Today at the Perlen Akademie booth, Creativa Expo, in Dortmund Germany, I snapped this photo of someone snapping a photo of the exhibit of my beadwork and felt jewelry.

Today my teaching schedule was clear so I had a chance to take in the Expo. While Marina (our interpreter, kindred beading spirit and German ambassador) took us around, we passed this beader wearing her "Bead Happy" necklace. As I noticed and remarked about her, we hugged and snapped photos: I took away this photo of her and she has a photo of the two of us. It is such a warm and wonderful life, this felty beadedness.

When I spotted this lovely felt necklace and earring, I just had to meet her. This is Crystal. She mosly felts hats and is working on garments recently, mostly incorporating silk.

This is the second photo I took of Christa Saalfrank. In the first one she was not wearing her gorgeous felt bead jewelry. Wish she had a website. Her work was lovely. Many felted beads embellished with decorative stitches strung on cable or (yikes) elastic. Many pieces with silver components.

Couldn't even get near this booth. Guessing by the appearance of mass production, I figure there must be a felting collective behind this. These pieces are very different than those I have seen for sale in the U.S. from the Nepalese felting collectives.

It was exciting to see the variety and abundance of felt items at the show. There were a couple demonstration/workshops going on also. Saturday, all day, I will demonstrate both wet-felting and needle felting in the Perlen Akademie Hall 5. There will be kits on hand so that anyone choosing can have a workshop right here, right then. In the evening I will teach the felted and beaded bangle bracelet that is so popular at Bead and Button Show.