Needle felted St. Lucia

Well, I finally did it. I attempted to needle-felt my first object/person: St. Lucia. For you Scandos out there you're already familiar with St. Lucia. For those non-Scandinavian folk allow me to explain.

St. Lucia Day is celebrated each year on December 13. There's coffee, pastries and a girl who dresses up in a white dress, red sash and a wreath of candles on her head. I'll do a post later with all the nitty gritty details closer to the actually holiday. But for now I just want to share my first needle-felted doll.

Here is St. Lucia at the start, basically a white mass with a red sash.

Next came the wreath:

After that came some leather thimbles to prevent myself from getting stabbed with the felting needle again. I was afraid I would eventually stab myself so hard that blood would get on St. Lucia's white dress (gross, I know).

Then came coloring her face and hands.

And the last step I reached was adding the blond braids on either side. I'm debating how to do her face, if at all. Sometimes adding a face makes it look kinda creepy (at least when I do it...). Maybe I'll do just eyes? What do you think?

I also need to figure out how to do the candles for her wreath.
Felt is a difficult medium to work with for small items, like candles. I'm trying to decide if painted toothpicks (cut down) would look ok? Any suggestions?

I'll be giving this to my mom when it's finished for Christmas. She's an avid collector of St. Lucia dolls. I'm trying to get all my Christmas gifts made while I still have ample time on my hands. We'll see how far I get. :)