Monday 30 July 2007

Needlecase: Part 3

A good friend of mine who has recently had a sudden and rather dramatic conversion to knitting as a hobby has just bought herself a lot of needles, crochet hooks, stitch holders etc. She's also about to move to North Carolina (from Glasgow), so I thought that a gift with a practical underpinning and a slightly Scottish feel to it might be in order.

And so a tweed needle case was born...


This is the same size and basic design as the one I made for myself but the construction is better and the darker fabric shouldn't show up the marks so badly.


The fabric came from another friend who makes kilts etc and was having a clear-out of off-cuts, so the tweed had to be patchworked together.


The fabric was also a lot heavier that the stuff I used for my own case so I didn't need the wadding. The button was a stiffened leather one from John Lewis.

The biggest improvement though, was that I finally learned to use the walking foot on my sewing maching. My in-laws gave us the sewing maching as a wedding present and it came with 8 different feet. I know how to use 5 of these and haven't had a need (yet) for two, but the walking foot is something that I've been meaning to get to grips with for ages. It's just genius! No more will a stack of heavy fabric all want to go different directions at once. I can't believe that I didn't have a go with it sooner as it would have made my own needle case a lot simpler (getting the wadding to stay in place was very tricky)!

3 comments:

lynhem said...

Wow, i love it. I was impressed with numbers 1 & 2 also, but the fabric on this one is a real winner. I think its a wonderful gift for your friend and i am sure she'll love it. Woth scrolling down the page for!

Isobel said...

I love, love, love this tweedy kilt needlecase. What a perfect gift for your friend. If you are thinking about creating some to sell, let me know I would love to have one.

Anonymous said...

I would be happy to make a few of these if people would be interested in them...