How cool are these! The balls will cut your drying time yet leave clothes soft, fluffy and static free without the use of chemicals or dryer sheets. Do you remember the old “tennis ball in the dryer” trick? This is it, but without the tennis balls! I have used these now for about 6 months with great results. If you add any fragrance, it will wear out within 2 months, so you can keep reapplying if you mind. To reach their full potential, I recommend using at least two with every load, I use three.

You'll need:

* Wool Yarn: This is a great time to use your scraps. For the best results, use a yarn that is 100% wool or otherwise is a good felting yarn. Do not use superwash wool. If it says it is machine washable, you don't want it for this project! There are a lot of good, cheap, felting wool yarns available at local stores.

The amount of yarn required depends on the weight and gauge of the yarn you choose. Bulky yarns will wind faster and take less yarn. For the worsted weight yarns pictured here, it was approximately 3 ounces.

* Old Pantyhose or a Sock

* Cotton or Acrylic Yarn or String: You can use scraps here, too. This will be used to tie the hose or sock. You don't want this to felt, so don't use the wool yarn here.

* Scissors
* A Small Crochet Hook
* A Measuring Tape

If you have ever wound yarn into a ball, this is basically just like that, except you want to wind it tighter than you should normally. There are *many* different ways to make felted wool balls. This is just one way. Feel free to experiment! You could also use wool roving and needles for felting to make the whole ball or just the core.

Basic Steps To Making The Balls:

First make the core by winding small balls of yarn (tight), then tie them off in a nylon stocking or sock. Wash the batch in preferably hot water and dry to felt them (keep the balls attached together in the stocking, you don’t need to cut them off to separate at this point). Wash and dry again if you want to felt them more.

Next cut the balls loose from the stocking, wind more yarn around the balls to the size you want, tie them off in a nylon stocking again and wash then dry to felt. Doing this in two steps keeps the inside of the balls tight and will hold together better than a ball done in one step.

Once they’re at least slightly felted, the balls are good to use. They will continue to felt and get harder as you use them.

There is much more to these and Good Mama has a complete set of details with photos throughout the tutorial. Great stuff so click here to get all the details and have fun!