Needle Minders Galore

Oh the excitement of things arriving from Etsy! 😂 All eight of my recently purchased needle minders arrived this week, the last four of them finally showing up yesterday. Eight? you may say. Well, yes. You see, I have very little impulse control when it comes to cute stitchy accessories, and frankly, I couldn't narrow it down any further than that. I did well enough to leave the other nine I fancied in my Save for Later section.

But most of all, I needed them! And when you see how cute and useful they are, you will wonder no longer at it. Plus, they all reflect my personality in different ways, which is fun. One of my very favorites is this little umbrella with the dangling heart charm from a shop called Kimsneedleminders (the next three are from there as well):

I love the color, the size is perfect, and I adore rainy days (probably because we get so few of them here in Arizona — absence makes the heart grow fonder).

And what goes perfectly with a rainy day? A nice pot of tea! Hence this one:

It's just so glitzy and cute. From there, I moved on to my love of traveling to new places:

This vintage luggage set makes me think of a trip to Paris in the 1950s. But my favorite place to travel is anywhere with a beach, so obviously I needed a pearl in an oyster:

And then I had to pay homage to my love of fairy tale stories with the glorious little pumpkin from Gina's Unique Boutique (the three following are also from there):

And if you have a pumpkin, you obviously need a coach:

This is my other favorite one. It's just so delicate and pretty, and I adore the colors. 

But lest we forget, I also absolutely have a sarcastic side:

And I'm very much a feminist:

Now, reproach me if you will. They are all utterly fabulous. And practical, too! Look how well the pumpkin and coach hold the muslin over my Jacobean piece:

With these little beauties in place, I will no longer have to worry about this covering dropping onto the floor and leaving my beautiful needlework ruthlessly exposed to dust. What, you may ask, did I do with the other six? Well, obviously, I needed to hold the tissue paper down on my Japanese embroidery piece:

The ones on the corners stay put, and I remove the middle ones when I want to work on the piece. They are great for keeping the tissue paper from blowing off when I have the fan running. And I basically have the fan running 345 days a year because it's Arizona and you just always need a fan going.

With these eight, that now brings my total to 10. I actually use the other two for — wait for it — minding my needles! 😂

The very first one I bought was this cute little hedgehog from Jessica Long Embroidery:

I'm not normally into animals when it comes to my embroidery, but this one was just too cute to resist. Jessica is actually a good friend of my sister and had invited us over one day. I was buying one of her floral kits anyway, and one thing led to another, soooo.... (Have I mentioned the impulse control issue?)

But srsly, this made a huge difference for me — no more rusting needles leaving dark spots on my clean white linen. The other one I use for minding needles is this cute hot air balloon from the Kitschy Stitcher:

This one reminded me of my childhood in New Mexico. They have a big hot air balloon festival there every year, and my dad used to take us. Plus, I just love flying. I've gone paragliding and hang gliding, flown in a sailplane with my dad, and taken ultralight flying lessons myself. Alas, going up in a hot air balloon is still on my bucket list.

But all that aside, you can see that needle minders are both practical and cute. They serve multiple purposes, and they're a nice way to reflect a little bit of yourself into your stitching accessories. I'm probably going to become a collector of these because I just love them. Well, with 10 of them, I could perhaps already be considered a collector.