One more pincushion, trash and a block

I have lots of pincushions, tins and pin boxes upstairs in my longarm room, but most of them aren't at all interesting - just containers of big yellow-headed pins I use to pin quilts to the machine leaders. Only one is at all interesting, so I'll talk a little about it.

I made the eggplant from craft felt years and years ago when felt was thick and rich feeling compared to the paper thin stuff you find now. The pattern was from an old McCalls Needlework and Crafts magazine - anyone besides me remember those? I started buying them when I was about 12. I made very few things from their patterns, but spent many long hours drooling over page after page of wonderful things. I bought every issue and saved every one until sometime in my 30's. I imagine this pattern was from the mid-1960's. I made the first eggplant after we were married in 1969, and wore it out so I had to make another, which is also starting to show it's age. These pincushions were called "vegetable pillows", and there was also a bunch of celery, an onion, a tomato, a carrot and others. I made the celery for the neighbor across the street within a year or two after we moved into the neighborhood. Wish I still had the patterns - they would be great in felted wool.

I guess someone asked about trash, too, as several bloggers have posted pictures of theirs. You don't find much in my trash in the way of fabric scraps since I save crumbs and cut the rest into squares, bricks and triangles. I use tissue containers for my trash - they work wonderfully! Downstairs I have one on my cutting table, one at the sewing machine, and one on the ironing board. Upstairs I have one by my bobbin winder, one at each end of the longarm table at both the front and back of the table and one on my Pfaff cabinet. We have lots of them because we both suffer from allergies, and they are so easy to toss - box and all - when they become full.

Yesterday I finished the prep on the remaining two appliqué blocks for Heirloom Stitches, and finished the stitching on the small 6" block. Then I sewed the borders onto the auction quilt for Northwest Medical Teams so I can finish my appliqué where it overlaps the quilt body from the border. I cut into crumbs the scraps from the two months' of Heirloom Stitches blocks. Doesn't sound like that much now that it's written down, but it felt like a full, busy day! Today I have the baby quilt to quilt for a customer, and then I'll make the binding for Broken Dishes. Hopefully I can get it machine stitched onto the quilt today so I can do the handstitching while watching the last week of Mariners baseball for this year.

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Gratitudes:

1. Homemade sourdough bread
2. A perfect day of beautiful fall weather
3. The housecleaners that come every other week - the best gift I've ever given myself
4. Jim Shore figures for fall
5. A basket of gourds and Indian corn

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