Glass eyes for your needle felt critters

Not much into writing lately but still doing a bit of the felting , just taken a back seat to some other obsessions right now . Below is a quick tutorial on how I am not making my glass eyes . There is lots of room for making these in your own style but this method seems to be the best for my needs ......

Above are a small sample of the eyes I made last night . They are about 35mm but I also made some smaller 20mm eyes for my smaller animals . I bought the glass cabs on Alibaba and they were a very nice quality, no air bubbles, individually wrapped and flawless .

Above supplies:

Paper is a peel-off label paper for printers . (chosen because one the eyes are done you can peel and stick and hold in place with lids felted on top and bottom OR use super glue )

Bic /acid free/ permanent markers

scissors to trim around eyes when dry

Kleancolor nail polish (or quality polish of choice), I used clear base with glitter specks

Glass cabs

thin tipped pen (to trace around cab )

I'm not an artist but I am fascinated by all the dimensions and colors in eyes . Above shows the progression of each "layer" of color starting with med golden brown , lightest green, blue-green, med blue around outer edge and fill the whole eye in with lightest golden brown . Once the eye is completely colored in, I lay down an even layer of polish on the paper and press the cab on top . That both seals the paper and acts as a glue to hold can onto paper . No need to add the "white highlight " to the eye, as you can see that cab naturally does that by reflecting light like a real eye . Wait until dry and trim around each eye . I like having them all together and only plan on cutting them out of the sheet "as needed . Go study some google eye close-ups and get some ideas on the colors you prefer for either realistic or fantasy creations . If you don't care about them each being hand-made, you can also print eyes onto label sheet and try the same process, though I don't know how well the copy machine ink stands up to the nail polish you could try a modge-podge instead .

Lastly, two of my latest animals...one small guy and a "head" that I plan on mounting when I get some more wood blanks .