Needle books

As promised, here's a photo of the needle books I was working on over Labor Day weekend. They are all made with wool-blend felt, which is very nice. There may be no going back to acetate fel for me! They each have 8 "pages" of white felt inside (actually two pieces of felt).

I had made some needle books before using the pattern in this book and sewing them on my machine, but I didn't have much luck keeping the spines straight and had to do a lot of trimming after the fact. Also, although my first one was very pretty, the flannel "pages" haven't held up very well and are fraying quite a bit. I probably should've pinked them, but oh well--too late now! I've become very attached to using a needle book, and I'm pleased with how useful they are. I only hope the recipients of these are just as pleased!

So, to make these, I followed the measurements in the book but reduced the number of pages. The felt is definitely more bulky than flannel. I folded each of the pieces in half to create a crease, then sandwiched them together and hand-basted down the center. Then I got out the embroidery floss and blanket-stitched each book's spine using three strands and pulling out the basting stitches as I went along. The whole process was really very quick and I easily whipped out this dozen, plus one for me, while watching television one morning.

These aren't completely finished, as I would like to add some embroidery to the fronts so that they are more personalized and cute, but the bulk of the work is finished. I've even filled them with:

• Quilter's betweens
• Sharps
• Gold-eye embroidery needles
• Glass-head quilting pins
• Flat flower-head pins

There are only three needles in each, plus 2-3 of each kind of pin, but still. These will be going to people who rarely, if ever, sew, so I figured a little bit of everything would be enough.