for this piece, I tried the loose wool fiber that I got a few years ago from livingfelt.com and it worked quite well.  It was perfect for this piece because wrapping with the core wool yields a shape which is symmetric around the armature wire, but you can add bits of the looks core wool for uneven shapes.

In this bottom photo I've begun adding the finished color all over.