I have a love/hate relationship with my standard tomato pincushion. I've had it since I was a teenager. It’s great for pins, but the mess of threads hanging out of needles jammed into the little attached strawberry. . . well. . . not so much. I’m always looking for things to create that are functional. When I was flipping through Alicia Paulson’s Embroidery Companion and saw a needle book, it was an ‘a-ha’ moment. I decided to take her basic idea and make it my own.
I downloaded a ‘K’ monogram from Mary Corbet’s Needle ‘n Thread, and sized it to fit in the bottom right corner. To accommodate the monogram under the tab closure, I decided to make the book itself slightly larger than the one in the Embroidery Companion. Finished size is 4 x 6".
I’ve been wanting to try printable Sticky Fabri-Solvy by Sulky. It was a success. So much easier than trying to transfer the monogram with carbon paper. I highly recommend it. I printed it, cut out the square with the monogram on it, stuck it on the felt and started embroidering! Who could resist their motto, “Create with confidence.”?
DMC Embroidery thread colors are: 372, 732, 744, 935 and 3740. The hoop was my grandmothers — possibly not the best choice to embroider on thick wool felt as there is no adjustable clasp, but I love using a hoop that she held. It’s wonderful with thin fabrics as there is an inset band of felt on the outside of the inner hoop. I used it carefully to not stretch the felt.
When the embroidery was complete, I gently washed the Fabri-Solvy off. I used as little water as possible because I didn’t want the felt to shrink. I then stitched around the cover with matching Gutermann thread on the machine and stitched the felt pages to the cover with a seam down the center.
To finish the book, I used a button from my grandmother’s stash, and hand stitched around the border of the cover with the yellow embroidery floss. This is the inside of the top of my grandmother's shaker sewing box. Watch out tomato. There's a new pincushion in the works.
Karin
