A New Needle BookI

My house has been invaded by needles.  What started out as a meager collection of simple needles appropriate to a new sewer grew when I was given a needle book several years ago.  That needle book had large eyes, blunt tips, and curved needles, all of which quickly became my favorite.  Recently, I think I have quadrupled the amount of needles in my house with the collection from my grandfather’s late girlfriend.  Then, I went and bought longer needles for weaving.

Where do I put all these needles?  How do I remember where I put them?

I take a great idea and make it better.

Remember that needle book I mentioned?  It was a small thing made of plastic canvas with a thinner strap to hold it closed.  The large needles it came with barely fit in it, and the strap long ago fell off.  So I made a new, larger version.

My new purple, white, and black needle book.  Yes, it looks blue, but I swear it's purple.

Plastic Canvas Needle Book

Supplies:

Plastic canvas

Yarn

Yarn needle

Felt

Sewing thread

Needle

Scissors

1 – Decide on the size you want your needle book.  I took my largest needle and laid it sideways on my cutting mat to get a feel for how big I needed it.  Once you have a basic idea, consult your plastic canvas and design idea.  Count out the squares and see if your design idea will work.  You may need to add more or less.  My needle book was twenty five squares high by twenty squares wide.

2 – Cut your plastic canvas into five pieces using your measurements. 

You will need:

2 main pieces for covers (twenty five squares by twenty squares)

1 piece for the spine – Make this piece as tall as your cover but only a few squares wide.   (Twenty five squares by two squares)

1 piece for strap – This piece should be as wide as your cover plus spine but only a few squares tall.  (Twenty two by three)

1 piece for the buckle (what holds the strap in place) – this should be about double the height of your strap.  (Seven by five)

3 – Decorate your canvas with yarn.  I chose to do a checked pattern with an outline (see below for instruction type things).  You could make it all one color, use stripes, whatever you wish your needle book to look like.  Use one continuous piece of yarn if possible.  If you do, you have less ends to worry about.  The inner side will be covered when done.

4 – Edge your canvas.  Pull your yarn up through one square and go over the edge of the canvas to come up through the next square.  Repeat this around the entire canvas to cover the edges.  When you are finished, weave in your end.

5 – Adding the strap.  On your back piece, center the end of your strap and hold in place.  Use your needle and thread to sew through the canvas to anchor your strap.  You could use yarn, but I like to use thread to make sure it is secure. 

6 – Add your buckle.  Lay out your front and back piece with a gap the size of your spine between them.  Center your buckle and move it slightly forward on your front piece over the strap.  Make sure you put the strap beneath the buckle.  The strap will cause the buckle to, well, buckle a bit.  You will want to keep that arch as you sew.  Sew down the top and bottom ends of the buckle with thread.  Go over the ends several times to secure.

7 – Add the spine.  Lay out your front and back piece on either side of your spine.  This time, use your edging yarn to whipstitch the spine to one of the covers.  Run your thread to the other side and whipstitch the other cover to the spine.  Tie off your yarn and weave in the end.

8 – Cut one to three pieces of felt just slightly smaller than the laid out book.  One piece will be sewn to the covers.  Any additional pieces of felt will become the pages of your book.  My original needle book did not have additional pages.  I added two extra pieces of felt to this new book. 

9 – If you have additional pages, stack all your felt pieces together and line them up.  Find the center of the stack and sew down the length of it, creating a ‘book’ of felt. 

10 – Putting it all together.  Center your pages in the middle of your spine.  Use thread to sew the bottom piece of felt to the cover.  Follow the edge and stretch your felt slightly if needed.  I went in and out along the first row of the plastic canvas.  When finished, knot and bury your thread.

11 – Put your needles in their new home!

 Now my large needles don't have to live in a plastic exile from all the others!

For the Checked pattern:

Columns are vertical.

Rows are horizontal.

With Yarn One, start at the second square down (first column, second row) and pull the yarn up and then down through the second square across (second column, first row).  Move to the third square down and repeat until you have yarn through the fifth squares (first column, fifth square and fifth column, first square).  Now, instead of moving down, you will move over.  Pull the yarn up through the second square in the fifth row (second column, fifth row) and down through the second square of the fifth column (fifth column, second row).  Continue through the third and fourth squares (fourth column, fourth square and fifth column, fourth square).  You have completed one square!  Move over five columns and continue.

With Yarn Two, repeat the same pattern above except begin at the opposite corner and move backward.  This varies the angle of the yarn.

With Yarn Three, begin at the space between the colors (column five, first square).  Pull your yarn up through column five, first square and down through column six, first square.  Pull the yarn back up through column five, first square and down through column six, second square.  Pull yarn up through column five, second square and down column six, third square.  Continue until you reach the end of the canvas.  Pull the yarn up through the last empty square and down through the square across from it, repeating what you started with.  Repeat this between all your squares.

