Quilted Needlebooks

Once upon a time, someone who will remain nameless, created a bunch of needlebooks for a get together and I was one of the lucky recipients!

And it was awesome.   I mean, I adore hand made gifts, like any crafter, but this needlebook has been in constant use since I got it.   It has pockets on the front and back, and I keep a pair of needles and whatever threads I feel like in the pocket.   I also have a magnet on the pocket so that the scissors don't move around too much, and just because, really.

I like to either pre-thread a bunch of needles and keep them there for use (on a project that uses a lot of one color) or, if I'm doing something else, I might use part of a thread, tuck it and snip it, and just park the needle with the rest of the thread for later use (I would do this a lot with Thanksgiving Fairy since I didn't want to waste the overdyed threads).

My current book in use.

But what I really decided was that I needed multiple needlebooks, so they could each live with a project forever and ever and I wouldn't have to change out the needles or thread, or even worse, try to function without a needle book.  So I bugged dear friend, she gave me the tutorial link from Sew She Sews and I eventually went to town.

Most of the books are made from my favorite left over fabric materials.

The two Cthulhu fabrics were left over from when I was making bags to use as "Monster cups" during Arkham/Eldritch Horror,  the puppy fabric is left over from a duffel bag I made (it was supposed to be for Mona's stuff when I traveled, but is so huge that I use it for my weekender).  The grey fabric is probably my favorite fabric of all time that I should probably just buy the entire bold of from the quilting store (seriously, so much love)

The wine themed fabrics are just fat quarters I picked up.  I had actually made a 7th needlebook, it had grapes/grapevines as the cover, but a friend saw what I was working on (I was attaching the snaps) and she fell in love, and I'm a sucker, so I gave her that one.

I just did simple lines for the quilting on most of them, realizing one book in why you really, really want to get that walking foot out.   But I couldn't just do a regular stitch on two of them.

On the dog fabric, I just couldn't bear to stitch over the cute Mona-esque puppy face (which ended up there by accident, I didn't even fussy cut or anything), so I went with a diagonal in both directions that left the puppy face bare.

And on this grey fabric, which I'm so in love with, I decided to go a little bit wavy because it seemed to fit the motion of the fabric much better.

So that was my big project for the past week or so.   I "need" to get back to Zodiac Mystery since it's now March (I bet I can finish this month's bit while binge watching House of Cards this weekend), and I was working on a different project at home before that (another box on BoInk), and I just wanted to have the needlebooks for the projects ready.

And just for some fun, here's my #WIPWednesday - he's filling in a bit.