The almighty pincushion

Pin cushions. How many do you have? How many do you use?

I've acquired a few over the years, but not many. I'm believe that I have five pin cushions. Yep - only five. Ask me how many I can find at the moment?  That would be three.  No idea where the other two are.  I received one at my very first work shop with a famous teacher - it was with Eleanor Burns in 2000. We all received a nice pin cushion and I've used it for a long time. It's gotten misplaced - probably in a basket somewhere.

The next pincushion that I got was a magnetic one. I LOVE this pincushion.

Magnetic pin cushion

 This is my favourite and gets the most use.  It's easy to pick the pins up from the pin cushion and it's easy to throw them into the pin cushion and not have to stick them in.

I'm in a very focused sewing mode these days and I've got a cutting mat set up, a station for adding borders, an ironing station and my sewing machine. I'll show you tomorrow what it all looks like.  Sometimes, I need pins at the cutting station, sometimes at the border station and then I need some place to put the pins when I'm sewing.  Hence, I need THREE pin cushions. I've only got one! Wait - technically, I've got three.

I dug out this one. But it's a major fail. It was a gift and was NOT to be used as a pin cushion.  It was bought for the chair, the pin cushion came with it.  I dusted it off this morning and started to use it.  I hate it as a pin cushion.  The arms get in the way of putting the pins in. My pins happen to be different lengths and impossible to stick in.  I filled it with pins and I'll empty the pins and then I'll put it back on the shelf with the cute little bear who sits in the chair on the comfy seat.

Pin cushion in a chair

Here's how I use the pin cushions. I put one on the cutting table or the border station.  I pin the borders or the joins or whatever I'm pinning.  Remember, I'm not a big pinner, but I pin borders and joins.

If I only have one pin cushion, I have to take the pin cushion from the cutting table to the sewing machine so I can put the pins back in the pin cushion.  I forget and then have to run back to get the pin cushion.  But if I have a pin cushion in all three spots - as one empties, I will switch it with the full one at the sewing machine.

Empty pin cushion

 Now that makes a whole lot of sense. But I need at least two pin cushions to make that happen.  And I like the magnetic ones.

I did find my third pin cushion in the applique box.  It's used to keep my pins that are necessary to open up the glue bottle for applique so those pins are icky to put in a border. And I found some pins in the pin cushion.

Applique pin cushion

 OMG - I thought the little applique pins (the white head in the photo below) were short. Look at the other ones I found.  They are microscopic!!!!  I put all the pins back in the pin cushion and put it back in the applique box.

Very teeny tiny pins

 That leaves me with two choices today.  Take the time to find the other pin cushion, carry the darn pin cushion between the stations or go out and buy a new magnetic one.  Hmmmmm - let's see how annoyed I get as the day progresses.

There is good news as well.  I found the missing quilt top.  DUH!!!!   It was under my border station so if it were any closer to me, it would have bit me!!!!   No such luck on the little book.

The lost quilt top!

Making great progress today, spent loads of time with Miss Lexi this morning. Time to get to work!!!!

Have a super awesome day!!!

Ciao!