The Morel Challenge

Ok, so the basic design of these things aren’t hard – kind of like a…uh…Christmas tree. Yeah, that’s it. A cone on a stick, easy peasy. So I whipped that up in no time. Morels top out at about seven inches and that’s how tall mine is. Shroots aren’t appropriate here so it’s heavy footing time. One problem I encountered with previous heavy foots is that the bottom of the forms invariably dome outward, making them not as stable as they could be. I figured out a solution, which I’ll share. These are done bottom to top so when starting out leave a long tail. Then about the midway point after you’ve put in your weighting material pull that tail tight and incorporate into the rest of the form by weaving in that end. This makes a nice, flat bottom that sits easily.

Footed, stuffed and closed, it’s now time to do the hard part: the soft, sponginess. At first I thought I would just meander all over the top, working back and forth a few rows. Yeah, that wasn’t going to work. I settled on using some crochet thread I had lying around, made a long tape a bit over a 1/4 inch wide of few rows of single crochet back and forth. I then sewed sections of these tapes in a meandering fashion. It worked out pretty good I think. Check it out (clicken to embiggen):

I think it compares pretty favorably to the first example picture in the post below. Here’s a closer look at the texture:

It’s not quite done yet though. Next is to get out the airbrush and darken up those interior pockets and some light, warm yellows around the outside to make the folds really pop. I need some further instruction from Mr. King on this and he’s been a bit incommunicado lately. I hope everything’s ok.

Check back tomorrow, I have something really special!