Embroidered Needlebook

I am happily a part of the Sew-a-bration of Womanhood – hosted by Call Ajaire and The Shaffer Sisters! You can read more about the thoughts and feelings behind the series in this post ; many have taken the time to sew something for themselves but if you’ve visited before you know I have no problems sewing clothes for me instead of my son (see some of my garments here). Instead, I decided to make something for myself that I wanted but didn’t truly *need*. Often I’ll make do with something ugly or half-done because I’m more excited about other projects.. not any more!

I made a needle book for my Mom for Mother’s Day and it occurred to me that I’d been using a wad of scrap fabric for myself. All my floss shoved in a Ziploc, needle through a hunk of cotton, scissors tossed haphazardly where I thought the toddler might not see them. What a mess!

I found Rebecca of Hugs Are Fun when we were both on the plastic canvas blog tour, and thought I’d jump in on her ‘doodle stitching’ sew along. I pulled out this happy, silly underwater fabric and outlined the octopus. Subtle, simple, but for me it represented taking the time to make something lovely for myself!

The trifold design was decided after the embroidering, on a whim. I sewed in some felt pages and then tiny little velcro-ed tabs to hold the seam ripper and scissors. I have these beautiful, worth every penny Gingher embroidery scissors* but I seem to lose them at least once a week. Naturally, when I went to photograph the needle book I couldn’t find them… so I bought a cheapie substitute from Hancock Fabrics.

I actually did a second project for myself – a serger cover! A true before and after. My beloved Brother 1034d * serger has been living under an upcycle-able shirt for the past 2 years. No more!

However, I can’t get a decent picture to save my life because my sewing room is in the basement and very packed. I’m planning on taking a second stab at making one, and writing a proper tutorial for it, but here is the prototype!

SO that is my project sew-a-brating myself! I so genuinely appreciate the online sewing community and have made some true friends through blogging.