Ok- so who has felted wool sweaters??

I have some ideas of items that I want to make from felted wool sweaters.

First I went to St Vincent's-no wool sweaters but bought about 10 at Goodwill. A couple are (*gasp*) cashmere that were $4.99!!
It seems you wash in washing machine then put in dryer. But since they are all different colors I don't want a color bleed problem.

Advise?????

I thought with cashmere you had to handwash it. I have a cashmere scarf that has directions on it to handwash and then let it air dry. Other than that, I have no idea

The goal in felting is to shrink the wool so it "mats". If you have ever washed a wool sweater in the washing machine by mistake it basically shrinks down so a toddler can wear it!!

I have felted some crochet work before, but I did each piece separately. You'll probably just want to start with one sweater at a time because you never know how much things will shrink up. This is how I did it:

1. Put everything in a zipped pillowcase.
2. Set the washing machine to Hot water/Heavy Duty cycle. (Add a pot of boiling water if not hot enough.)
3. Add a little dish detergent and 1/4 c. baking soda to the water.
4. Put some old jeans in for agitation.
5. Keep checking every 5 minutes.
6. Rinse in cold water.
7. Reshape and let spin to take out excess water.
8. Block item and let air dry.

Another forum I'm on has some info on felting crocheted items, and I believe some people have also experimented with recycling wool sweaters. Here's the link:

http://www.crochetville.org/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=40

Hope that helps!