Now where are we going to put all this?

A lot of us now have piles of new, or new to us, stuff now sitting in our living rooms, taking up space in the corner, and squeezed into rooms.  What are we supposed to do with all the gifts from the holidays?  If you have kids, you especially know how hard it can be to find a home for everything.

Of course, if you live a simplistic lifestyle, you might not have that problem.  I, on the other hand, still have a clutter problem. 

Luckily, this year didn't bring lots and lots of gifts, and most of big items go in the kitchen.  On the other hand, I am still trying to find space for the crafty items I picked up from the estate sale of my grandfathers late girlfriend.  She tended to store things like I do and had some really nice things. 

I picked up a sewing box, a storage container, and a couple baskets with scissors and other items.  It's always fun to go through old stuff, and I found some nifty vintage sewing needle books. 

I got something similar to these last year as a promo item from a group.  It was new but looked vintage.  I think these actual vintage items are much cooler.  Why don't places give out free needles anymore?

Inside the sewing box were even more needles, pins, bobbins, thread, and a few other things.

I'm not entirely sure, but I think this thing is supposed to go over the arm of a chair.  It has pockets on both sides and the center has a pin cushion, with even more needles and pins.

I don't think I'll be running out of needles for a long time.  All these things prompted me to do a bit of hand sewing over the weekend.  It's been a long time, but I'm getting back into it.  Now I just wish there had been a thimble in there somewhere...

Create: Stuffs for a Stuffed Mini-zine

I decided to make my new old cookbook the subject of a stuffed mini-book swap I am participating in. I'm excited about this book because I've never made one and it is such an interesting thing.  There are little pockets to tuck things into.  Here are a couple of the tutorials that I'm looking at to make my book.

So what do I think of when I think of stuffing a book about cookbooks?  A recipe card!

The size of the book will be 3x3 since it uses a sheet of 12x12 paper.  This recipe card, with a copy of the book's recipes is 3x5.  I'm not sure if it will be too big for what is supposed to stick out of the book, but it's my book and I can make it the way I want to, right? 

I took the published page and added it to the back of the recipe card.  It looks a little plain, but I like it.

I also made a bookmark and forgot to take pictures.  I think I might make a mini zine on how either substitutions or meat cuts.  The other will probably be what the mini-book is about.


It looks like all the tutorials are just pretty things bound in neat form, but I always feel like I need to make zines into actual books with stories and such.  I feel weird making it just pretty pictures - unless I were to collage it, then I guess it would be okay.  But to me it's not about being an art book, it's about being a book.

I'm hoping to be able to work on it more during lunch today!

Have you ever made one of mini-books?  How do you view zines - art or story?

Have a great weekend!

Inspire: Cooking from the Past

I'm going through a vintage phase, in case you hadn't noticed previously.  And I'm a terrible book hoarder.  Book sales are my weakness.  But what is even worse than sales are piles of free books.  I haven't figured out why, but my local library has a shelf of free books next to the door.  In another room they have books to sell.  I think they are all donated by various community members.  But why this free book shelf?  Are they books they can't get rid of any other way?

I thought so, but I have found a few beauties that I would have paid for.  I would have paid quite a bit for the one I recently found.

A Better Homes and Gardens Cook Book binder in fantastic condition.  I'm pretty sure it's from 1951 to judge by the copyright dates.  How freaking awesome is that? 

The binder even has a plastic thingie in between the rings that says Patent Pending.  I think it was supposed to help the pages turn? 

The pages and dividers all seem to be in pretty good shape.  Some of the dividers are fraying at the tabs from use, but they are in no danger of falling apart.  The pictures of food make me laugh and go eww at teh same time, but it's full of interesting information.  There are multiple pages of how to identify and cook different cuts of meat.  There is a page that tells you how to cook spaghetti noodles.  The recipes all seem to be no nonsense things and several recipes are on each page.

I'm over the moon with this find.  I want to use it, and I think I will use the homemade noodle recipe, but I don't want to run the risk of ruining it with a spill. 

Do you have a favorite cook book or regular book find?

Create: Vintage House

In my lovely new (to me) basket filled with vintage goodness was this little house.

The instructions that are with it are for a 'gingerbread' house and after comparing the two, I'm not sure this little house is supposed to go with those instructions.  But it's neat.  It is plastic canvas and yarn.  I didn't make this one but my plan is to make a roof for it. Wouldn't this be cute with little flowers around the bottom?

After I make the roof for this one, I think I will dive into my stash of plastic canvas and maybe make some actual gingerbread houses for xmas.  I think I'm going to have to make a house with flowers too.  The picture on the instructions so the house as an ornament, but I think it's a bit too big to hang on my tree, so I might experiment with making it smaller.  Too much goodness!